American teen employment has dropped 20 percent from the late 1980s, in part because more and more immigrants have flooded into the market to displace native-born kids from jobs in percentages far higher than on adults, according to the Federal Reserve.Really, it's sad that this is even news. Of course, having a huge pool of immigrants ready to take jobs at half the wages, show up on time and work all day in the sun and humidity is going to suppress teen employment.
"The displacement effect of immigration on the employment of younger persons is much larger than on the employment of prime-age adults," said the September 2014 report, "Labor Force Participation: Recent Developments and Future Prospects."
The Fed report is the second to blame immigrants for taking jobs "native" teens would normally fill and come as new media reports show teen employment down this year.
However, most of those media reports don't cite immigration as a cause or even cite last year's surge of over 70,000 illegal youths crossing over the U.S.-Mexico border.
A July 3 New York Times report on the issue, for example, didn't mention immigration even though the Federal Reserve last fall and in 2012 put a blame on immigration.
That first job is an important step for many American teens. It's the first movement into adulthood; responsibility of arriving at the job on time, doing a days work, often under less than ideal circumstances, and getting paid real money for doing so.
I can't tell you how many people I've heard say something like "I got a job as a brick layers assistant, and it spurred me to go back to school." Sadly, those opportunities are becoming less.
One thing the Republican candidates need to make absolutely clear in the next campaign is that one of the costs of the Democrats open borders policy (and that's what it is), is the suppression of American jobs, with teenagers, blacks, and Hispanic hardest hit.
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