What would be useful to me is for someone directly involved on the business side of CA trades with respect to inputting personal experiences. Are these numbers accurate or not?
I have personally experienced illegals in the trades largely working at lower rungs of the wage pyramid with the paying customers largely lower income themselves. At the highest level of the trades, the employers are less likely to be complicit with employing illegals because of liabilities. As an extreme example, several decades ago, there was an explosion at a Texas petrochemical plant during the yearly maintenance shutdown. 47 people were killed, mostly the contract maintenance workers. The root cause is non-english speaking workers and their supervisors had no clue from their safety orientation what lock-out tag-out was nor with the daily task specific instructions were. So, the idiots cut off a padlock from a valve then opened the valve thus flooding a tank with combustible gas that promptly blew up. The petrochemical and refining companies forced reform on the regional safety council to play it straight regarding basic and advanced certifications and this radically weeded out lots of illegals by itself from this higher level within the wage pyramid. Still though, illegals get into the plants largely through maintenance contractors, mainly via larger crews working shutdowns.
For Gods sake, ya don't talk to the greedy employers. They're the same SOBs who've hired millions of these criminals. Hello??
You're the same guy who believes millions of illegals have not significantly affected wages and employment the work place? Yep, that's you.
How about some truth? Mr. Hoot?
I know of many cases. Lemme tell ya about this one case where an illegal alien machine operator who always drank alcohol on breaks in the back ally, returned from break one day and was so drunk he started urinating all over the rubber mat he stood on, while all his illegal co-workers rolled on the floor laughing.
Did the greedy azsholes who hired him fire him? No! This individual was sent home and was authorized to return to work the following day.
Ya know why Mr. Hoot? Take a wild guess.
Btw Mr. Hoot, there are many other cases just as alarming as this one. Lemme know if ya want to hear more.