But... but... Unions!
It’s all a big cost-shifting scheme.
Their wages are lower than citizens’ wages, because some of the costs (free medical, dodging taxes with stolen identity, schools for their kids, etc) are shifted from the wage payer to the taxpayer.
Correction: Illegal aliens have been ALLOWED to take over every trade. The door is open and they walk right in.
In fairness, so have all of us.
Now we get to the rut of the issue. Charging $45 per hour in the late 80s (roughly $80 per hour inflation-adjusted) had to be due to unions...and so people responded...and that has us where we are now.
So, I credit the UNIONS for this nightmare that California has become.
Is there any place in the USA where this is not true?
DUH! This was being screamed about fifteen years ago and someone just now is realizing it?
I have lived in SoCal all my life and he is absolutely correct on this, a lot of my friends are in construction. Illegal Immigration has destroyed the entire Middle Class in this godforsaken tarnished state.
My dream is to see ALL OF THE DEPORTED and then laugh as the Slave Masters can NOT get a damn thing built in this State.
Same thing has happened in Virginia.
Virginia was low crime, Republican and English speaking before George W. Bush was President.
Only in California? In my brief stint on a framing crew in Orlando and then in Charleston, every last one of the workers except me were Brazilians, and the boss was an illegal Russian. I got $9 an hour picking up discarded scrap wood and other odd jobs. They got $12 or $15 depending on skill level.
From $45 an hour to $11 an hour. Yep, that’s MORE than half.
Whistle blower? The only people who need a whistle to be alerted to this fact is Stevie Wonder and ignorant fools living a bubble world.
When we started closing down trade/vocational schools we opened the door to cheap labor.
Builders hire one trade contractor who’s legal and he hires all illegals.
Go after the businesses!
And yet, California housing costs are still the highest in the country. So much for the argument that illegal labor results in lower costs.
Outside of union areas, try to find a roofer that speaks English.
When I got my roof replaced a few years ago, the crew was all born Americans. Foreman was Hispanic, but third generation.
He was not found of illegals either.
Drive by every construction site here in CA, and it is obvious the illeal Mexicans have taken over. Think twice before entering any recently constructed building here in earthquake country.
In LA, working class blacks once were heavily employed in the construction industry, the illegals pushed them out.
Illegals are also taking over the trucking industry.
Mr. Trump has a huge task ahead of him to reverse all this.
Ironically, they’ll probably be building the wall, which will be fairly useless until they take away the incentive.
Except for FEMA and Army Corps contractors. They are all white and from everywhere other than here.
Quotes on rebuilding modest homes in the fire areas of Sonoma county range from $450-$650 a square foot and that is without plans. I cannot imagine the cost if the labor was 40% higher.
The article is accurate. The crews are largely Mexican. If you are white, you cannot get hired especially if you don’t speak Spanish. And talk about racism; you had better not put together a crew of illegals from different parts of Mexico. They need to be all from the same region or they will kill each other, or at least fight all the time.