1986 - Immigration Reform and Control Act

The Immigration Reform and Control Act was signed into law by President Ronald Reagan on November 6, 1986. The act reformed the prior immigration law and made it illegal to hire or recruit illegal immigrants, including those who did not possess lawful work authorization, and required employers to attest to their employees' immigration status. In contrast however, it also granted protection and immunity to certain illegal immigrants who were already residing in the United States prior to January 1, 1982 and had been living there continuously.

The reformation was pushed through Congress by Kentucky Democratic Romano L. Mazzoli and Wyoming Republican Senator Alan K. Simpson. The new law criminalized the act of knowingly hiring an illegal immigrant and set financial and other penalties for employing illegal aliens with the idea that lowering the chance of employment would reduce the amount of illegal immigrants coming into America hoping to find jobs. This new law also introduced the I-9 form to ensure that all employees presented documentary proof of their legal eligibility and resident status to be employed in the United States.

There were a few loopholes to this new law however that critics instantly jumped on. The first was that the time period that was set on legal status allowed 2.7 million individuals to easily gain access to legal eligibility for jobs in the United States even though they were previously illegal immigrants. This amnesty brought about many protests from those were not included in the set time frame. Also, the new law caused employers to be more selective about their hiring process, often discriminating against workers who seemed foreign, which resulted in a downturn of employment for minorities across the board. Not only was hiring down because of the IRCA, but wages were also being lowered to compensate for the risk of hiring foreigners. Another big change was that the hiring process became more indirect. Employers turn to subcontractors, in which employers could "hire" a specific number of workers who contractually agreed to work for a certain period of time and at a fixed wage. The loophole in this was that in using a subcontractor, the workers that the employer picked up would not be considered employees, and thus the employer was able to dodge many liability issues. And on top of this, the worker's wages were reduced even more because the subcontractor gets to keep a small portion of whatever the worker makes.

Seeing as how Asian-Americans are still a minority, this greatly affected the ability for Asian-Americans to immigrate to the US and also find work that paid a reasonable wage. For immigrant Asians, this was difficult because most immigrate in order to make a better wage than back at their home country and send money home. For resident Asian-Americans this just made it more difficult for them to find employment just because they look foreign and are still a minority.