Posted on 05/14/2018 7:45:13 AM PDT by GIdget2004
Eddie Devine voted for President Donald Trump because he thought he would be good for American business. Now, he says, the Trump administrations restrictions on seasonal foreign labor may put him out of business.
I feel like Ive been tricked by the devil, said Devine, owner of Harrodsburg-based Devine Creations Landscaping. I feel so stupid.
Devine says it has been years since he could find enough dependable, drug-free American workers for his $12-an-hour jobs mowing and tending landscapes for cemeteries, shopping centers and apartment complexes across Central Kentucky.
So for years he has hired 20 seasonal workers, mostly from Guatemala, through the U.S. Labor Departments H2-B guest worker program. Importing these workers for a few months cost him an additional $18,000 in fees and expenses beyond their wages, which must be the same as he pays American workers. But thats the only way he could serve his customers.
Restrictions on guest-worker visas, which began during President Barack Obamas second term as immigration became a hot issue for conservatives, have gotten worse under Trump. And its even more of a problem now that the unemployment rate is the lowest it has been in years.
Devine says he lost a $100,000 account because he didnt have enough men to do the job. Hes worried he may be out of business next year if things dont improve.
He isnt alone. Cuts in H-2B visas are hurting small businesses across the country that cant find Americans willing to do hard, manual labor: Maryland crab processors, Texas shrimp fishermen, and Kentucky landscapers and construction companies.
We live and die by these visas, said Ken Monin, owner of Monin Construction, which specializes in home additions, roofs, decks and garages.
(Excerpt) Read more at kentucky.com ...
The author of the article should take it to its logical conclusion. Blame President Trump for not legalizing slavery thus allowing the business man to lower his costs further...
Well, no.
I’m saying that the dregs of the American labor pool won’t get’er done.
You advocate wage inflation that will not result in getting landscaping accomplished.
Locally as real jobs open up, those who will work and are working for landscapers will take the better jobs. Landscapers will never be able to compete with wages.
You don’t understand, and in all your years here you have been too stupid to understand when people with much better employees explain it too you. Below a certain point, all your wages offered will only be enough to bring in addicts who have been fired from job after job.
You deserve what you are getting because you are too cheap to pay a relevant wage.
Anyone who makes it their business what a person consumes on their own time deserves to go out of business; good riddance. None of anybody’s damned business unless and until it actually effects performance.
Liar; he’s too lazy to look for workers.
Trump spoke about this at a rally in Michigan.
He assured employers that seasonal ‘guest workers’ would be allowed to help and then they would return home.
I’ll wager this guys business model includes making his temporary imported labor pay him rent for substandard seasonal housing.
Harder to underbid his American only competitors when you’re not making it up on the back end.
BTW, where does a "seasonal worker" from Guatemala go in the off season? The welfare/unemployment/SS offices?
“Article is pure BS. Cheap labor express at the expense of working Americans.”
To be honest, around here it is very hard to get hard-working, courteous laborers.
Who "won" the business? Somebody was able to find cheap labor.
Just like jacking wages down using H2b effects ALL companies in a market, jacking wages UP by not using H2b effects ALL companies.
The difference is we are hiring Americans who are paying taxes to America.
In the other case, they are paid cash and they send the money home and no taxes are paid America.
And yet they get welfare, healthcare, food stamps...
I know a guy who started what is now a $1M a year landscaping business and his seasonal workforce is primarily made up of college guys. Some of them work part time after school starts, and those who are ambitious get the opportunity to become supervisors or work on sales, and he says several have started their own businesses after graduation.
“Hire some high school kids for $12/hr instead of importing indentured servants that the U.S. doesnt have the stomach to deport.”
How can they work when they have to be in class.
Importing these workers for a few months cost him... their wages, which must be the same as he pays American workers.
More pathetic sloppy logic dressed up as a news item. How much does he pay American workers? The answer is $0. He does not hire American workers. He knows $12 is not enough to hire American workers so what is his factual basis for paying the foreigners $12 if he is required to pay them the same rate.
Around here factory works is at $15 with benefits and we still cannot find drug free, literate, and dependable workers. Rule of thumb is you can get 2 of 3 of those requirements.
I understand the problem. Landscaping customers will cutback on landscaping if it gets too expensive. I pay the neighbor kid $40 for 3/4 of an acre. Takes him 2 hrs using my equipment. If he ask for more The wife will make me do it.
Jobs that exist at $12 may not exist at higher rates.
Lol, $12 an hour.
Exactly the way it used to work before the Bush Plan for North Mexico.
By the terms of their visa, they go home.
The $12 hour foreign workers have their wages subsidized by the American taxpayer through food stamps and eitc fraud.
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