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04/25/2008: "Los Angeles 'is a Third World city'"

Los Angeles is becoming a "Third World city" with immigrants making up
half its workforce, says a new study.

A third of immigrants have not graduated from high school and 60 per
cent do not speak English fluently, the Migration Policy Institute
found.

It said this left immigrants ill-equipped to fill California's
fastest-growing occupations, such as computer software engineering and
nursing. The organisation added that as the so-called baby boomers reach
retirement age, a similar pattern will spread across the US.

Ernesto Cortes Jr, of the Industrial Areas Foundation, a think-tank that
specialises on social change, claimed Los Angeles was at a crossroads.

"The question is are we going to be a 21st century city with shared
prosperity, or a Third World city with an elite group on top and most on
near poverty wages?" he said.

[ What measures would allow the first possibility? The immigrants are not going to be turned into skilled workers. ]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/04/23/wla123.xml