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Grant,

Well put but its the corporations who are providing the jobs that bring the illegals.

Until US corporations and politicians start thinking longterm and not the shortterm profits, nothing will change.

Grant,

Great point made. But America will never realistically do that. It does hurt Americans earning power but ever since free trade agreements were acknowleddged, it created this problem.

As a matter of fact, its not only Mexicans creating this problem but now south asian skilled labor also contributes to it. Nike as you know benefits from cheap labor in places like Malaysia and Thailand etc.

Just phone Dell tech support and I gurantee you will probably land someone in India too. Alot of US jobs in certain sectors are being outsourced.

Ooh yeah Grant , what about the damage done to the cotton farmer in India when America is subsidizing their farmers here, while in the same time exporting American fertilizers and such for a cheaper price , fertlizers I might add incompatible with their way of doing business.
We either live in a global world or not!!
It's unbelievable how wealthy America is { lightyears ahead of the rest of the world} and I'm still bemused by the fact that some people feel threatened by Mexicans who for the vast majority perform jobs that the average American won't do.
Check out what happened to the famers in California , Colorado { maybe Utah} after the INS imposed stricter guidelines on the seasonal foreign work force coming from Mexico. NOBODY to do the job!!! It ain't about wages , for they{ farmers } were willing to pay more .
Let's get real here.

So long as Americans are lazy and too proud to do the menial labor work, mexicans and others will fill the void. How do they hurt the economy when they are doing jobs no one wants to do?

Ina Baxar,

My opinion is that the guilty party is "Free Trade". I assume that Indian cotton farmers could be paid appropriately if they were producing for the Indian market and were suitably protected by import quotas or duties. The old system.

It is when you remove those equalizing forces that the trouble arises.

The corporate intent of free trade is to reduce the cost of labor to it's lowest common denominator. Labor in the developed world is the looser. Even labor in the underdeveloped world loses as one county's labor becomes more expensive than anothers, and the outsourcing is sent elsewhere.

The argument that no one wants to do those jobs is fallacius. No one will do those jobs FOR THE MONEY BEING OFFERED. And for so long as the corporations can find people to work for less, they will not offer more.

Okay Grant on the first part about the "free trade ".
On your second point , like I said the INS imposed new guidelines on the whole seasonal Mexicans helping out the Califirnian farmers .New tarifs also , check out the USIC website , btw the price for getting a green card for example has jumped from 275$ 2 yrs ago to a cool 1000$ . Anyway so the farmers tired of all the administrative paperwork , placed ads in their local communities some in papers out of Sacaramento and San Francisco , pledging higher wages .
Number of people who showed up for work--> ridiculously low
Number of people that stayed throughout the season --> 0
It was on PBS and CNN, I ain't making it up.
Check PBS website you may find something on it , not sure .

Ina Baxar,

As far as I am aware, cheap Mexican labor has never been unavailable in California. Certainly not for any extended period and certainly not in the past ten years. We have had daily line-ups of undocumented workers here in Oakland for at least that period.

We have always had a supply of cheap labor, so no other source has developed. I have not a clue what those farmers offered, but day laborers here in Oakland get $10/hr. The farmers usually work on contract with labor brokers, who I doubt pay even that. It's never been a laborers' market. Why do you think Chavez tried to start a union?

In any fair deal, agricultural labor needs to be paid way more.

[quote="Ican"]So long as Americans are lazy and too proud to do the menial labor work, mexicans and others will fill the void. How do they hurt the economy when they are doing jobs no one wants to do?[/quote]


Exactly.