Ronda Fox finally got news last week—three months into planting season—that the federal government approved her application to employ more than a dozen temporary foreign workers for her landscaping business in Aurora, Colorado.
Meanwhile, in Centennial, Colorado, Phil Steinhauer faced the same challenge for his landscaping business. But his application for 150 temporary foreign workers was selected through the federal lottery in the first round, and his hires were in place when the season started.
As The New York Times reports, what the two business owners have in common is their reliance on the H-2B visa program, which allows unskilled workers from Mexico, the Philippines, Jamaica and dozens of other countries to take temporary nonfarm jobs in the United States.
Debates over using foreign workers for seasonal labor have been as constant as the calendar. But a tight labor market and the fraught politics of immigration have added new urgency to the issue in an election year when Republicans and Democrats are wrestling for control in Congress.
Unions and immigration opponents argue that the program suppresses wages and deprives Americans of jobs. Advocacy groups contend that foreign workers are often exploited. Employers insist that the refusal to face up to the worker shortage just encourages businesses to hire undocumented immigrants at below-market wages.
But this year, the conflicts have intensified. Record low unemployment rates have left landscapers, restaurants, hotels, amusement parks and others scrambling for low-skilled seasonal labor. Changes in the rules governing the program caught many employers by surprise, threatening the crab industry in Maryland and tourist havens in Maine.
