RE: This: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1614760/posts
ICE and CBP team up to seize 70 kilos of cocaine with a street value of more than $1 million
Posted on 04/21/2006 5:20:33 AM PDT by kinghorse
RE: This: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1614760/posts
ICE and CBP team up to seize 70 kilos of cocaine with a street value of more than $1 million
he was making about 25 to 35 cents per pallet, or about $6.50 an hour.
And since they're illegals, I doubt anyone is paying taxes and SS on that.
I agree, the taxation is awful (which is why we're a 1 man crew!), but I think we could put most of the blame on the employers.
I found the pictures I told you about on the IFCO Systems post you had. You may want to note these.
There's one factor that your math doesn't include.
Arresting 1,187 illegals per day on a consistent basis would significantly shrink the under-the-table labor market. Arresting their employers would reduce it even further.
The shrinking demand for labor would encourage a huge number of those 11+ million illegals to self-deport. It would also cause many who are still in Mexico to give up the idea of jumping the border.
Sorry, but it's taxes, regulations and over-indulged American workers that cause this phenomenon in the first place, and lax enforcement and bought off politicians that allow it to continue.
Employers are stuck between the proverbial rock and the hard place:
They have a responsibility to their bosses (Upper management and shareholders) to maximize and improve profits. They will do this in any way they can: automation, cost cutting, reducing payrolls, etc. At some point, it becomes an imperative to take advantage of every comeptetive and profit-squeezing tool you have available. Their own jobs depend upon it.
The risk of being caught (and prosecuted/punished) in a scheme like this is pretty low, if the figures I saw yesterday are any indication (les than 3% prosecution rate in these cases). And even if you are caught, the current level of enforcement doesn't scare anyone. The fine (which is usually what happens, no one ever gets arrested or has their business seized) gets passed on as "simply the cost of doing business".
As for the workers, a good many of us are spolied rotten because we've had it relatively well in the past. It was easy to have our cake and eat it too when we didn't have to compete with anyone, but those days are long over.
Somehow we have to strike some kind of balance: if American workers don't learn to make do and perhaps control their own behavior (spending more than they bring home and demanding more afterwards), and management doesn't learn that you don't increase profits at the margins, but by offering superior products and services, then the only solution for business is to continue to cut corners at the expense of the American worker --- This is why use of illegal labor is becoming a common practic ein the first place.
Here's an idea: how about we make it virtually impossible for anyone to get a college loan in this country. How many would-be college students do you think would take $6.50 to work their way through school breaking up pallets or spend their summers picking lettuce for a comparable wage?
A good number, I'd say.
So, why don't we make it difficult to go to college and bring back the old "working my way through school" routine? Employers will get the cheap, entry-level labor they require, Americans will be employed, gaining experience, and paying taxes, and everyone should be happy. Except the spolied brats who have to engage in physical labor in order to study "Lesbian Dwarves of the Impressionist School" but they would need to grow up at some point in time anyway, no?
"They were able to do things that other companies just couldn't do." "
Simple. All you have to be is a whore and a traitor.
Why is a "bounty" necessary? Motivated people can do it for free and save the money.
Start with the Fortune 500. I'll bet 495 of the 500 hire illegals. So let's put them all out of business so their competitors can get that business.
Oh! Does it count if they sub-contract for the illegals through some sham contracting firm? I've been a "contractor" to the Fortune 500 most of my life. But everyone describes me as working for the client company, not for the contracting firm. A much higher percentage of my fellow contractors are illegals than the percentage in the true employee base.
So when Walmart contracts with illegals to clean its stores and doesn't hire them directly, should Walmart be snitched on and closed? Or just the contracting firm?
When Fortune #1 and Fortune #2 thru Fortune #499 contract with IT consulting firms that hire illegals should we let the Fortune 500 slide? Isn't that like going after some mafia loser and giving the crime boss a pass?
Maybe the illegals are refugees. Remember that a couple hundred thousand of the N.O. refugees are illegals. You don't hear much about them. A full week before the disaster they saw the National Weather Service in Spanish that I saw on Telemundo and Univision explicitly stating that the levees would break and everyone should evacuate N.O. before that happened.
They didn't wait for Naggin-Blanco-Brownie-Chertoff to get them buses. They don't depend on government/ politicians to "help" them. They helped themselves and got the hell out of there.
The MSM doesn't like stories about poor people who take care of themselves without the help of government.
Does that take into account that maybe 1,183 illegals enter the USA every day?
Since 40% of 11 million illegals came here legally and then their permission ended, imagine what happens if the number of "temporary" legals doubles? That means that when their "temporary" status ends, they become illegal. If 40% of 11 million is 4.4 million and it doubles then 8.8 million illegals then will be here because their "temporary" permission ended?
I suspect you'd agree that on all sides of this issue there are half-baked ideas with no concept of the current reality, nor of the unintended consequences of good intentions.
Curiosity. I'm surprised 47% had valid SSN. Of the 53% how many were invalid and how many were mis-matched? A mismatched SSN can be one of two types
1) The immigrant or his ID provider took a random number that just happened to belong to someone else.
2) The immigrant used the valid SSN of his spouse, child, cousin or other acquaintance.
Note that a SSN purchased by an illegal from an employee of the Social Security Dept is a valid SSN. Dem patronage has sold a lot of them in Chicago. How common it is in other areas I do not know.
I just like to know these little trivia points.
I don't want to pay anymore for pallets. I like IFCO's low prices. Can we please let these Mexicans stay if they want to so I don't have to pay more for pallets? My American babies need the money.
Thanks
I know these homeowners. Even when they can't vote, they put Bush and local GOP yard signs in their lawn. Every single one of them has FICA, medicare, Fed and State income tax withheld from their paycheck.
Most lack health insurance (as do my family and I). We lose much less work due to (feigned) illness then those with bennies. We visit medical providers much less often. We (in IL) take much less government aid of any type than do other parts of the population. In my suburb, while home values have skyrocketed (due to demand exceeding supply) the crime rate has gone down, DUI and auto crashes have gone down, domestic disturbance calls have gone done. Life is just a little short of perfect.
Of course, my suburb was known as Hangover Park due to the type of people who lived in it before the immigrants took over.
The ironic thing is that as immigrants become "Americanized" they increasingly take unemployment comp and other "bennies" that their non-American value system despised. Especially in the Mexican culture, to be a "hombre" is to "work". To be unemployed (for whatever reason) is a disgrace to the entire extended family that is the safety net of the culture when there is no government safety net.
Better yet just close down any business found to be employing illegal aliens and allow their law abiding competitors to benefit from the additional business.""
I like that idea, but you have to prevent them from opening up again ujder a different name, opening new bank accounts, etc.
I saw a few ICE press releases (and posted them here) where some corrupt law firms were setting up illegals with close to valid paperwork work (IDs).
I seriously question your expertise on the thinking of both illegals and their employers. How many do you know well and have discussed this with them? In IL there used to be "raids" of employers, deporting the illegals, fining the employers.
When word of the "raid" spread, illegals lined up to fill the vacancies and were hired by the employer. In most cases, the "raid" was triggered by an illegal who had a personal beef with one of the illegal workers and then got drunk and called the INS. In a couple cases it was the Dem politician who called the INS because the employer would not pay the customary bribe.
Those frequent raids during the Johnson-Nixon-Ford-Carter era stopped with Reagan, who believed in the free market.
their not being allowed to take needed medications into some of the men and stories like that.""
So do I get to guess that some sort of "assistance" got them their medications, also?
Another leak in a very big boat.
BUILD THE WALL!!!!!
Back in the early 70's I was part of a community organization that had a very interesting protest.
For many years the Chiago machine had sold "valid" SSN out of the Social Security Office and "valid" Drivers Licenses and "valid" voter registration cards to illegal European immigants, but not Hispanic immigrants.
Oscar Lopez (Puerto Rican, not immigrant) and other friends organized a thousand people to "demand" that Hispanics receive equal opportunity. They "won" their demands and the illegal Hispanics could now buy their "valid" IDs just like the Europeans.
That resulted in a major shiift in the political dynamics of the community, the ascendancy of Cong Gutierez, etc.
With 53 plants across the country, the nation's largest supplier of recycled pallets...
Probably one just down the street from you, let us know how you like the work.
All pallet recylcers use Mexican illegals (OK, there's that one on the West Side of Chicago that uses Lithuanians). The competitiors who just can't understand the success of this company are full of it.
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