its not a problem here. I was going to respond to something you wrote in another thread, that yard men make $15 an hour so they are taking good jobs. that's ridiculous. those guys might make minimum wage and no one here wants that job
Here's something from an article that's been posted before, or at least one article addressing the same subject matter. http://teacher.scholastic.com/scholasticnews/indepth/upfront/debate/index.asp?article=d090108 The thing about this study I like is that they compared how much is paid in by the immigrants, and how much the "benefits" like health care and education they receive. They are a plus to the economy rather than a drain on it.
Well you missed my point then. My point was that illegals artificially push the wages down. If there were no illegals, the wages would be 15 per hour and plenty would want the job. No one wants the job now because the market has been screwed from super cheap labor. If someone is charging you 20 bucks for a small yard to be mowed, there is room for a 15 per hour worker in that business. that is just a fact.
There is a lot of illegal immigration to Minnesota. (5-year-old source) In fact, they were one of the first states to start pushing a copycat bill of what Arizona has passed. Minnesota is a border state, and not every illegal immigrant comes across the Mexican border.
While I agree with you in principle, the counterargument is that the jobs would not be possible without the cheap labor making the price palatable. If mowing yards with 15/hr employees meant 40 bucks to mow the yard instead of 20, I bet a lot of folks would decide against the expense. And the IRS does not care at all if you're an illegal. You can get an alternate tax ID and happily pay taxes as an illegal. The IRS is also forbidden to voluntarily share that information with other agencies.
A 20 dollar yard takes less than 30 minutes to mow. There is plenty of room for a 15 per hour employee at that price point.
Healthcare in a sense is free. Illegals cross the border just to get medical care. They are unable to pay and don't have insurance but yet they still get treated. The federal govt reimburses the hospitals for non-paid treatment although not for the same amount. This is why you are not going to find any private practices near the border. Also the argument that illegals pay taxes and are good for the economy is the biggest load of bull. If you want to really look at some facts and figures on costs of illegal immigrants just on healthcare click here http://www.cis.org/illegalsAndHealthCareHR3200 Its a fairly unbiased study that just looks at numbers. Also it does support your claim in a way the cost of legalizing illegals might be even higher. Which by the way I do not support granting amnesty since that will just further encourage the problem and does nothing to solve it. Perhaps we should adopt Mexico's immigration policy and enforce it http://factreal.wordpress.com/2010/...-states-mexican-immigration-laws-are-tougher/
I think in some cases that is the true, but in other cases the jobs are either low paying ones, or they just go away and aren't jobs at all. http://money.cnn.com/2006/05/01/news/economy/immigration_economy/index.htm
Maybe - factor in equipment, gas, gas for transport and I don't know. I kind of think it hrd to believe that 15/hr is reasonable given that (at least in my neck of the woods) the yard service industry seemed to explode as cheap labor became available. I don't think that was coincidence.
But that article looks at the cost of health care, but not all the taxes that illegals pay. They pay gas tax, sales tax, most likely some form of sin taxes as well. Most actually also pay income taxes, social security, unemployment, etc. but never collect those benefits. I won't get into the other misrepresentations of the health care reform bill in the article for this thread, but it still doesn't calculate in the benefit of the illegals. I posted a real life example on how the removal of illegal immigrants hurt the economy, and other facts about how much they pay vs. how much they receive also shows that they put more into the economy than they take out.
You are forgetting that these people will be, and are already, tax payers. Also given the problem that we have with Social Security where more are starting to withdraw from it than are paying into it. The only solution to that is through increased immigration. Why then don't most US citizens just do that? Frankly this statement is thinly veiled racism / nativism in that it betrays an attitude that immigrants are only here for handouts. My experience is that immigrants, particularly illegals, are the some of the hardest working people there are. And facts to counter it?
there are industries that you can argue maybe that americans are being priced out of. but i think you would be hard pressed to name any. for laborers who come over here with actual skills, plumbing, carpentry, welding, there are plenty of americans still willing to do those jobs even for wages that have been supposedly suppressed.
First off perception isn't always reality and while most people in border states might disagree the facts don't necessarily supportthat opinion. Second as the article notes illegal immigrants don't just stay in the border states but spread out. For an agricultural state like Minnesota we have a lot of illegal immigrants here. Finally the US Constition particularly states that the Federal Government is empowered to deal with immigration issues, not the states. As a US citizen my opinion matters as much as someone living Yuma, Az.
I agree with this that it is a jump to conclude absolutely that immigrants reduce crime as the causality isn't completely clear but at the minimum it shows that there isn't a correlation between high amounts of immigration, legally or illegally, and high crime. The correlation instead appears to go the other way. That said I think the argument for why immigrants would reduce violent crime makes sense and my experience as a first generation American and with immigrants reinforces that. The vast majority of immigrants are here to better themselves and given the opportunity to advance peacefully and legally will do so.
this is just not true. I'm sorry but I doubt you know anything about the cost and amounts involved. The people running the crews are just making more now by paying 8-10 per hour instead of 15.
to argue that mowing residential lawns as a business hasn't blown up in the last 20 years is just dishonest
