The High Price of Cheap Labor - Immigration's darker side

NRO ^ | 0122/04 | Jack Dunphy

[gubamyster]

ping

[PersonalLiberties]

to bad people cannot pool together and purchase the border land, and police it themselves since the govt. doesn't want the hassle (I know, this is not realistic - so please don't jump down my throat) just an opinion

[WayneM]

It is a real shame that the situation is such that the officer cannot even use his own name for fear that he will be punished somehow for speaking out against a criminal class.

It is an even bigger shame that some "conservatives" seem to have no problem with this, and wish to reward these criminals - along with their enablers and co-conspirators - with an amnesty program.

[MissAmericanPie]

Well, here's the thing, being able to identify who is coming in, implies an ability to keep them out. How is a government, whose agenda is to over run the native population with an illegal invasion, suppose to look innocent if at the same time if they have the ability to know who is entering the country?

[rovenstinez]

And a view from the South. Here in Mexico, we suffer because we have single moms trying to raise teen age boys who need their dad! Of those I personally know who went to the USA through the back door and NOT the welcome mat, 80% of them had criminal records. Paying $5.00 to get an appointment at the Embassy and $100 for an interview to get a visa.....passports cost $80 US dollars. It is just much more simple to sneak in. (Even the US President wants to give them legal status!)VISAS need to be easily acquired, and let the good guys in, and nail those who come in with false IDs. Send them back home to be fathers to their kids.

[spodefly]

BTTT

[newgeezer]

On a related note, I keep hearing that these illegals are filling jobs that Americans "don't want" or "won't do." I hear it from liberals and conservatives alike.

Well, that's just a lot of cr*p. It's not that we don't want or won't do the job; it's just that the employer isn't willing to pay whatever it will take to get someone to accept the job.

Close the borders. Now, you can't get someone to clean your toilets, slaughter your pigs, or dress your chickens for $5.50/hour? Double the wage offer, and don't stand in front of the door, lest you get run over by the stampede of people who allegedly "don't want" or "won't do" those jobs.

Nah, the real problem isn't the jobs. It's the standard of living we've come to expect and demand, thanks to cheap labor the world over.

[netmilsmom]

Something also has to be said for the gov't regulations, employer taxes and such that goes into employing American workers. When one compares the cost of a worker (unemployment cost, paperwork costs etc.) with a Migrant worker, the employer would not only have to pay more but it would cost more than the amount in the difference in pay. This is the reason why the "Guest worker" program may not work. Hire someone who is now a worker with paperwork or an illegal with none. The illegals will still run rampant.

[Gritty]

In its editorial, the Wall Street Journal says smugly, "We could always next build a Berlin Wall along the 2,000 miles of U.S.-Mexican border, or deploy the 101st Airborne, but we doubt Americans would be morally comfortable with either."

Yeah? Try me!

That said, we don't need a low-tech cement block wall with guard towers and machine guns. We can do a 95% job with hi-tech, the military and choking off the demand for illegal labor.

But we can never do it while sitting around wringing our hands in anguish we might offend somebody who shouldn't be here and doesn't deserve to be here in the first place - nor their smug enablers!

[PersonalLiberties]

that is so true. The employer's share of the taxes, plus workers's comp, unemployment, it adds up. Plus, with the white collar job, here US students, for the most part, has student loans to pay off, so need to make above minimum wage. Does the foreign worker have student loans? But it is definately that we are not willing. I too get so mad when I hear that. Living in TN as I wrote earlier, a lot of manufacturing has been stut down since I moved here, about 6 months. Those people are looking for jobs. Cleaning or farming would be fine to them.

[BiffWondercat]

From what I've read here from folks and farm owner's on the border, they are barely allowed to protect their own.
Nothing is going to change until we get super-pissed and
sream 24/7 to our 'leaders'! Hell, that won't even work anymore. Anybody got a few billion so that I can 'contribute' to a few poli's?

[marron]

I keep hearing that these illegals are filling jobs that Americans "don't want" or "won't do."

You are right, that is just more elitist thinking. They assume that because they wouldn't take the job that you or I, or your brother-in-law that can't find a job, wouldn't take it.

The fact is that when they say Americans don't want those jobs, they mean that they won't take the job at the price and conditions offered.

There is a powerful fallacy driving this that low wages are good for the economy. The reverse is true. America is what it is because traditionally labor was very expensive.

Expensive labor is what allowed families to live on one paycheck. Expensive labor is what drove modernization of manufacturing methods. Expensive labor is what allowed my older relatives to work those same fields that foreign workers are in today, when work was slow and they couldn't find anything else. They would load the kids in the car and travel cross country following the harvests. It was enough to raise their kids, at least until other things opened up.

Expensive labor is why America has always been fairly egalitarian without laws enforcing it. A man could make enough to live by the sweat of his brow, but couldn't afford to pay someone else to do his chores. Thus it was customary even in well-to-do homes for people to cut their own grass, do their own laundry, and fix their own cars.

It is also the reason Americans were mostly practical people, who knew how to do for themselves. They couldn't afford to have work done, they learned to do it themselves. But they earned enough to live on one wage.

[Siamese Princess]

Expensive labor is why America has always been fairly egalitarian without laws enforcing it. A man could make enough to live by the sweat of his brow, but couldn't afford to pay someone else to do his chores. Thus it was customary even in well-to-do homes for people to cut their own grass, do their own laundry, and fix their own cars.

It is also the reason Americans were mostly practical people, who knew how to do for themselves. They couldn't afford to have work done, they learned to do it themselves. But they earned enough to live on one wage.

I never thought of it that way -- you are right. In third world countries, even a middle class family will have a servant or two to help out -- labor is so cheap. Thanks.

[PersonalLiberties]

"There is a powerful fallacy driving this that low wages are good for the economy. The reverse is true."

Thanks for the thought provoking post.

[FITZ]

Here in Mexico, we suffer because we have single moms trying to raise teen age boys who need their dad!

It's very common for the illegals to send money back to their wife and kids for a little while --- but they soon forget them ---- and when the money stops coming, there is desperation. Then the mom usually packs up and goes north to be some domestic servant raising other peoples' kids --- not her own or to work in a maquila.

That's one of the reasons Mexico is having skyrocketing crime rates. Their families are being destroyed and when you see many illegals, it's not their own families they're with but some live-in girlfriend on welfare. It seems more rare than common to hear of an illegal still supporting his kids after 2 or 3 years of being here ---- many just cut off all connection in a fairly short time.

A real temporary guest worker program would be much better --- the guest worker could come up by bus or plane for just the harvest season --- 3 months max ---- return to the family and village and with the money he brings back, invest in his home and neighborhood.

All this massive migration is bringing about a lot of instability --- some towns have half their population gone --- and families and neighborhoods that once provided stability and security are gone for good.

[PersonalLiberties]

Here is an interesting article I found today. Regarding globalism.

http://www.vdare.com/roberts/mfg_jobs.htm

[marron]

The article points out that part of the cost of labor is the fact that employees make workmen's comp claims against their employers, whereas Chinese workers don't.

We have to figure out what it is we want. We put a system in place to protect workers, to allow workers to recover some of their losses when they are injured, which also puts pressure on the employer to provide a safe workplace, and then gut the system by allowing the jobs to be outsourced to a place beyond the reach of US labor law, or we employ workers who are not eligible to claim workman's comp.

So really we are just kidding ourselves. Either we are serious about enforcing our workplace laws, and we shut off illegal employment, and close the doors to imports made by workers who don't have those rights, or we get rid of the laws we aren't willing to enforce.

What we are doing now is just a pantomime. We enact laws which will never be enforced, since the workers in question are illegal workers, or Chinese.

[Nanodik]

We can do a 95% job with hi-tech, the military and choking off the demand for illegal labor.

No need to go to the expense. We can take the low-tech way and fence in a 200m mine field along the border. It works everywhere it's tried.

[rovenstinez]

Mexico has also an illegal problem. They deported 81,000 Guatemalans, 58,630 Hondurans, 217 USA citizens, 28,000 from El Salvador, and on, and on. Which shoe does this foot fit_ http://www.inami.gob.mx/paginas/estadisticas/enedic03/rechazos.mht