Posted on 11/30/2002 8:03:21 AM PST by B4Ranch
All the illegals are flocking in to take low-paying jobs while better-paying jobs are diminishing in this country every year.
I'm sorry I come across as defeatist, but that's the way I see it.
And I'm not sure it is morally ethical to keep them out, even though I don't like what is happening in this country.
Sooner or later the economic bubble will burst because it has been propped up artificially for too long. Then what?
THEN WE FIGHT HARDER! This is OUR home!
The demand cycle heats up. Need new line workers. Union start rate 15-18/per hr. + benefits after 3 months.
Hire trainees. Local HS Grads and street corner loafers. they have, I have observed: (A)No physical ability, i.e. an 8-hour day is killer! (b) No reading and writing ability which translates into a profound inability to follow written instructions (c)No shift discipline, i.e. ability to show upn time for shift or 5 0r 6 days in a row. (D) It also goes without saying that they have had no mechanical training, which gave older workers a modicum of industrial "common sense." They in some cases must be tiaught to use a screwdriver, and the accident rates among new hires are very high.
Out of 30 or 40 hired, 3 or four make it through 90 days. Older workers take up slack and love it for the overtime.
Slow-down after 3rd quarter. Sack all the new people who are left. High pay, low productivity. Cheaper to pay old-timers (heavy attrition among them anyway) who are left, some overtime.
Next time the cycle heats up, managers hire temporary workers: $10-13 an hour paid to an agency, no benefits. In many New England scenarios, these new temps are going to be illegal Mexicans, or equivalent. The fact that they cannot speak English at first or not read and write is no more of a supervisory problem than using HS Grads. They will be on time. They will work a full week. Come next cycle, throw'em out. Start over when you need them.
Sooner or later, some corporate people logically deduce that it would be cheaper to build a maquiladora on the South Side of the border and leave it closed three months a year.
Soon there is no work in the village and we are left with a huge illegal population and every one is poor. It comes as a shock to the union jocks who gave in to a two-tier wage system: i.e. Good wages for them and benefits: Poor wages and no benefits for temps.
Pardon the condensation, but the pattern is the same all over New England. This country, if my region and experience are valid examples, is not ready for globalization. Our younger people are not properly prepared.
We desperately need to improve the preparation of our "MTV" people, in school and on the job with a training wage setup so employers can afford to train them for a couple of years. They need it. They are simply not prepared mentally or physically, to perform in a business setting.
Because of the short-comings of today's younger people (which is certainly NOT THEIR FAULT), illegal aliens (now instantly deliverable where and as needed by 18-wheeler) are taking over vast swaths of the bedrock industrial jobs. Stopping this destructive trend will certainly take border discipline, but we also have to do away with the economic need for them on this side of the border by training our own people.
It ain't gonna be easy. There is no leadership coming from either party, or even the unions on this.
1....An immediate moratorium on immigration waivers and new applications in the pipeline until major changes are made and the system re-vamped.
2...Under the new Homeland Security Dept., we need to create a massive border security program. We need to expand the border patrol by 150 to 200 thousand members.
We need to do this under the civil service programs that bush has been touting. We may need to re-establish the draft for this purpose. Not for the military, but for a cadre of our young people to protect our borders, while at the same time, giving two years of service to the country.
We can train and board them at un-used military bases. We can give them educational opportunities under the GI bill and a small but adequate allowance for someone who is provided three squares and base housing.
In return, they can get their civil service requirement out of the way, get educational benefits and the experience of training and military discipline. Some may want to continue in a military career.
What say you?
I'm 44 years old but you sold me. Where do I sign up?
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