The View | I asked new immigrants to the US why so many Americans are dropping out of the job market, and here’s what I learned

I am filing this column from the United States, as a bruising election year continues, replete with violent scuffles and shouting matches, particularly at political rallies for Donald Trump. Among the most popular insults being hurled this election season is: “Get a job!”

Embedded in this phrase is a macroeconomic assumption: that American economic malaise is not a top-down problem, but a bottom-up one. There is work for those who are willing. So get a job!

This would seem to contradict another Trumpian tenet – that the Chinese or the Mexicans are stealing American jobs – yet it also makes sense in a twisted way. Anyone spending time in a US city will notice that “foreigners” occupy many positions. This even as the labour participation rate of worker-age adults remains depressed at around 63 per cent– i.e., as many Americans leave the workforce by choice or because they gave up seeking.

Why then are so many Americans opting out of the job market, even as so many fresh migrants can be seen managing convenience stores, checking people in at airports, running restaurants and hair salons, or filling the ranks at hospitals?

I decided to ask immigrants their opinion on this matter. This is a slightly risky business. First I had to ask the dreaded “where are you from?” question –which is apparently a loaded, racist “microaggression” under modern communication rules. Luckily, however, my interview subjects were chatty about their backgrounds and their journeys. And interestingly, they shared the same opinion as many native-born Americans I have also quizzed in my recent few weeks in the country: Americans are too soft.