来源：《华盛顿邮报》
原文刊登日期：2022年4月5日
The economy of United States has bounced back swiftly from the pandemic lows — aided by more than $5 trillion in government aid — and companies are trying to hire enough workers to keep up with the surge in demand for everything from waffle irons to cars. The nation has more than 11 million job openings and 6 million unemployed.
在超过5万亿美元的政府援助的帮助下，美国经济已从疫情低点迅速反弹，公司正试图雇佣足够的工人，以满足从华夫饼熨斗到汽车等各种产品的需求激增。全国有1100万个职位空缺，失业人口为600万。
This imbalance is giving workers and job seekers tremendous power. Pay is rising at the fastest pace in years, workers are quitting jobs and finding new ones at record levels, hourly employees at companies such as Starbucks and Amazon are starting unions, and companies are offering flexibility and benefits that would have been almost unthinkable pre-pandemic. These are welcome trends.
这种不平衡给了工人和求职者巨大的权力。工资正以多年来最快的速度增长，工人们正在以创纪录的水平辞职并寻找新工作，星巴克和亚马逊等公司的小时工正在组建工会，企业正在提供大流行前几乎无法想象的灵活性和福利。这些都是值得欢迎的趋势。
But it’s also the case that the U.S. economy is still operating with significantly fewer workers than before the pandemic. The labor force participation rate, a measure of how many civilians 16 and older are working or looking for work, is at 62.4 percent — down a full percentage point from before the pandemic. Much of this decline can be explained by two factors: a surge in Americans retiring and a massive drop in legal immigration under President Donald Trump that has yet to turn around.
但另一个事实是，与大流行之前相比，美国经济运行中的工人数量仍然显著减少。劳动参与率——衡量有多少16岁及以上的人正在工作或正在找工作——为62.4%，比大流行前下降了整整一个百分点。这种下降在很大程度上可以用两个因素来解释：美国退休人数的激增，以及唐纳德·特朗普总统任内合法移民人数的大幅下降，而这一趋势尚未扭转。
President Biden insists he is doing everything he can to lower inflation and keep the economy strong. But he has yet to take an obvious — and much-needed — step to fix the legal immigration system.
拜登总统坚称，他正在尽一切努力降低通货膨胀率，保持经济强劲。但他还没有采取明显的——也是急需的——措施来修复合法的移民制度。
There are 9.5 million people waiting for their legal immigration paperwork to be processed by the U.S. government. These include people seeking work permits, asylum, green cards and citizenship. It’s an unprecedented backlog. Some people trying to renew temporary work permits are waiting so long that they are losing their right to work legally, meaning they lose their jobs and income. In all, people waiting for employment authorization or reauthorization make up about 1.6 million of the backlogged applications. They are ready and able to work, yet government bureaucracy is in the way. This is a major loss for the U.S. economy.
有950万人在等待美国政府处理他们的合法移民申请。其中包括寻求工作许可、庇护、绿卡和公民身份的人。这是前所未有的积压。一些试图延长临时工作许可证的人等待的时间太长，以至于他们失去了合法工作的权利，这意味着他们失去了工作和收入。在积压的就业申请中，等待就业授权或延长授权的人约占160万。他们已经准备好并且有能力工作，但是政府的官僚体制是一种阻碍。这是美国经济的重大损失。
It’s obvious how to fix this. As Julia Gelatt of the Migration Policy Institute put it, “More funding and more staffing is the clear way to address all of these backlogs.”
如何解决这个问题是显而易见的。正如移民政策研究所的茱莉亚·吉拉特所说，“增加资金和人手是解决所有这些积压问题的明确途径。”
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services — part of the Homeland Security Department — finally announced some steps last week to help clear the backlog. They include allowing more immigrants to pay up to $2,500 for faster action, and aiming to limit processing to no more than six months. USCIS also implied it would automatically extend work authorizations from 180 days to a much longer period for applicants who had a work visa and are waiting for a renewal.
国土安全部下属的美国公民和移民局上周终于宣布了一些措施，以帮助清理积压的工作。其中包括允许更多的移民支付高达2500美元的费用以加快审批，并将处理时间限制在不超过六个月。美国移民局还暗示，对于持有工作签证并等待续签的申请人，将自动将工作授权期限从180天延长到更长的时间。
Companies are desperate for workers. Millions of legal immigrants want to work in the United States. This shouldn’t be so hard to fix.
公司迫切需要员工。数百万合法移民希望在美国工作。这应该不难解决。