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The AZ Immigration Law Has Been Decided

No actually that will increase demand for legal employees.

You realize that you're making the union argument, right? Employers are just paying low wages because they're greedy -- not because they have to to remain competitive. Sometimes its true -- in both cases -- and sometimes it's not. Sometimes the loss of undocumented workers will result in more legal workers being hired, and sometimes a company can simply no longer compete with foreign competition.

The truth is that the economy is better off with illegals than it would be without them. Immigration laws in Arizona and Alabama come at a great economic cost | Business | TIME.com

Of course it would be better still if we brought them out of the shadows with immigration reform.
 
You realize that you're making the union argument, right? Employers are just paying low wages because they're greedy -- not because they have to to remain competitive. Sometimes its true -- in both cases -- and sometimes it's not. Sometimes the loss of undocumented workers will result in more legal workers being hired, and sometimes a company can simply no longer compete with foreign competition.

That's why we need to stop all immigration AND throw up Tariffs.
 
That's why we need to stop all immigration AND throw up Tariffs.

... thus destroying the economy and blowing inflation through the roof by instigating a trade war.
 
If you REALLY wanted to end the "cheap foreign labor" profits you would CUT all federal aid to the states for illegal aliens. The federal gov't MANDATES that the states educate (the children of) illegal aliens and pays them to do it while it leaves the border open. Stop that education aid and the states would help turn off the jobs magnet as they would then bear these HUGE costs. As long as the federal gov't bears the costs and the state gets the benefits, illegal immigration will never end. The illegal immigration magnet is FEDERALLY subsidized, making it not a state cost.

We need well-educated immigrants with marketable job skills. Most immigrants from Mexico are uneducated and lack technology and management skills. We have more than enough gardeners, landscapers, short order cooks and day labelers. We don't need any more.

The illegal immigration magnet only benefits the U.S. employers who hire these people and provide them with jobs. If they had to bear the full costs for doing so (public education, free medical care, subsidized housing, higher crime rates), they would not give these people who are here illegally jobs in the first place.


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We need well-educated immigrants with marketable job skills. Most immigrants from Mexico are uneducated and lack technology and management skills. We have more than enough gardeners, landscapers, short order cooks and day labelers. We don't need any more.

I believe the employers in Arizona and Alabama would disagree with your assessment. They have not been able to find legal workers to fill the vacated jobs. The United Farm Workers are running a "Take Our Jobs" campaign in California, offering fruit picking jobs to any American who wants them. They got about two serious candidates. TAKEOURJOBS.ORG
 
I believe the employers in Arizona and Alabama would disagree with your assessment. They have not been able to find legal workers to fill the vacated jobs. The United Farm Workers are running a "Take Our Jobs" campaign in California, offering fruit picking jobs to any American who wants them. They got about two serious candidates. TAKEOURJOBS.ORG

You are mistaken, AdamT.

There are many U.S. citizens who will accept the jobs employers in Arizona and Alabama give to illegal workers. CNN did a study and found that most non-farm jobs (farm jobs are very short and seasonable) would be accepted by legal workers if these jobs were actually offered to them.

The employers in Arizona and Alabama will not hire legal workers because they do not want to pay the Social Security taxes and the minimage wage to our legal workers that are required for them to do so by federal law.


These employers save a lot of money and avoid a lot of paperwork if they instead hire illegal immigrants to work for them.
 
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You are mistaken, AdamT.

There are many U.S. citizens who will accept the jobs employers in Arizona and Alabama give to illegal workers. CNN did a study and found that most non-farm jobs (farm jobs are very short and seasonable) would be accepted by legal workers if these jobs were actually offered to them.

The employers in Arizona and Alabama will not hire legal workers because they do not want to pay the Social Security taxes and the minimage wage to our legal workers that are required for them to do so by federal law.


These employers save a lot of money and avoid a lot of paperwork if they instead hire illegal immigrants to work for them.

If they aren't willing to accept the wages offered, then they aren't willing to take the job. Everybody would do any kind of work for enough money.
 
If they aren't willing to accept the wages offered, then they aren't willing to take the job. Everybody would do any kind of work for enough money.

You are mistaken, teamosil.

Would you accept a job where you make less than minimum wage with no Social Security credits when you can make more by drawing food stamps and unemployment benefits?

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Would you accept a job where you make less than minimum wage with no Social Security credits when you can make more by drawing food stamps and unemployment benefits?

No. That's the point. Virtually no citizens would.
 
No. That's the point. Virtually no citizens would.

We agree.

The states should crack down on the employers who do not pay minimum wages and Social Security taxes.

This will solve our illegal immigration problem very quickly if the people who come here illegally cannot find jobs.
 
We agree.

The states should crack down on the employers who do not pay minimum wages and Social Security taxes.

This will solve our illegal immigration problem very quickly if the people who come here illegally cannot find jobs.

People will not do those jobs for minimum wage, period. You think a tomato farmer can afford to pay a fruit picker $20/hr.?
 
We agree.

The states should crack down on the employers who do not pay minimum wages and Social Security taxes.

This will solve our illegal immigration problem very quickly if the people who come here illegally cannot find jobs.

No, I never said that at all. We can't crack down on employers that hire undocumented immigrants until we have a guest worker program that is sufficient to replace them. Otherwise we'd just crash our economy. For example, 88% of the price of a strawberry is labor. They pay migrant laborers a couple dollars an hour. It is brutally hard work, you have to move every few days and live in shanties and it is only seasonal. So, to hire a citizen would cost, in California, a minimum of about $10/hour. So that means the price of strawberries made here would rise about 400%. That means the industry shuts down and lots of legal jobs are lost too in the process. So, we can't stop hiring the undocumented immigrants to pick strawberries until we have a guest worker program that can satisfy that need. The same is true of most jobs undocumented immigrants do. Without the super cheap labor, those jobs wouldn't exist, nor would the legal jobs they support.
 
No, I never said that at all. We can't crack down on employers that hire undocumented immigrants until we have a guest worker program that is sufficient to replace them. Otherwise we'd just crash our economy. For example, 88% of the price of a strawberry is labor. They pay migrant laborers a couple dollars an hour. It is brutally hard work, you have to move every few days and live in shanties and it is only seasonal. So, to hire a citizen would cost, in California, a minimum of about $10/hour. So that means the price of strawberries made here would rise about 400%. That means the industry shuts down and lots of legal jobs are lost too in the process. So, we can't stop hiring the undocumented immigrants to pick strawberries until we have a guest worker program that can satisfy that need. The same is true of most jobs undocumented immigrants do. Without the super cheap labor, those jobs wouldn't exist, nor would the legal jobs they support.

We agree.

Let's crack down on employers that hire undocumented immigrants to harvest strawberries when we have a guest worker program that is sufficient to track them.

Meanwhile, let’s crack down on the unscrupulous employers who hire illegal immigrants to do the work of non-farm jobs such as gardeners, landscapers, short order cooks and day laborers.

We have more than enough gardeners, landscapers, short order cooks and day laborers. We don't need any more.
 
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No, I never said that at all. We can't crack down on employers that hire undocumented immigrants until we have a guest worker program that is sufficient to replace them. Otherwise we'd just crash our economy. For example, 88% of the price of a strawberry is labor. They pay migrant laborers a couple dollars an hour. It is brutally hard work, you have to move every few days and live in shanties and it is only seasonal. So, to hire a citizen would cost, in California, a minimum of about $10/hour. So that means the price of strawberries made here would rise about 400%. That means the industry shuts down and lots of legal jobs are lost too in the process. So, we can't stop hiring the undocumented immigrants to pick strawberries until we have a guest worker program that can satisfy that need. The same is true of most jobs undocumented immigrants do. Without the super cheap labor, those jobs wouldn't exist, nor would the legal jobs they support.

"If illegal workers disappeared from the apple harvest and wages for the remaining legal workers rose by 40 percent in response — and that entire wage increase were passed on to the consumer — that still would add less than 3 cents to the retail price of a pound of apples.
Local News | Low-paid illegal work force has little impact on prices | Seattle Times Newspaper

•If unauthorized workers were replaced by authorized workers at the higher average wage rate authorized workers currently earn, farms in the fruits, nuts, and vegetable sector would experience a total labor cost increase of 10 percent, and the increase for the field crops and grains sector would be 6 percent.
•Major crops like corn, soybean, and other cash grains would experience, on average, a 12 percent decrease in net farm income as a result of a 6-10 percent average wage increase.
•The fruits, nuts, and vegetables sector would be impacted the most as the average net farm income would decrease by 12 percent, yet, the average commercial farm in this sector would still have earned an average net farm income higher than that of any other average commodity farm studied (without passing on any costs to customers).

Illegal Immigration and Agribusiness: The Effect on the Agriculture Industry of Converting to a Legal Workforce

not even close to 400%.
 
"If illegal workers disappeared from the apple harvest and wages for the remaining legal workers rose by 40 percent in response — and that entire wage increase were passed on to the consumer — that still would add less than 3 cents to the retail price of a pound of apples.
Local News | Low-paid illegal work force has little impact on prices | Seattle Times Newspaper

•If unauthorized workers were replaced by authorized workers at the higher average wage rate authorized workers currently earn, farms in the fruits, nuts, and vegetable sector would experience a total labor cost increase of 10 percent, and the increase for the field crops and grains sector would be 6 percent.

•Major crops like corn, soybean, and other cash grains would experience, on average, a 12 percent decrease in net farm income as a result of a 6-10 percent average wage increase.

•The fruits, nuts, and vegetables sector would be impacted the most as the average net farm income would decrease by 12 percent, yet, the average commercial farm in this sector would still have earned an average net farm income higher than that of any other average commodity farm studied (without passing on any costs to customers).

Illegal Immigration and Agribusiness: The Effect on the Agriculture Industry of Converting to a Legal Workforce

not even close to 400%.

You are correct, Mike.

"If illegal workers disappeared from the apple harvest and wages for the remaining legal workers rose by 40 percent in response — and that entire wage increase were passed on to the consumer — that still would add less than 3 cents to the retail price of a pound of apples."

Most of the cost of produce has to do with the price of fuel and the transportation costs to deliver them to the supermarkets. The labor costs to harvest them are very small in comparison.
 
We agree.

Let's crack down on employers that hire undocumented immigrants when we have a guest worker program that is sufficient to replace them.

Cool. Agreed on that part.

Meanwhile, let’s crack down on the unscrupulous employers who hire illegal immigrants to do the work of non-farm jobs such as gardeners, landscapers, short order cooks and day laborers.

We have more than enough gardeners, landscapers, short order cooks and day laborers. We don't need any more.

What the Obama administration is doing is cracking down on employers starting with the most desirable jobs that undocumented immigrants are in, which has largely been manufacturing so far. I agree that's a good stop gap, but its just a stopgap. Ultimately we need a guest worker program that identifies the industries that really do need very low cost labor. Agriculture is a lot of it, but there are jobs like that in other industries too. Once we have that in place, there will be an option for folks who are already here to get in line with the law and start paying more taxes, and then we can start cracking down across the board on employers IMO.

But, just a side note. The number of undocumented immigrants in the US has been falling for 3 years in a row now. IMO we need to be careful to assign resources to enforcement in proportion to the harm done. Undocumented immigrants cost us around $40 billion a year in social services, they take some jobs citizens want, but they also boost up the economy by taking jobs citizens don't want. We currently spend around $40 billion on enforcement as well. So, IMO, the goal should be to do things smarter, not to expand enforcement overall.
 
No, I never said that at all. We can't crack down on employers that hire undocumented immigrants until we have a guest worker program that is sufficient to replace them. Otherwise we'd just crash our economy. For example, 88% of the price of a strawberry is labor. They pay migrant laborers a couple dollars an hour. It is brutally hard work, you have to move every few days and live in shanties and it is only seasonal. So, to hire a citizen would cost, in California, a minimum of about $10/hour. So that means the price of strawberries made here would rise about 400%. That means the industry shuts down and lots of legal jobs are lost too in the process. So, we can't stop hiring the undocumented immigrants to pick strawberries until we have a guest worker program that can satisfy that need. The same is true of most jobs undocumented immigrants do. Without the super cheap labor, those jobs wouldn't exist, nor would the legal jobs they support.

Guest workers are simply semi-slaves and should be ILLEGAL unless minimum wage x2 PLUS free decent housing is guaranteed. It is FAR different to allow a foreign machinist or medical technician a work visa than a fruit picker. That is simply nonsense to avoid paying a wage that supports a decent living in this country. To assert that those paid to DO NOTHING on welfare or unemployment can not pick fruit is INSANE.

The creation of a permanent underclass, imported temporarily or not, is INSANE. That is why AMNESTY for illegal aliens is insane, it converts field working semi-slaves into instant welfare recipients. There is NO NEED for below market wage workers, NONE at all. If a job is worth getting done, then it is worth paying a wage to attract workers to do it. If the required SKILL involved is not available in the U.S., then the wages are NOT depressed by using foreign TEMPORARY labor, ONLY until the U.S. can build up that trained workforce; but for unskilled or semi-skilled workers that is simply semi-slavery, using them for a season, and then sending them scampering into OUR cities and suburbs. We did not get 11 million illegal aliens that WILL NO LONGER PICK FRUIT by accident.
 
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"If illegal workers disappeared from the apple harvest and wages for the remaining legal workers rose by 40 percent in response — and that entire wage increase were passed on to the consumer — that still would add less than 3 cents to the retail price of a pound of apples.
Local News | Low-paid illegal work force has little impact on prices | Seattle Times Newspaper

•If unauthorized workers were replaced by authorized workers at the higher average wage rate authorized workers currently earn, farms in the fruits, nuts, and vegetable sector would experience a total labor cost increase of 10 percent, and the increase for the field crops and grains sector would be 6 percent.
•Major crops like corn, soybean, and other cash grains would experience, on average, a 12 percent decrease in net farm income as a result of a 6-10 percent average wage increase.
•The fruits, nuts, and vegetables sector would be impacted the most as the average net farm income would decrease by 12 percent, yet, the average commercial farm in this sector would still have earned an average net farm income higher than that of any other average commodity farm studied (without passing on any costs to customers).

Illegal Immigration and Agribusiness: The Effect on the Agriculture Industry of Converting to a Legal Workforce

not even close to 400%.

Apples are very low labor crops. Heck, people pay extra to go to the orchard and pick the apples themselves. Harvesting corn and things like that are essentially mechanized processes. So, I agree that those industries would be just fine.

Where it really is an issue is migrant laborers. People that travel around from farm to farm picking whatever crop it is intensively for a few days then they need to move on to the next one. Those tend to be ultra labor intensive crops- strawberries being one of the very most labor intensive. And, they involve working conditions that are particularly brutal. People need to leave home and travel from farm to farm living in shacks for the season, then there is no work the rest of the year. Bringing those conditions up to OSHA standards and standards of comfort that a citizen might be willing to accept and raising the wages to minimum wage, would destroy those industries.
 
Apples are very low labor crops. Heck, people pay extra to go to the orchard and pick the apples themselves. Harvesting corn and things like that are essentially mechanized processes. So, I agree that those industries would be just fine.

Where it really is an issue is migrant laborers. People that travel around from farm to farm picking whatever crop it is intensively for a few days then they need to move on to the next one. Those tend to be ultra labor intensive crops- strawberries being one of the very most labor intensive. And, they involve working conditions that are particularly brutal. People need to leave home and travel from farm to farm living in shacks for the season, then there is no work the rest of the year. Bringing those conditions up to OSHA standards and standards of comfort that a citizen might be willing to accept and raising the wages to minimum wage, would destroy those industries.

Then those industries SHOULD be destroyed. To assert that an industry is ONLY possible if FOREIGN semi-slave temporary labor is used is INSANE. Those are the products that SHOULD be imported, NOT simply the labor to produce them. How would YOU like it if your boss said your work is fine, but I must pay you HALF what you now get, to compete with China or Mexico? Think, before you drink, even koolaid.
 
Apples are very low labor crops. Heck, people pay extra to go to the orchard and pick the apples themselves. Harvesting corn and things like that are essentially mechanized processes. So, I agree that those industries would be just fine.

Where it really is an issue is migrant laborers. People that travel around from farm to farm picking whatever crop it is intensively for a few days then they need to move on to the next one. Those tend to be ultra labor intensive crops- strawberries being one of the very most labor intensive. And, they involve working conditions that are particularly brutal. People need to leave home and travel from farm to farm living in shacks for the season, then there is no work the rest of the year. Bringing those conditions up to OSHA standards and standards of comfort that a citizen might be willing to accept and raising the wages to minimum wage, would destroy those industries.

illegal-aliens.jpg


This is what Mexican immigrants who come here illegally to work as day laborers think of our U.S. immigration laws. These people have no fear of being deported and do not hide from the local police! Barack Obama wants to open our borders up to more of these people!
 
Guest workers are simply semi-slaves and should be ILLEGAL unless minimum wage x2 PLUS free decent housing is guaranteed. It is FAR different to allow a foreign machinist or medical technician a work visa than a fruit picker. That is simply nonsense to avoid paying a wage that supports a decent living in this country.

This argument is a bit disingenuous. What you're arguing in effect is that a guest worker's quality of life would only be a 2, which is too low, so we should just relegate them to living a quality of life of 1... It doesn't make much sense. The life of a guest worker is definitely a step up from the life of an illegal immigrant. Just because it isn't as good as the life of a citizen doesn't mean it isn't an improvement.

But, to call it slavery is ridiculous. They are free to choose whether they want to be in the guest worker program or not and they get paid.

To assert that those paid to DO NOTHING on welfare or unemployment can not pick fruit is INSANE.

The creation of a permanent underclass, imported temporarily or not, is INSANE. That is why AMNESTY for illegal aliens is insane, it converts field working semi-slaves into instant welfare recipients. There is NO NEED for below market wage workers, NONE at all. If a job is worth getting done, then it is worth paying a wage to attract workers to do it. If the required SKILL involved is not available in the U.S. then the wages are NOT deppressed by using foreign TEMPORARY labor until the U.S. can build up that trained workforce, but for unskilled or semi-skilled workers that is simply semi-slavery

This is the part I honestly just don't understand for a second about the right's position on this stuff. We were to revert a large portion of our workforce from modern, high return, jobs to migrant laborers that would be a massive step backwards economically. Why would anybody want that? That's crazy.

We want to move the economy FORWARD not BACKWARDS. We need to be looking for new jobs at the high end so everybody moves up a notch and we leave more jobs behind us. Then we fill in those jobs we left behind with guest workers.
 
illegal-aliens.jpg


This is what Mexican immigrants who come here illegally to work as day laborers think of our U.S. immigration laws. These people have no fear of being deported and do not hide from the local police! Barack Obama wants to open our borders up to more of these people!

WTF dude. You were having a good, adult, discussion and then you reverted to this?
 
Then those industries SHOULD be destroyed. To assert that an industry is ONLY possible if FOREIGN semi-slave temporary labor is used is INSANE. Those are the products that SHOULD be imported, NOT simply the labor to produce them. How would YOU like it if your boss said your work is fine, but I must pay you HALF what you now get, to compete with China or Mexico? Think, before you drink, even koolaid.

You are correct, ttwtt.

The liberals complain about "slave wages" and deplorable working conditions" in China but then they turn around and allow these same conditions to flourish in this country.

Again, let's crack down on employers that hire undocumented immigrants when we have a guest worker program that is sufficient to replace them. Meanwhile, let’s crack down on the unscrupulous employers who hire illegal immigrants to do the work of non-farm jobs such as gardeners, landscapers, short order cooks and day laborers.
 
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illegal-aliens.jpg



This is what Mexican immigrants who come here illegally to work as day laborers think of our U.S. immigration laws. These people have no fear of being deported and do not hide from the local police! Barack Obama wants to open our borders up to more of these people!

WTF dude. You were having a good, adult, discussion and then you reverted to this?

I did not mean to offend you, but unfortunately, this is the honest truth.

Are you aware of how Mexico treats the illegal immigrants who cross over into Mexico from their southern border?

They detain them in hot Mexican prisons without due process until they can deport them to their host countries.
 
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