Illegal Aliens and Immigration
Thomas Dawson
June 03, 2005
We do not have an immigration problem with Mexico. We do have a border problem with Mexico. Without making more jokes about Homeland Security, borders are important. Without borders, there is no country…or security. Some public political debate has begun, but don’t expect too much.
The easiest way to win a political argument in today’s world, particularly if your position is without practical merit is to confuse the issues. The proponents of open borders, and there are many, use this method to make their arguments. They never use the correct term “illegal alien”. They refuse to view these people as either illegal or aliens. The most that one can hope for, is that they will use the term “undocumented immigrants”. You can bet that after one or two minutes of discussion the term will degenerate into just “immigrants”. Without any qualifier, most of what they say is correct. Most importantly, whatever you say in their context sounds racist. Of course, we live in an age of labels and buzzwords. If you allow such people to get away with it, they will play the game of “gotcha” as they try to stick a label on you. Unfortunately, this is not a child’s game.
If the media polls are correct, the American people overwhelmingly recognize the gravity of the situation and would like to correct it. We’re not talking about Democrats or Republicans here nor Conservatives or Liberals. When we take the labels off, you’ll find that most American citizens can and often do, think!
Alas, there is little hope for any real change to take place in the near future. There is a great and growing disconnect between modern politicians and the people they are supposedly representing. So there will be a great deal of gamesmanship or slight of hand to convince people that they are looking into the situation. In reality, the politicians will continue to stall any useful action for the sake their “financial constituency”.
Some discussion at the federal level has finally begun again, and a few really big political names are making a lot of noise. But in a typical stalling tactic, the discussion is not about closing the borders. The talk is about those illegal aliens that are already here and many more that will come, as we make plans for them. Their only concern is what will be the final criteria to make them underclass citizens? Discussions with this kind of detailed minutia can be dragged out for a very long time… and they will be. Meanwhile, Vincente Fox is sending us as many of his people as he can; as fast as he can.
The federal politicians are beholden to organized interest groups for financial support and really find it difficult, if not impossible to stand up for their people ‘back home’ on any major issue where a lot of corporate money is at stake.
Amnesty for Mexican illegal aliens was granted a few years ago, and since then the border control has been relaxed. Now we are being told that there is no alternative for a humane solution without again providing amnesty. Don’t listen to the politicians; they have no intention of closing the Mexican borders until, and only if forced to do so. It is only a ploy to bring in more cheap labor for exploitation.
The failed corporate religion of Globalization in the name of ‘free trade’ is really a search for the cheapest labor available. Corporations have greased the wheels of government and momentum is steamrolling any public opposition.
Manufacturers are now allowed to ‘globalize’ by outsourcing their labor costs to the cheapest of overseas labor, and retailers can ‘globalize’ by purchasing the cheapest products they can find manufactured overseas, and thus they can both increase their profits. They can also claim increases in productivity in a single stroke as they reduce their costs. The question arises. Why should agriculture and service industries that cannot move overseas not share in Globalization? The simple answer is they can. Simply have the politicians “move the mountain to Mohammed”.
Now that the government allows corporations to bring in really cheap “illegals” for the service and agriculture industries, they too are receiving the labor/cost benefits of ‘Globalization’. Not to mention the hundreds of thousands of “guest workers” that have already been imported to work as engineers, IT technicians, etc which are hired at only 50% to 80% of the going rate in this country, thus holding down the wage scales of the middle class and increasing corporate profits. With a single stroke of the pen and government grease, anything can be made legal. Seems like a sensible way to reduce wages and push profits up.
To paraphrase Milton Friedman, “Corporate executives, provided they stay within the law, have no responsibilities in their business activities other than to make as much money for their stockholders as possible.” Milton Freeman is absolutely right. A corporation has no responsibility to anyone. It is not a person. It is a legal animal (entity) created by the law of a country. It is an animal without social conscience or concern for anything except profits. If a corporation has any responsibility, it is only to the law of the country in which it operates. It is the duty of the country of origin to regulate and control its offspring. When a domestic corporation behaves badly, it should be disciplined. When a foreign company behaves badly, it should be disciplined and if it continues, refrained from doing business. Every country should set the rules for its own house.
If we allow “globalization” to wring out our middle class, we can easily lose the increased standard of living gained during the first quarter century after World War II. (Since then. our standard of living has gone nowhere. It has probably even declined a bit in the last quarter century.) Our problem is not with the natural ambitions of corporations. Our problem is with the deliberately calibrated reluctance of (the peoples?) representation in government to regulate with any care for or concern toward the public good.
In the long run though, the politicians at the state and local levels will have to face the reality of the economic situation. Continuing to assume low cost, near poverty level labor has a depressing effect on all wages over extended periods of time. Increases in poverty create demand for state and local services as well as lowering per capita taxes. Hospitals across the south to California have had to go into bankruptcy and some have closed because of expenses incurred by illegal aliens who are unable to pay. Many immigrants and illegal aliens have earnings low enough to qualify for welfare assistance. At the same time, these states and local governments are experiencing lower per capita tax revenues as wages begin to drift downwards. The greatest increase in costs due to these illegal aliens and low cost immigrants is, of course education. Law enforcement and incarceration costs are also rising. It is estimated that in 2003, California alone, even after accounting for tax contributions from illegal aliens, the direct cost was more than $8,000,000,000 and total costs probably well in excess of $11,000,000,000. California can’t even fix their roads, and this is just the beginning! All this is just part of the cost of subsidizing labor for the service industries.
As we erode the middle class and the consumer market begins to falter, the tax base will continue to shrink and tax revenues fall. After all, middle class working people pay the vast bulk of the tax burden. What will your town look like as state and local governments slash services by 15, 20, or even 25%?
Increasing numbers of illegal aliens and poverty level immigrants cause economic and social disruption. On the other hand, carefully managed legal immigration will contribute to the economic and social growth of the country. Bringing in large numbers of qualified people to fill jobs (at current rates of pay) where there are labor or professional shortages means more contributing citizens. Encouraging carefully managed increases in immigration is important to this country, both as an economic contribution and by increasing the population underpinning.
Do we have problems in agriculture? Certainly! How many people do we need to help us out? The government says that we already have between eight and a half million and eleven million illegal aliens. Others estimate between eighteen and twenty million. The likely probability is that we have between twelve and fifteen million. This means that the illegal aliens represent about four percent or slightly more of our population. This is about one out of every twenty-five people. Should we bring in more people for every crop and then let them melt into the general population and continue to grow a permanent underclass of cheap labor, undermining the wage base of the entire country? Of course not! There must be a constant, but controlled rotation of workers for agriculture. Perhaps permanent labor arrangements could be had with foreign labor at a slightly better rate of pay. Assuming we want to continue to subsidize agriculture with cheap labor, there are a number of possibilities.
Alternatively, we may want to consider taking the gratuitous profits away from corporate owners of our subsidized, socialized agricultural enterprises. Or perhaps even doing away with socialized agriculture and even corporate welfare entirely! I am sure that politicians would find this to be a national security issue far greater than merely open borders! But that is a subject for another day.
Even if we continue to subsidize agriculture with (dare I say dirt cheap) labor, this does not mean that every business should be entitled to hire at poverty wage levels. Inviting immigration at or near poverty level wages is not good for this country’s public good. Let the service businesses pay a little more and charge a little more. We can pay more for the services or pay a lot more for the subsidies.
Workers in the construction trades have been a part of the middle class for the last fifty years. Now, with the strongest continuous housing boom and the highest prices for houses in our history, construction workers are experiencing falling wages and unemployment due to unemployed cheap and often illegal labor. It’s past time to consider where we are heading.
It’s also time to close our borders and then begin a serious discussion. In any case, any political talk about solving the immigration problem without first closing the borders is pure deception, and a sham!
The easiest way to win a political argument in today’s world, particularly if your position is without practical merit is to confuse the issues. The proponents of open borders, and there are many, use this method to make their arguments. They never use the correct term “illegal alien”. They refuse to view these people as either illegal or aliens. The most that one can hope for, is that they will use the term “undocumented immigrants”. You can bet that after one or two minutes of discussion the term will degenerate into just “immigrants”. Without any qualifier, most of what they say is correct. Most importantly, whatever you say in their context sounds racist. Of course, we live in an age of labels and buzzwords. If you allow such people to get away with it, they will play the game of “gotcha” as they try to stick a label on you. Unfortunately, this is not a child’s game.
If the media polls are correct, the American people overwhelmingly recognize the gravity of the situation and would like to correct it. We’re not talking about Democrats or Republicans here nor Conservatives or Liberals. When we take the labels off, you’ll find that most American citizens can and often do, think!
Alas, there is little hope for any real change to take place in the near future. There is a great and growing disconnect between modern politicians and the people they are supposedly representing. So there will be a great deal of gamesmanship or slight of hand to convince people that they are looking into the situation. In reality, the politicians will continue to stall any useful action for the sake their “financial constituency”.
Some discussion at the federal level has finally begun again, and a few really big political names are making a lot of noise. But in a typical stalling tactic, the discussion is not about closing the borders. The talk is about those illegal aliens that are already here and many more that will come, as we make plans for them. Their only concern is what will be the final criteria to make them underclass citizens? Discussions with this kind of detailed minutia can be dragged out for a very long time… and they will be. Meanwhile, Vincente Fox is sending us as many of his people as he can; as fast as he can.
The federal politicians are beholden to organized interest groups for financial support and really find it difficult, if not impossible to stand up for their people ‘back home’ on any major issue where a lot of corporate money is at stake.
Amnesty for Mexican illegal aliens was granted a few years ago, and since then the border control has been relaxed. Now we are being told that there is no alternative for a humane solution without again providing amnesty. Don’t listen to the politicians; they have no intention of closing the Mexican borders until, and only if forced to do so. It is only a ploy to bring in more cheap labor for exploitation.
The failed corporate religion of Globalization in the name of ‘free trade’ is really a search for the cheapest labor available. Corporations have greased the wheels of government and momentum is steamrolling any public opposition.
Manufacturers are now allowed to ‘globalize’ by outsourcing their labor costs to the cheapest of overseas labor, and retailers can ‘globalize’ by purchasing the cheapest products they can find manufactured overseas, and thus they can both increase their profits. They can also claim increases in productivity in a single stroke as they reduce their costs. The question arises. Why should agriculture and service industries that cannot move overseas not share in Globalization? The simple answer is they can. Simply have the politicians “move the mountain to Mohammed”.
Now that the government allows corporations to bring in really cheap “illegals” for the service and agriculture industries, they too are receiving the labor/cost benefits of ‘Globalization’. Not to mention the hundreds of thousands of “guest workers” that have already been imported to work as engineers, IT technicians, etc which are hired at only 50% to 80% of the going rate in this country, thus holding down the wage scales of the middle class and increasing corporate profits. With a single stroke of the pen and government grease, anything can be made legal. Seems like a sensible way to reduce wages and push profits up.
To paraphrase Milton Friedman, “Corporate executives, provided they stay within the law, have no responsibilities in their business activities other than to make as much money for their stockholders as possible.” Milton Freeman is absolutely right. A corporation has no responsibility to anyone. It is not a person. It is a legal animal (entity) created by the law of a country. It is an animal without social conscience or concern for anything except profits. If a corporation has any responsibility, it is only to the law of the country in which it operates. It is the duty of the country of origin to regulate and control its offspring. When a domestic corporation behaves badly, it should be disciplined. When a foreign company behaves badly, it should be disciplined and if it continues, refrained from doing business. Every country should set the rules for its own house.
If we allow “globalization” to wring out our middle class, we can easily lose the increased standard of living gained during the first quarter century after World War II. (Since then. our standard of living has gone nowhere. It has probably even declined a bit in the last quarter century.) Our problem is not with the natural ambitions of corporations. Our problem is with the deliberately calibrated reluctance of (the peoples?) representation in government to regulate with any care for or concern toward the public good.
In the long run though, the politicians at the state and local levels will have to face the reality of the economic situation. Continuing to assume low cost, near poverty level labor has a depressing effect on all wages over extended periods of time. Increases in poverty create demand for state and local services as well as lowering per capita taxes. Hospitals across the south to California have had to go into bankruptcy and some have closed because of expenses incurred by illegal aliens who are unable to pay. Many immigrants and illegal aliens have earnings low enough to qualify for welfare assistance. At the same time, these states and local governments are experiencing lower per capita tax revenues as wages begin to drift downwards. The greatest increase in costs due to these illegal aliens and low cost immigrants is, of course education. Law enforcement and incarceration costs are also rising. It is estimated that in 2003, California alone, even after accounting for tax contributions from illegal aliens, the direct cost was more than $8,000,000,000 and total costs probably well in excess of $11,000,000,000. California can’t even fix their roads, and this is just the beginning! All this is just part of the cost of subsidizing labor for the service industries.
As we erode the middle class and the consumer market begins to falter, the tax base will continue to shrink and tax revenues fall. After all, middle class working people pay the vast bulk of the tax burden. What will your town look like as state and local governments slash services by 15, 20, or even 25%?
Increasing numbers of illegal aliens and poverty level immigrants cause economic and social disruption. On the other hand, carefully managed legal immigration will contribute to the economic and social growth of the country. Bringing in large numbers of qualified people to fill jobs (at current rates of pay) where there are labor or professional shortages means more contributing citizens. Encouraging carefully managed increases in immigration is important to this country, both as an economic contribution and by increasing the population underpinning.
Do we have problems in agriculture? Certainly! How many people do we need to help us out? The government says that we already have between eight and a half million and eleven million illegal aliens. Others estimate between eighteen and twenty million. The likely probability is that we have between twelve and fifteen million. This means that the illegal aliens represent about four percent or slightly more of our population. This is about one out of every twenty-five people. Should we bring in more people for every crop and then let them melt into the general population and continue to grow a permanent underclass of cheap labor, undermining the wage base of the entire country? Of course not! There must be a constant, but controlled rotation of workers for agriculture. Perhaps permanent labor arrangements could be had with foreign labor at a slightly better rate of pay. Assuming we want to continue to subsidize agriculture with cheap labor, there are a number of possibilities.
Alternatively, we may want to consider taking the gratuitous profits away from corporate owners of our subsidized, socialized agricultural enterprises. Or perhaps even doing away with socialized agriculture and even corporate welfare entirely! I am sure that politicians would find this to be a national security issue far greater than merely open borders! But that is a subject for another day.
Even if we continue to subsidize agriculture with (dare I say dirt cheap) labor, this does not mean that every business should be entitled to hire at poverty wage levels. Inviting immigration at or near poverty level wages is not good for this country’s public good. Let the service businesses pay a little more and charge a little more. We can pay more for the services or pay a lot more for the subsidies.
Workers in the construction trades have been a part of the middle class for the last fifty years. Now, with the strongest continuous housing boom and the highest prices for houses in our history, construction workers are experiencing falling wages and unemployment due to unemployed cheap and often illegal labor. It’s past time to consider where we are heading.
It’s also time to close our borders and then begin a serious discussion. In any case, any political talk about solving the immigration problem without first closing the borders is pure deception, and a sham!
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