Free Republic

U.S. Sen. Susan Collins has sent letters to the heads of the U.S. Department of Labor and the Citizenship and Immigration Service, asking what their agencies have done to address problems in foreign-labor programs that were detailed in a recent Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram investigation. Collins wrote in her capacity as chairwoman of the Senate's Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. It's the first official call for answers from federal authorities since the newspaper's series ran in late September. The three-part series detailed concerns about the H1B visa program and the permanent green-card system. H1B visas let skilled...

The jobs crisis and the GOP Posted: March 10, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern © 2004 Creators Syndicate, Inc. President Bush and his advisers are puzzled and worried. Economic liftoff took place right on schedule in July when the tax cuts took effect. In the last six months of 2003, the economy blazed along on a growth path of 6 percent. But where are the jobs? Last week's jobs report, with hundreds of thousands giving up the search for work, and manufacturing jobs disappearing for the 43rd straight month, jolted the White House. What is going on? They're calling it a...

White males are suffering from long-term deterioration in lifetime income growth and job security, according to a study, "Divergent Paths," just released by the Russell Sage Foundation. The study by four academic sociologists and statisticians compares the wage growth and job security of young white males who entered the labor market in the late 1970s and early 1980s with the experience of a previous generation of young white males who entered the labor market in the mid-1960s. The study finds that 90 percent of young white male workers can expect to have lower lifetime wage growth than the previous...