Immigration Issues

[BH]

Hiring illegals is illegal.

If you dig deep enough, you'll find the government at the root of most problems.

You are thinking of greed. Government can't be trusted, big business can't be trusted, the general population can't be trusted. What do they all have in common, they consist of people. That is nature, people are flawed. Libertarians are deluded in their unjustified position that the people are not flawed. Libertarians will blame institutions of people, but not people in general.

Greed without government is someone saying "I want that" over and over. Greed with government is using violence or the threat of violence to enrich the person using the government. It is no different from a simple mugger or shoplifter but for some reason people think it is acceptable when using the right label.

You make it sound like sociopaths are powerless without government. A Government is just a broader collaborative of population control. There will always be people in control, whether it is a mob or functioning government. The smaller the groups, the easier it is for sociopaths to take over. This is why power vacuums are so dangerous. Those who are so bold to takeover usually aren't the best of people.

Libertarians are often like the Utopianists in America back in the 19th century, where they thought they could create small collaborative communes. They never worked in the end.

If a mugger comes up to me and threatens violence, nobody would question a violent response. Give that mugger a title and a badge and suddenly statist utopian boot-lickers think the demand is the most proper thing they've ever seen and any resistance a crime.

Political Science was my minor at university. It was taught in international relations and other classes countries were just gangs and their leaders the head gangbangers. No one gets upset if this is acknowledged on a nation relating to another nation basis. They only get upset when the comparison is then drawn in regards to the local gang and its neighborhood.

Government and its officers may do good, just like the gang or mob may do some good and token acts of service to members of the neighborhood it runs, but in the end it rules by coercion and fear and all the arguments used by governments to show they are somehow different from a gang seem to always fail when looked deeply into. Also like the gang or mob, any good the government does for "regular people" really is just to protect and help the leaders prosper and do well and hide the fact they are pimping the general population.

 

[RVonse]

Your statement that businesses need to quit ‘seeking bottom wage slaves,’ what do you propose? Not what I would propose which is to pay all employees decent, livable wages.

I propose the exact business model that followed high wage unionization of the auto plants. Robots and automation. This offers the leverage that 1 person can now do what it used to take 15 people. The end result is high productivity, high wages, but cheaper and higher quality products. Both management and labor wins in the long run. The government itself also wins because there is more tax revenue and less people needing welfare.

What do the other 14 people do?

They go off and produce other products that society does not even know it wants yet.

For example, I did not even know I wanted a smart phone until Apple made one that demonstrated how much better it made my life.

 

[RVonse]

I like diversity too. And yes I agree it makes life more interesting.

But it surely does not make the nation stronger. It does not make us stronger because we can not communicate with those who speak a different language. It does not make us stronger when we become confused over cultural differences. Nor does it help having a country fighting with each other all the time. Unity is what makes any organization including a country much stronger.

Yes, it does.

5. Taxes​

Undocumented immigrants pay billions of dollars in taxes annually. Households headed by unauthorized immigrants paid $10.6 billion in state and local taxes in 2010. This includes $1.2 billion in personal income taxes, $1.2 billion in property taxes, and more than $8 billion in sales and excise taxes. Immigrants—even legal immigrants—are barred from most social services, meaning that they pay to support benefits they cannot even receive.

How can undocumented workers further power our economy?​

“Granting citizenship to undocumented immigrants would create jobs and increase tax revenues. If undocumented immigrants acquired legal status today and citizenship in five years, the economy would add an average of 159,000 new jobs per year, and formerly unauthorized workers would pay an additional $144 billion in federal, state, and local taxes over a 10-year period.”

Five ways undocumented immigrants are powering the American economy

Explore the many ways that undocumented immigrant workers drive the economy of the United States

www.ilr.cornell.edu

You make an excellent argument the plantation owners of the southern states would have successfully made in the early 1800's.

Of course GNP and tax revenue will look good if you are exploiting labor to the fullest. And of course the economy in general will be helped by exploiting that same class of labor. Does that mean we should exploit people if there are other social aspects to be looked at?

The obvious difference between the slavery during the early 1800's and today's immigrant labor is that society actually called them slaves back then. But both workers then and now were being paid far lower than their real worth.

 

[laughing dog]

I like diversity too. And yes I agree it makes life more interesting.

But it surely does not make the nation stronger. It does not make us stronger because we can not communicate with those who speak a different language. It does not make us stronger when we become confused over cultural differences. Nor does it help having a country fighting with each other all the time. Unity is what makes any organization including a country much stronger.

Yes, it does.

5. Taxes​

Undocumented immigrants pay billions of dollars in taxes annually. Households headed by unauthorized immigrants paid $10.6 billion in state and local taxes in 2010. This includes $1.2 billion in personal income taxes, $1.2 billion in property taxes, and more than $8 billion in sales and excise taxes. Immigrants—even legal immigrants—are barred from most social services, meaning that they pay to support benefits they cannot even receive.

How can undocumented workers further power our economy?​

“Granting citizenship to undocumented immigrants would create jobs and increase tax revenues. If undocumented immigrants acquired legal status today and citizenship in five years, the economy would add an average of 159,000 new jobs per year, and formerly unauthorized workers would pay an additional $144 billion in federal, state, and local taxes over a 10-year period.”

Five ways undocumented immigrants are powering the American economy

Explore the many ways that undocumented immigrant workers drive the economy of the United States

www.ilr.cornell.edu

You make an excellent argument the plantation owners of the southern states would have successfully made in the early 1800's.

Of course GNP and tax revenue will look good if you are exploiting labor to the fullest. And of course the economy in general will be helped by exploiting that same class of labor. Does that mean we should exploit people if there are other social aspects to be looked at?

The obvious difference between the slavery during the early 1800's and today's immigrant labor is that society actually called them slaves back then. But both workers then and now were being paid far lower than their real worth.

The obvious difference is slaves had no choice in the matter. Funny you missed that.

 

[RVonse]

Government and its officers may do good, just like the gang or mob may do some good and token acts of service to members of the neighborhood it runs, but in the end it rules by coercion and fear and all the arguments used by governments to show they are somehow different from a gang seem to always fail when looked deeply into. Also like the gang or mob, any good the government does for "regular people" really is just to protect and help the leaders prosper and do well and hide the fact they are pimping the general population.

I could not agree more. In the final analysis government doesn't give a crap about us. Not really. All they really care about is keeping their own jobs and giving themselves more freedom and power mostly at our expense of limited liberty.

 

[TSwizzle]

Anti-racism activists clashed with police and anti-migrant protesters on Saturday outside a London hotel where asylum seekers are being housed.
Meanwhile, people believed to be migrants were seen filming and laughing as protesters and counter-demonstrators clashed in the streets of Islington today. It comes after a coach of suspected migrants was seen arriving at the four-star Britannia International Hotel in Canary Wharf at around 1.40am this morning.

Daily Mail

No wonder the “migrants” are laughing.

Anyway, is it any wonder that the natives feel they are being replaced.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

People are angry that their industries they worked for left. Undocumented workers didn't do that.

Exactly. It wasn’t undocumented workers, it was corporations outsourcing jobs to cut labor costs, maximize profits, and pad executive bonuses. There's nothing inherently wrong with being rich or cutting costs, and bonuses aren’t evil in themselves. But when profit becomes the priority at the expense of the very workers/consumers who make that profit possible, that’s the problem. When profit is put above the well-being of your fellow citizens, something’s broken. What’s the point of all this patriotic grandstanding, celebrating soldiers, cops, miners, oil riggers for putting everything on the line, if you won’t demand even a fraction of that same loyalty from billion-dollar corporations getting major tax cuts? You want a tax cut? Then show some fucking patriotism, bitch. These same people will argue that folks on welfare need to “get a job” or at least hold one, yet they champion tax cuts for corporations that outsource jobs and lay off workers. In the end, it’s the very people they screw over who are expected to carry the weight and foot the bill for their windfall.

Except it was mostly machinery rather than offshoring.

I watched it happening--my employer increased productivity around 20x for around 5x more workers. The rest of that was the machinery, the computer assistance etc. Offshore wasn't even remotely an option because of the turnaround time.

As for illegals--we don't blame the employers because we do not have viable systems for establishing identity. Yes, we have e-verify but that does not solve the issue of identity theft and thus I consider it worse than the problem it's supposed to fix. Would you prefer an illegal work under a completely forged identity, or under the identity of a real person, giving said person IRS headaches?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

50 years on Green Card? How is that normal?

I would assume someone who doesn't want to give up their original citizenship, or someone who can function well enough with their native language that they don't have to learn English. (Citizenship includes a spoken English test.)

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Because citizenship is extremely difficult and expensive to acquire, many people will take deferred actions and so forth if they are offered, foolishly trusting the government when it lies and says that legal documents make them a legal resident.

Nothing expensive about it, the only difficult part of it is that part of the test will be done orally in English. The green card is a lot harder and more expensive. Her green card was many forms (and every form comes with a price tag that is supposedly the average cost to process said form), many unpleasant interviews in cities far from us. Several thousand out of pocket and there were several months she was not allowed to work. Citizenship was IIRC one form, half a day.

 

[Toni]

People are angry that their industries they worked for left. Undocumented workers didn't do that.

Exactly. It wasn’t undocumented workers, it was corporations outsourcing jobs to cut labor costs, maximize profits, and pad executive bonuses. There's nothing inherently wrong with being rich or cutting costs, and bonuses aren’t evil in themselves. But when profit becomes the priority at the expense of the very workers/consumers who make that profit possible, that’s the problem. When profit is put above the well-being of your fellow citizens, something’s broken. What’s the point of all this patriotic grandstanding, celebrating soldiers, cops, miners, oil riggers for putting everything on the line, if you won’t demand even a fraction of that same loyalty from billion-dollar corporations getting major tax cuts? You want a tax cut? Then show some fucking patriotism, bitch. These same people will argue that folks on welfare need to “get a job” or at least hold one, yet they champion tax cuts for corporations that outsource jobs and lay off workers. In the end, it’s the very people they screw over who are expected to carry the weight and foot the bill for their windfall.

Except it was mostly machinery rather than offshoring.

I watched it happening--my employer increased productivity around 20x for around 5x more workers. The rest of that was the machinery, the computer assistance etc. Offshore wasn't even remotely an option because of the turnaround time.

As for illegals--we don't blame the employers because we do not have viable systems for establishing identity. Yes, we have e-verify but that does not solve the issue of identity theft and thus I consider it worse than the problem it's supposed to fix. Would you prefer an illegal work under a completely forged identity, or under the identity of a real person, giving said person IRS headaches?

Of course we have a viable method for establishing identity. I was expected to provide my govt. issued ID, SS number, appropriate transcripts and records as well as verified references for my jobs. Admittedly I only needed my SS number when I spent a summer detasseling corn, a common summer job for kids too young to drive to better paid jobs. Immigrants I know have a government issued work permit that they present upon application for a job, along with whatever other credentials are required. Immigrants have passports and usually driver’s licenses and even RealID. Just like US citizens.

Identity theft is not much of an issue as far as immigrants are concerned. There is a much greater threat of identity theft through a variety of scams, admittedly many committed by persons in other countries.

I prefer that undocumented immigrants not be referred to as ‘illegals’ or with other dehumanizing terms. No person is illegal. I prefer that employers treat ALL employees with dignity and respect, pay fair wages, provide safe and fair work conditions for all employees, regardless of where they were born.

 

[Toni]

Because citizenship is extremely difficult and expensive to acquire, many people will take deferred actions and so forth if they are offered, foolishly trusting the government when it lies and says that legal documents make them a legal resident.

Nothing expensive about it, the only difficult part of it is that part of the test will be done orally in English. The green card is a lot harder and more expensive. Her green card was many forms (and every form comes with a price tag that is supposedly the average cost to process said form), many unpleasant interviews in cities far from us. Several thousand out of pocket and there were several months she was not allowed to work. Citizenship was IIRC one form, half a day.

Immigration attorneys are not cheap.

 

[ZiprHead]

Anti-racism activists clashed with police and anti-migrant protesters on Saturday outside a London hotel where asylum seekers are being housed.
Meanwhile, people believed to be migrants were seen filming and laughing as protesters and counter-demonstrators clashed in the streets of Islington today. It comes after a coach of suspected migrants was seen arriving at the four-star Britannia International Hotel in Canary Wharf at around 1.40am this morning.

Daily Mail

No wonder the “migrants” are laughing.

Anyway, is it any wonder that the natives feel they are being replaced.

"People believed to be migrants"

You're a sucker for bullshit journalism.

 

[ZiprHead]

People are angry that their industries they worked for left. Undocumented workers didn't do that.

Exactly. It wasn’t undocumented workers, it was corporations outsourcing jobs to cut labor costs, maximize profits, and pad executive bonuses. There's nothing inherently wrong with being rich or cutting costs, and bonuses aren’t evil in themselves. But when profit becomes the priority at the expense of the very workers/consumers who make that profit possible, that’s the problem. When profit is put above the well-being of your fellow citizens, something’s broken. What’s the point of all this patriotic grandstanding, celebrating soldiers, cops, miners, oil riggers for putting everything on the line, if you won’t demand even a fraction of that same loyalty from billion-dollar corporations getting major tax cuts? You want a tax cut? Then show some fucking patriotism, bitch. These same people will argue that folks on welfare need to “get a job” or at least hold one, yet they champion tax cuts for corporations that outsource jobs and lay off workers. In the end, it’s the very people they screw over who are expected to carry the weight and foot the bill for their windfall.

Except it was mostly machinery rather than offshoring.

I watched it happening--my employer increased productivity around 20x for around 5x more workers. The rest of that was the machinery, the computer assistance etc. Offshore wasn't even remotely an option because of the turnaround time.

Your tiny little plant is not the entirety. Here in the rust belt whole plants were shut down and sent to cheap labor countries. It decimated Detroit and elsewhere in the northeast.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

But the GOP and their propaganda mill did a marvelous job making some people think that unwashed hoards of illegal immigrants were swarming into the US.

It wasn't propaganda though. It was actually happening. Unprecedented numbers of people from all over the world entered the USA illegally. You could point to Brandon's loophole of filling out an asylum application on an app as them not being illegal but even then, the numbers just crossing over the border illegally was significant. In total it is estimated anywhere between 10 and 14 million people came into the USA on Brandon's watch.

It wasn't the flood that Putin told you it was. And just look at what's happening in the world--more places are turning into political messes, of course there are more refugees.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

What kills me about all of those people who complained about inflation? Inflation hasn’t been that bad —especially if you are old like me and remember home mortgage interest rates of >18% and lines at gas stations for blocks to miles. Most young adults never had to deal with significant inflation. And btw, reading the minimum wage ( as it should have been) was going to cause some inflation.

Yup, so few learn from history. And even less so if it's not their history. How many of her relatives listened when I said about the real estate market being way overvalued? Zero.

I realize that I experienced the past 4 years when we were at the peak of our earning, had paid off the mortgage and had done some expensive and very necessary renovations. Like anyone wise I would have preferred no inflation but was wages rise, so does inflation. And yeah, I feel it at the grocery store and with my utility bills.

I look at the world, I see the US did better than average at dealing with the inflation from the supply chain shocks of Covid.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

View attachment 51600

https://democrats-homeland.house.gov/imo/media/doc/letter_re_dallas_ice_counsel_to_noem.pdf

While he is correct that America was indeed founded by whites and historically white they will no longer be a majority of the population. Not because of immigration but because whites decided they don't like to have kids anymore.

It's not that "whites" decided they don't like to have kids anymore. Every industrialized society sees the same thing--reproduction rates below replacement.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Present day robots and automation can already do most of the agriculture work furthermore AI will soon be able to do personal care in the near future. Even without this supposed technology Americans can and will do any job if the price is correct with the market.

Instead of seeking bottom wage slaves, business needs to work smarter, be more competitive, and become more productive. That way everyone who wants a good job has one and everyone has goods they can consume.

Earth to RVonse:

Many agricultural jobs can be done by robots--and those jobs generally are done by robots. The humans do the jobs that require too much judgment or too much delicacy (good luck picking that strawberry with a robot!) for the machines.

And quit listening to the Muskrat. General purpose AI has basically been an abysmal failure. And an actuator that can actually take care of a person? It takes a pretty darn good system to simply pick up an egg without breaking it. And I'm not aware of anyone making an actuator with proper force control and pressure sense across all fingers--things like egg-gripping are simply thumb against fingers, not separate finger control. We are a long ways from the hardware needed for personal care even if the software was magically available.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Of course you blame Biden even though Trump gave orders to derail a good bipartisan immigration bill.

The immigration bill was just a typical political ruse of Democrat obfuscation.

Even you should see how useless this bill really was given that Trump has fixed the border without needing it. We don't need any more bills or problems caused by congress we just needed to enforce the laws we have.

1) We have no idea if The Felon has "fixed" the border. Law enforcement encounters are not a realistic metric.

2) If he's "fixed" it it's by becoming a fascist hellhole. The "cure" is far worse than the disease.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

What does it matter what race or ethnicity someone is? We are all humans for better or worse. I'm white and I think I have at least as many close black friends as I do white ones in Georgia. They are all good people who I still keep in touch with by phone. In fact, my black friends are the best as they tend to be more caring and friendly compared to some of my white friends.

Exactly. My wife is not white. That is of absolutely no relevance to me. I married a person, not a skin color.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

"If present day robots could do the work, they would be doing the work." Totally false. If Elon Musk can catch a rocket mid air I can assure you any agriculture job can and will be automated given the effort. Present technology robots can do this work, it is simply not cost effective to invest that amount of capital now since it is just more practical to hire someone who will pick the crops for an ultra low wage.

No. The limiting factor is volume.

Can we build every piece of a machine capable of picking a strawberry without damage? Yes. Can we build a complete machine that can fit in to a strawberry plant to pick it without damage? No.