Angie Craig: “I approach this part of the debate on a critical piece of legislation with due caution. I say that because of my respect…”

“I approach this part of the debate on a critical piece of legislation with due caution. I say that because of my respect for my colleagues from Arizona and from the State of Texas and the work they have done as members of the Judiciary Committee and the due diligence they have always put into this critical issue. I believe there is a component missing from this debate that speaks to the need for this country to be in a continual and progressive mode of training and shaping a permanent stable workforce. Unlike all of the demographic studies of the last decade or two, there is something upon us as a nation that we have never experienced before. I am a 1945 baby. I am 60 years old. I am just 1 year ahead of a great class of people--77 million Americans--called baby boomers. They, similar to myself, because of their age, will soon be leaving the American workforce. There are demographic studies out there today which suggest that if we are to sustain a 3.5- to 4- percent growth economy, we have to have about 500,000 new, non-U.S. citizen workers in our workforce on an annual basis. Yes, we will have ups and downs in the economy. We always have. But in the last downtrend we had, in the final days of the Clinton administration and the early days of the Bush administration, it was about 3.5 million in the downturn before it came back. In the 5.2 million jobs created since that time, one-third of them have been claimed by foreign nationals.…”