Hiring of Illegal Workers by Baird Sparks Little Uproar : Child care: Senators signal Justice Dept. nominee won’t be harmed by doing what many working parents do.

Atty. Gen.-designate Zoe Baird is embarrassed today because she did what millions of other upper-middle-class American working parents have done: employ an illegal immigrant to care for her child at home and, along the way, save money by not paying the required Social Security and other taxes.

Indeed, it is one of the nation’s worst-kept secrets that such violations of immigration and tax laws are committed with scarcely a second thought by the most law-abiding, civic-minded parents--model citizens who would not think of breaking other laws. No precise figures exist, but experts believe that a large percentage of the estimated 3 million illegal immigrants now residing in the United States are employed in child care and domestic work.

“It’s a great hypocrisy,” said Sen. Alan K. Simpson (R-Wyo.), author of the 1986 law that bars Americans from knowingly employing a worker who is in the country illegally. “These are often the same people who babble about human rights.”

So far as the attorney general-designate’s future is concerned, her prospects for confirmation appear unharmed by the disclosure. Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee that will open hearings Tuesday on her nomination, said that Baird volunteered information about the case in her first meeting with him and that he does not think it will block confirmation.

Biden’s reaction was echoed by the committee’s ranking Republican, Sen. Orrin G. Hatch of Utah, and by Simpson, another panel member. Simpson said that he has talked to Baird about the matter and will not oppose her.

In large part, the absence of political uproar over Baird’s conduct reflects the fact that “millions of working women across the United States” have done the same thing, said Madeline Janis, executive director of the Central American Refugee Center in Los Angeles.

Baird and her husband, Yale constitutional law professor Paul Gewirtz, hired a Peruvian woman for two years to care for their son--paying her somewhat less than $250 a week. In addition, her husband was employed for a shorter period to act as a driver for the family. Baird and Gewirtz paid the back taxes, and a penalty, in a lump sum on Jan. 5, after Clinton transition lawyers reversed legal advice they had been given not to pay the taxes. The amount of the taxes and penalty could not be determined.

One measure of how few employers like Baird pay the necessary taxes is the fact that an estimated 2 million employers should be subject to household employee tax, according to Census Bureau figures, but the IRS receives only about 500,000 filings annually, meaning that only one in four are in compliance.

“It’s extremely widespread, particularly in the bigger cities,” said Demetrios Papademetriou, a labor and immigration expert at the Carnegie Endowment.

Patty Siegel, executive director of the California Child Care Resources and Referral Network, estimated that among California families with children under 1 year old where both parents are working professionals, more than one-third rely on child care workers who are in this country illegally.

Working parents hire illegal immigrants for two overriding reasons: convenience and cost, although money was presumably not an overriding factor for Baird, who earned more than $500,000 a year working for the Aetna Life & Casualty Co.

Immigrants come cheap and they are willing to work long hours--even longer than the typical hard-working, upwardly mobile middle-class couples who employ them.

“If you take away the illegality, it’s the most effective form of child care you can have,” said Bradley Googins of the Center for Work and Family at Boston University. “For a busy two-worker family, what could be finer than at-home, low-cost, wrap-around coverage?”

Plus, there is relatively little risk that these employers will ever be called to account because the Immigration and Naturalization Service does little to police American homes--although the agency, which Baird would oversee as attorney general, has stepped up enforcement in a few areas, including Los Angeles.

John Brechtel, assistant director for investigations of the INS district office in Los Angeles, acknowledged that even with a crackdown, his office is handling only two or three cases a month--and the penalties are hardly staggering for affluent employers. “I don’t have exact figures, but it’s generally been two to three cases a month, and fines have ranged from $250 to $1,500,” Brechtel said.

Yet by winking at the illegal practice, experts said, American society may also be paying a heavy price in other ways. Not only is there evidence that many of these workers are being exploited, but illegal workers may drive down wages for child care workers and discourage American citizens from taking such jobs.

Furthermore, some see a nagging question of priorities.

“You are basically bringing someone into your house that you know relatively nothing about to take care of your most precious commodity,” said Googins. “As a society, we pay people more to take care of our pets than our children.”

On the other hand, when working parents begin looking for in-home child care, they often find that very few legal residents will apply for the job. Russell C. Brower, 32, of Ventura, said that he became extremely discouraged recently when he advertised for someone to care for his 5-year-old son.

“I kept coming across people with emotional problems or with very unstable work histories or people who didn’t have the documents to work in this country,” Brower recalled. “It’s a horrible situation.”

Professional headhunters report that about 50% of the people who respond to their ads are illegal residents. “I can usually tell as soon as I talk to them on the telephone whether they are legal or not,” says Irene Lannon, whose Nannies for You service operates in Baird’s hometown, New Haven, Conn.

While parents might prefer to hire legal American citizens, Lannon said, they soon discover that it is easier to find a mature woman care-provider if they chose an illegal worker. Many American citizens seeking child care jobs are in their early 20s, some of them women taking a year off from college.

In addition, Marian McIntosh, owner of Maid Marian, another nanny referral service, said that an illegal worker will often accept $100 to $200 a week less than an American citizen. For an entirely legal live-in nanny in many parts of the country, experts said, the going rate is $250 to $300 a week.

Whenever parents claim that they cannot find a legal citizen to fill the job, labor experts usually reply that the parents are demanding too much for too little pay. “You can find good workers if you are able to make it a real job with real wages,” Jane O’Grady, legislative representative for the AFL-CIO, insisted.

Racism also rears its head in some cases. Papademetriou said that he has known a number of people in Washington who simply preferred hiring illegal immigrants over American black workers.

Parents who hire an illegal immigrant are violating more than the U.S. immigration laws--a misdemeanor that might bring a maximum fine of $3,000 upon conviction. They are also violating the Social Security provisions, federal and state tax statutes and worker compensation laws by failing to withhold taxes and contribute to these funds.

In 1986, Congress specifically rejected an exception from the immigration laws for domestic workers--a provision that was widely known as “the Beverly Hills” exemption.

Many parents who hire illegals justify their action as an act of kindness to a foreign person who is striving to achieve the American dream. Yet sometimes it is an obvious excuse for exploitation.

McIntosh said that she recently received a call from a 21-year-old French girl who was paid a mere $50 a week to tend four children, often during long absences by the parents.

“A lot of that goes on,” observed McIntosh, “and it makes it difficult for legitimate individuals who have chosen this as a profession. In that market, they cannot compete.”

Times staff writers Ronald J. Ostrow and Robert. L. Jackson contributed to this story.