KQED's California Connected: Immigration Special

KQED ^ | 4/22/2004 | KQED/KCET/KPBS

[risk]

Immigration and Agriculture: Hiring Hands

Most of us have heard about the challenges farm workers face, but what about the people who recruit these workers? Meet a licensed farm labor contractor who can't find enough legal workers to fill his crews each day.

• Immigration and the Changing Face of Rural America, The Migration Project, UC Davis

• "Why Didn't Collective Bargaining Transform California's Farm Labor Market?," Promise Unfulfilled: Unions, Immigration, and Farm Workers, reprinted by the Center for Immigration Studies, advocates for restricting legal immigration

• "Farmers: Let Our Workers Stay," CBS News

• "California farm labor by the numbers," Sacramento Bee, figures

[risk]

It's pretty obvious to me that agribusiness is responsible for a tremendous amount of our illegal immigration. What are we doing about the demand side of this problem?

Why should ordinary Americans who can barely afford to buy their own housing be sympathetic to large landowners who are using illegal immigrants to harvest their food?

No blood for lettuce!

[risk]

ping - More Kalistan Connected "balanced" journalism.

[ETERNAL WARMING]

According to Fair.org, only 2% actually work on the farms. So what are the rest up to besides bleeding the taxpayers dry?

[risk]

If so many are illegal, then how do they know?

[Choose Ye This Day]

Many [not all] of the other 98% are working and paying taxes, using false names and social security numbers. They do pay some income taxes; they also are paying payroll tax for Medicare and Social Security (which means that they are paying into a system from which they will never withdraw).

Don't misconstrue this. I'm definitely NOT pro-illegal immigration. If they're going to come here, they should follow the rules and do so legally. I just think most people forget that illegals ARE paying some taxes while here.

[jeremiah]

It would seem to me that farmers should talk to the legislators, and get the child labor laws arranged so that the youth of America can make some money, and learn how to become useful. There was a time when the young people actually did something other than hang out, play video games and watch tv. It was called summer vacation, and the reason was for these youngsters to be free to work the crops, help dad at the ranch etc.

[BfloGuy]

If the entire supply of illegal, immigrant labor were to be stopped tomorrow, agri-business would set about mechanizing its operations.

The same technologies that have led to the drop in manufacturing jobs would be applied to agriculture (just as they were in the 20th century) and we'd carry on.

[risk]

If food prices were a little higher, farmers could afford to pay adults the wages they need to find these jobs profitable. That's capitalism, isn't it? Supply and demand. Right now these big land owners are receiving corporate welfare from the government in the form of a blind eye to a flat out invasion.

[glorgau]

Meet a licensed farm labor contractor who can't find enough legal workers to fill his crews each day.

Can't find enough workers at the price he's willing to pay.

[Susannah]

As food prices continue to climb, the welfare clients will need more food stamps.

Californians voted to limit benefits to illegals, but the government did it's own thing. There's one thing illegals and people working "off the books" in California can't escape though: the rising sales taxes and fees.

[AnimalLover]

Bump

[HiJinx]

[SAMWolf]

Can't find enough workers at the price he's willing to pay.

Bingo

[B4Ranch]

Construction work pays more than harvesting crops. Perhaps President Bush should allow another 10 million into the US to see if we can find some illegals who don't like construction work.

[4Freedom]

What I believe you're forgetting is that what illegal aliens pay in NET tax, after everything's all said and done at the end of the year, is what's important.

What illegal immigrants pay into the system, on average annually, isn't even close to what they take out, annually. According to the Center for Immigration Studies, illegal immigrants are on average a NET drain of 10's of billions of dollars on our economy annually.

The Earned Income Tax Credit was bumped up to $1,000 per child. A lot of illegal aliens are collecting it, buying homes under federally funded programs and having their children educated and receiving health care, for free, at U.S. Taxpayer's expense.

If we rid this country of all the illegal aliens, employers would have to pay American citizens a higher wage to get the job done. Those employees would then be in a high enough tax bracket that they actually paid net income taxes.

I believe I read that 44 million workers didn't pay any NET income taxes this last year.

Not only do I believe that most working illegal aliens fall into this category and received a full refund, if anything was with-held in the first place, they also received a whopping big Earned Income Tax Refund check.

Send them all back, we don't need a single one of them.

[Choose Ye This Day]

I don't like any freeloaders, illegal or otherwise. There are plenty of home-grown sponges who don't pay any net taxes; we don't need people illegally crossing our borders and adding to their numbers.

I don't know how many illegals file a return. Some probably crank up the number of exemptions as high as they can so less is taken out of their check each week ("Sí, yo tengo diez niños."), and then they don't bother filing, since their SS is fake. I don't know, though. That's just speculation on my part.

[skeeter]

What illegal immigrants pay into the system, on average annually, isn't even close to what they take out, annually.

Not to mention their earnings do not benefit our economy as most of it is sent home - hence no multiplier effect.

The ONLY benefit from illegal immigrantion goes to corporations (some trickling down to investors) & business owners using them.

There's NO REASON why the rest of us shouldn't be screaming at the tops of our lungs that something be done to stop it.

[TLI]

Many [not all] of the other 98% are working and paying taxes, using false names and social security numbers

The notion that they are paying taxes is very misleading. By using false names and SS numbers they know they will never see any of the money that goes in, so they simply claim 4 - 6 exemptions and pay in practically nothing. They are "paying taxes" but in reality they are probably getting nicked for less than 2 - 3 % of their gross pay.

Pretty sweet deal . . . and now the libs want to give all of them full benefits as if they were really "paying taxes."

[american spirit]

INVADING - OCCUPYING - BREEDING

[Brownie74]

.....agri-business would set about mechanizing its operations.

Bingo!! Move to the head of the class.