In an allegation likely to raise controversy among Asian Americans, Kwong asserts that wealthy Chinese are exploiting their own, urging their workers to be submissive with appeals to racial solidarity. They are able to convince workers that Chinese, being a minority group, have great disadvantages in competing with American mainstream businesses. Kwong also notes that assimilation is especially difficult for the smuggled-in immigrants because they face even more prejudice than other people of color, because of their illegal presence coupled with the labor contracts burdening them. Even established Chinese Americans detest the new arrivals, forgetting that at one point, all Asian immigrants were regarded with derision. In the late-19th century, Congress decided to exclude Asian immigrants.
History repeats itself.
The conditions they toil under make a mockery of the already low American labor standards, the most regressive among the advanced industrial nations. The author says American consumers are partially responsible. Our interests as consumers who like cheap restaurant service and affordable clothing conflict with our ideals as citizens of a democracy of equals. Ironically, policies which punish companies for hiring undocumented people make it all the easier for employers to abuse them. Because undocumented individuals are neither protected by basic labor laws nor organized well by unions, they continue to have a negative effect on domestic pay scales.