Answering a question with a question isn't an answer.
See: #440, as you've been asked a question, repeatedly.
Posted on 04/24/2006 4:24:45 PM PDT by HEMICRASHBOX
Illegal immigrants in this country are threatening a massive boycott on May 1, purportedly to demonstrate they are so essential that the U.S. economy would shut down without their labor. On the contrary, such a boycott will expose the lie expressed by President George W. Bush in Cancun, Mexico, that they are "doing work that Americans will not do."
According to the Pew Hispanic Center, illegal immigrants make up less than 5 percent of the U.S. labor force. If every one of the 20 million illegal aliens in our country plays hooky from his job on May 1, the overwhelming majority of those same types of jobs will be worked by millions of U.S. citizens.
All over America, U.S. citizens will flip hamburgers in fast-food shops, wash dishes in restaurants, change sheets in hotels, mow lawns, trim shrubs, pick produce, drive taxis, replace roofs on houses, and do all kinds of construction work. Americans are quite willing to work unpleasant, menial, tiresome and risky jobs, but not for Third World wages.
An employment service in Mobile, Ala., recently received an "urgent request" to fill 270 job openings from contractors who were hired to rebuild and clear areas of Alabama devastated by Hurricane Katrina. The agency immediately sent 70 laborers and construction workers to three job sites.
After two weeks on the job, the men were fired by employers who told them "the Mexicans had arrived" and were willing to work for lower wages. The U.S. citizens had been promised $10 an hour, but the employers preferred Mexicans who would work for less. Employment agency manager Linda Swope told The Washington Times: "When they told the guys they would not be needed, they actually cried ... and we cried with them. This is a shame."
Swope said that employment agencies throughout Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi all face similar problems because an estimated 30,000 men from Mexico and Central and South America, many in crowded buses and trucks, came into those three states after Hurricane Katrina, willing to work for less than whatever was paid to U.S. citizens.
Meanwhile, President Bush signed the Katrina Emergency Assistance Act extending for 13 weeks the unemployment benefits to U.S. citizens displaced by Katrina. Thus employers get the benefit of cheap foreign labor while you and I provide taxpayer handouts to workers whom the government allowed to be displaced from the jobs they were eager to take.
There is no penalty on employers who replace U.S. citizens with illegal immigrants at lower pay. Homeland Security even announced it has suspended the sanctioning of employers who hire illegal immigrants, and President Bush suspended the Davis-Bacon Act, which requires local contractors to pay "prevailing" wages.
A study published by the National Bureau of Economic Research reported that the surge of immigration in the 1980s and 1990s lowered the wages of our own high school dropouts by 8.2 percent. The surge has accelerated since that report was issued. The Congressional Budget Office reported that 60 percent of Mexican and Central American workers in the United States in 2004 lacked a high school diploma.
The Kennedy-McCain-Bush guest worker plan would import more uneducated, unskilled workers, and thereby deny our own high school dropouts (of whom we have too many) the opportunity to get started in building their lives in the labor force. U.S. citizens are threatened that the cost of lettuce will rise precipitously if we don't continue to import Mexican agricultural workers. But a farm worker gets only 6 or 7 cents out of a $1 head of lettuce, so even if the pay doubles, consumers would hardly notice the difference.
On the other hand, the costs taxpayers are forced to pay for social benefits for low-paid workers are astronomical. The National Research Council reports that an immigrant to the United States without a high-school diploma consumes $89,000 more in government services than he pays in taxes during his lifetime.
Low-paid illegal immigrants obviously pay very little taxes, but they cash in on all sorts of benefits paid by other taxpayers, such as schooling for their children, emergency health care, housing subsidies, Earned Income Tax Credit and law enforcement. If the 20 million illegal immigrants are legalized, they will also become eligible for Medicaid, and that's a real break-the-bank prospect.
These figures don't even count the rapidly growing underground economy, in which millions of illegal immigrants are paid off the books in cash. That enables both employer and employee to avoid paying taxes, and enables employers to avoid paying workers' compensation, unemployment compensation, and assorted other taxes.
If the Internal Revenue Service collected all the taxes that should be paid by the underground economy, our current budget deficit would disappear overnight, according to a Bear Stearns study released in 2005. The Americans who pay taxes are giving a free ride to those who are not paying taxes, and a 7-cent increase in the price of lettuce should not be on our worry list.
While "foreigner" may be an easy, and inclusive, word to use, it a generalization and inadequate.
To be more accurate, you need to use illegal, native born, and legal, to include naturalized and/or green card holder. Additionally, thase protest may have been compriseed mainly of hispanics, but there were non-hispanics participating also. Recognize that these protests were proceeded by an Irish protest, over which Hillary presided. Although it is not a totally accurate word to use, "the underclass" should be considered.
You should also recognize that those that participated are only a symbol of a much larger group, that includes non-hispanics.
As recent articles posted here have stated, the question is whether the protests will translate into political activism-increased political power. One such article pointed out that not only has a hispanic voter registration drive begun, but also one for asians.
No doubt the demographic shift of the last 25 years, which will continue into the future, is significant. But more significant is the republican's(some republican's) willingness to throw it away.
What else have you got?
I am extremely proud of the fact that I, one person, have been able to lead a larger group into a blind alley with so many replies and views.
It is proof positive how easy and effective it is to make the zealots "backlash".
Don't flatter yourself. Keep bumping the thread though. It helps.
Answering a question with a question isn't an answer.
See: #440, as you've been asked a question, repeatedly.
I"m still trying to figure out, do you hate me or the Mexicans worse?
House guest season begins here on Friday and I will have to curtail my activity here. I'm trying to get prepared for that.
I don't mean to alarm you, in Sept I'll be back in full force, making fools of you all.
"I don't mean to alarm you, in Sept I'll be back in full force, making fools of you all."
No, thanks, but I chose to grow-up.
About a hundred?
And just think, all it took was just one quisling with a magic flute. It really is amazing.
"It is proof positive how easy and effective it is to make the zealots "backlash".
Well, and I know this won't surprise you, we look at it a little differently. We thought it was a slam dunk that if we annoyed you sufficiently, you were bound to keep bumping this thread to its up front and center position for more and more loyal Americans to see. We do owe you for that--so thanks.
Loved that one, nic. Very funny.
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