Willing to risk their lives and clean toilets for minimum wage, yet not willing to do "the things needed to compete"? Your assessment of immigrants and what they're willing to do is way, way, way, way, way, way off.
I've been thinking about this thread, and I thought I'd post my final thoughts on it: We have a one-size-fits-all education system that has national control of things that should be controlled on a local level. Boys, urban blacks, rural blacks, rural whites, and Hispanics from border states all seem to be left behind in this system. The Federal government throws more money at the problem, puts in stricter "standards" and makes the schools worse. But we blame the immigrants for the problems in their schools. If only they wouldn't send these kids who don't know English and aren't interested in learning, the schools would all be better. We have healthcare companies who stopped offering insurance years ago. They got the American public accustomed to looking to them for their healthcare. They successfully convinced Americans that they should pay them everything up front, and they'll take care of their medical needs. So now, they screw the worker on payday and the healthcare provider when the bill is sent. Doctors hate the healthcare companies, hospitals hate healthcare companies, and patients hate healthcare companies. The government lines up to help the healthcare companies out, keep promising them their big payday where they get everyone on their system, while funding is cut for veterans and welfare healthcare. Healthcare companies are making money hand over fist, while the hospitals starve. But in border states, we blame the immigrants for the problems with the healthcare systems. If only so many Mexicans weren't using the hospitals for free, they'd all be better. We have this ridiculous idea where we criminalize addicts and throw them in jail. We create a black market underworld where drugs are sold, and when this prohibition causes crime to increase, we increase penalties for selling those drugs. We fill up prisons, then build more prisons. Our police are too busy booking dealers to stop the guy down the street stealing a lady's purse to pay his dealer. But we blame immigrants and migrants for the crime. All these Mexicans and Columbians are enabling addicts in the United States. Sometimes, the person you think is creating a problem is just showing you a problem you've had all along.
Good post, weslinder. Times have changed, in many ways for the worse. My father had the old style Blue Cross/Blue Shield. He paid the deductable every year because he had a lot of health problems. Being a university prof, he had good coverage. Instead of croaking before he was 40, which he was told would happen to him by the experts at the Mayo Clinic, he made it to 63. Why? Because he could see any doctor he wanted. His heart surgeon was Denton Cooley, who's world renowned in the field. He was able to get experimental drugs before they came on the market. In short, he got the finest care Houston, famous around the globe for it's medical facilities, had to offer. Want that kind of care today? Good luck! (or be wealthy) D&D. Replicant Émigré
Oh please. (insert rolling eyes here) These romanticized notions of immigration are becoming just silly. In our current economy, you need to speak at least some English to really compete in the economy. There are loads of jobs just above minimum wage that a rudimentary knowledge of English will qualify you for. As to my assessment of what immigrants are willing to do is not way off. I stated that many of them are unwilling to learn English. That is not off, it is a fact evidenced by the scores of them that have been here for quite a while, yet speak not a word of English. I'm sorry that your emotional thoughts on this subject render you unable to comprehend my point.
1. i agree it benefits them to learn English. 2. these immigrants are no different than your forefathers..unless they came here already speaking english. again, we had communities of all sorts of immigrants coming from all around the globe who refused to learn or speak english for generations. this was particularly true for Germans...but was true for others as well.
Except that my forefathers from Germany stepped off the boat and went right to work on the farm. They received no government benefits and didn't ask for any. They didn't have a group like LULAC trying to get them more free stuff from the government. My mother can remember her grandmother only speaking German but her grandfather got here and immediately learned English so that he could get a better job, etc. They did whatever they could to get a leg up and to succeed in society. They did so out of pride, and out of necessity, because there were no government benefits and no tolerance of not speaking the language.
How did the government and insurance companies pay for that great care before? They paid for it by having a growing youthful workforce that could support things pensions and health insurance. One of the problems we got now is that our demographics are starting to become top heavy and if it wasn't for immigrants coming into our workforce we would already be at disaster. As it is we still might hit disaster and since US citizens don't seem to be having more kids immigrants are the answer to make up that demographic gap.
As opposed to the notions of immigrants coming here as free loaders to suck off the American teat.. While many first generation immigrants have problems with the language but within a generation or so learn English. I haven't met a single child of an immigrant, illegal or otherwise, who by their teenage years can't speak English, in many cases better than people's whose families have been here for generations. Again that wasn't the case. Because their were immigrant communities that lived in rural farming villages there was left impetus to learn English depending on where you settled at the turn of the 20th C. As others have noted there were communities throughout the Midwest were people spoke German, Polish or some other language for decades. The pressure now is greater to learn English since communication is so much widely available and labor is much more mobile. Just because many lower income immigrant workers don't speak English at the moment is no indication that their children won't. Also the continuing saw about immigrants having no pressure to better themselves because of government benefits is questionable at best. As SF noted why risk your life crossing the AZ desert if you aren't going to try to better yourself. For two many illegals can't access benefits because they are here illegally but still pay sales and property taxes.
Bit of a stretch there, Sishir. As for how it affected the government workforce in the United States, I know of no evidence that suggests what you say is true. Could you provide some? D&D. Replicant Rubber Bands.
This is simply false. Illegals qualify for free health care at the county clincs, they qualify for WIC, and their kids get free breakfasts and lunches at school. I know this because my mother worked at an elementary school that contained a lot of illegals and their parents would come to eat at the school with their kids at free lunch time. They come here for a better life, and in 2007 they have more here than in their homeland just by being here and breathing.
You're the only person here who thinks cleaning a toilet is romantic - that's the problem. I suggest you try it.
. what is a head-turner, in the inner-city schools in the Los Angeles unified School District, is that 90%+ of all Advanced Placement classes (math, science, english, social studies, advanced composition, etc.) are populated by immigrant students.
The point is not whether they qualify for free things or not. SirShir never said at any point that illegal immigrants don't qualify for free stuff. People vary. On the one hand you have people who are not satisfied with their lot and life and try to better themselves, and on the other hand you have the happy-go-lucky types. In Mexico, as in the USA there are some of each. Generally speaking, you are one or the other. People don't start as obsessive compulsive and determined only to change and suddenly stop caring and living a happy-go-lucky life. Combine this with the fact that crossing the border illegally is an arduous task, only undertaken by determined people, the pool of immigrants who will put forth the immense effort and actually cross skews towards those with ambition. The difficulty of crossing necessarily results in a more determined group. And again, people who are more determined don’t suddenly flip and become lazy. Obviously this doesn’t prevent lazy people from crossing, but tends to result in them crossing at a rate much lower than would exist for the standard population. Illegal immigrants may qualify for benefits, but they don't put forth the effort to cross the border in order to come here, be lazy, and live on those benefits, or else they wouldn't end up crossing the border in the first place, but would be sitting in Mexico thinking that crossing the border might be a good idea one of these days and never getting around to it.
Actually his demographics argument is very true. Europe, Japan and Russia (although they're a different case) are experiencing virtual negative population growth that will hit them hard in the next few years. Something has to give. Either, immigration and/or a higher birth rate fills in and generates enough people to fill in jobs or the economy slows down substantially and less jobs are open. Europe's economy has by and large experienced very slow growth and their silly economic policies have created other problems that have masked their population woes but they're still there. Continuous population growth is needed to fill in for workers that leave the workforce. Europe and Japan have top-heavy demographics. The amount of elderly individuals is substantially increasing and there aren't enough births and immigration to compensate for that loss of workers from the workforce. America on the other hand is a unique case. We too should eventually start experiencing the negative population growth that comes with tertiary economic growth. Most population studies divide growth into 5 stages, the fifth concluding with what we see in Europe. However, America has much more liberal immigration rules both legal and of course illegal immigration. Two reasons for our difference... 1. We just have more immigrants to boost our labor pool and work force. Europe doesn't. The percentage of foreign born residents in comparison to American births has increased virtually every year of America's history (save for a few years here and there where American significantly rolled back immigration) Europe on the other hand has done the opposite. Immigration in many countries has gotten more and more restrictive as local populations continue to blame them for problems in their society. 2. immigrants in America have more kids, thereby compensating for the declining birth rate of natives of America. If you threw out immigrants and looked exclusively at American birth rates, it would probably look a lot like Europe. However, if you factor in immigrants, the numbers change. http://www.cis.org/articles/2005/back1105.html
Following Ottomaton's point. Yes, illegals get free breakfast and lunches in school and can go to emergency rooms but can they get welfare, medicare, medicaid, or collect social security? Illegals still pay into many of those benefits because they still pay taxes, property and sales and in many cases social security and payroll taxes, yet they can't access those services. As for them coming here and having a better life isn't that the point of why they are here? That doesn't mean they aren't here though to work and contribute. Unless you are implying that they are somehow taking our air.
unfortunately, they do. and our policies separate families when we detain them. so children are separated from their parents as their status is up in the air. it's real sweet.
i find the comparisons of other cultures, that have migrated to america in the past, not to be particularly good. It's a different time, different era and a different situation. And i dont know if any of those can compete with the huge numbers that is currently being faced.
huge numbers? then or now?? why don't you find the comparisons to other cultures valid? let's take the Irish for example...what's so different?
like i said, its just a different time. Isnt the country much different then than it is now? Is the flow of people as continuous as it is across the borders? and again, how many of them actually registered when they entered the country. There are some similarities, of course, but again i dont think you can use them to prove anything about the current situation. times change
