Not starting businesses because they know they will be undercut.
Was run out of business by cookie-cutter contractors who hired illegals. Brother had to lay off his crew which hurt about as bad as downsizing his own home and eventually moving out of a nice area.
Before leaving, he went back to school and got his PhD and is now teaching economics at a small Presbyterian College. Good for him, not so good for the young men who lost their first good paying job.
We paid a premium price for the best shingles we could buy.
The company owner said he had operated with American born guys but they didn’t always show up for work.
There's something to what you said. Back in the late 90s to around 2006 I ran a small construction company. Around 2000 I started noticing a huge influx of Mexican and Central Americans on job sites. Also noticed how I began winning fewer and fewer bids. I was paying my guys $15-20 per hour. These "southerners" were working for $6-10. I just couldn't compete with that. Given that the vast majority of the "southerners" were in fact illegal aliens I would not hire them strictly because of ethical considerations. But most of the contractors I knew did, because they just could not compete otherwise.
I saw the handwriting on the wall, found another line of work and never looked back.