Illegal Immigrants

[Tails]

Illegal immigration is, while not a crisis, an issue that must be tended to, especially in California. There have been a few proposals to deal with the issue.

George W. Bush has drawn up the "work permit" plan. This would allow foreigners and illegal immigrants to obtain work permits and work legally in the United States for a certain amount of time. After, I believe, 6 years their work permit expires and they must obtain a green card through a background check or return home.

Arguments for this proposal say that it is a balanced approach. It does not offer amnesty while at the same time doesn't apply additional force in throwing illegal immigrants out. Arguments against the proposal say it's a plan that will spiral out of control and is an insult to legal immigrants.

There are definitely many pros and cons for this, but I personally agree with the work permit plan. It seems like a realistic plan that will benefit the economy while at the same keep the much welcomed labor in the country, which will now be legal and trackable (a definite plus for homeland security).

What are the short term and long term effects of this plan? Is this plan flexible enough to accomodate for necessary changes? Will this benefit Americans and immigrants alike?

And finally, a random smiley: :ionfish:

[ceejayoz]

I think the remaining Native Americans should get to decide.

[Alex Drake]

Agreed.

[Verrin]

The natives just want a tax free living. And all they're getting is a nice big government thumb up the ass. (My mother's side of the family are all natives, and they complain a lot. What better do they have to do? :cranky

They'd probably boot me out of the country if they could. Family love, eh?

[Moe]

I think it's a good idea, by making them "legal" workers and thereby forcing the corporations to pay them the legal minimum wages, one of the big incentives to hire illegal immigrants over legal residents is destroyed since they can no longer be paid below mimimum wages.

[kaskara]

I haven't read the proposal, so I don't really know all the details. Maybe you can help clear something up for me.

The main reason corporations exploit illegal immigrant workers is because it's cheaper. Obviously they get away with this a significant portion of the time, or it wouldn't be an issue in the first place. Companies feel the risk is worth the financial reward.

Now, as far as I can tell, all that's changing here is the balance of legal/expensive choices vs. illegal/cheap choices. Where the only choices before were between cheap illegal immigrant labour (group A) and expensive legal resident labour (group B), there is now the choice of legal foreign labour (group C). I think we're assuming this new group would be about as expensive as legal resident labour?

The best result I can see is a slight job shift from group A into group C, based on simple risk vs. reward reasoning. Most jobs from group A won't be worth the cost of moving them to group C, in spite of the risk hiring from group A represents. Unless, of course the job supply from group A becomes negligible.

So my question is, assuming supply from group A needs to shrink drastically in order for this policy to be effective, how are illegal immigrants going to be sufficiently encouraged to obtain work permits? It seems obvious that any companies using cheap, illegal labour will act to protect their bottom line and apply some pressure against illegal immigrants getting permits. Or is this assumption wrong?

[Black]

Illegal immigrants need to be educated about work permits obviously. Of course they should be educated about becoming legal citizens as well. The best way to make sure they obtain work permits is to crack down on companies that hire them in the first place. Once that happens it will become easier to make sure they receive the same pay as legal citizens, and the same living conditions consequentially.

[Vaarok]

http://www.sre.gob.mx/tramites/consu...te/default.htm

Personally, while I find things like the Minuteman project appealing, it's too big to stop until the mexican economy picks up. Which signs indicate will be soon, which could quite likely abruptly reduce the flow of cheap labor heading north.

[Nurizeko]

so the illegals will be illegally immigrating back to mexico, lol...

[TheDeadlyShoe]

The 'work permit' bit was announced back in what, 1999? But it's not gotten anywhere since then. Dead in the water, like Mars.

[ceejayoz]

Personally, while I find things like the Minuteman project appealing, it's too big to stop until the mexican economy picks up. Which signs indicate will be soon, which could quite likely abruptly reduce the flow of cheap labor heading north.

That'll be fun for our economy, heh.

The more globalization we get, the more Americans are going to have to adjust to more reasonably priced labor. A good thing, overall, but it'll be painful for we who've gotten used to cheap goods and services.

[Starfisher]

Just heard something interesting on NPR.

A girl was brought over illegally when she was three by her parents. She went through high school and did pretty well. When it came time to apply for college, she realized she couldn't because she didn't have an SSN. Somehow someone found out, and she and a friend got scholarships to go to college.

The kicker: She's STILL not a citizen.

FFS. I don't know if it's her own fault for not trying to become one (how DO you become a citizen anyway?) or the governments fault for not just freaking giving in and giving her citizenship.

[Tails]

Immigrants trickling in to the United States would provide the same type of labor that outsourcing companies are looking for. Only in this case, they wouldn't need to go overseas because their labor would be coming to them. In addition, there are certain jobs that cannot be outsourced (such as farming), and still require the labor.

[Bobacanoosh]

I don't remember the exact rules for citizenship, or the various rules that apply to people who have immigrated at certain times and have had amnesty legislation passed for that period, but "naturalization" generally requires several years living in the country and applicants usually have to take a course over American government and pass a test that most U.S. citizens couldn't on the American government. The girl may not want to become a citizen so that she doesn't have to give up citizenship to her native country, since most don't allow duel citizenship except in special circumstances (i.e. Child of citizens of one country born in another).

[Italka]

For some reason.

I am tottaly against illigal immigration because..

In california, they play a tottaly backwards version of the immigration law. They reward the people who sneaks across the border, and punish those who try to deport them(See special order 40). And technically here where I live it's not fair because U.S. citizens have pay high taxes for illigal/undocumented aliens to get free service.

I mean it's a lot easier for a person who came from Guatemala a week ago to get service than a US citizen who is in US for 40 years.

I'm not trying to be racist but we have immigration laws as well.

And yes, this is a hot issue.

[General Nuke Em]

As far as I know, you become a citizen by getting a visa, coming over legally, get permanent resident status, then after a period of time (usually 5 years) you can apply for citizenship. Then if you meet some requirements (that pretty much anybody could meet as long as they're not a criminal), you take a test on US Patriotism 101 (how many stars are on the flag? What color are those stars? who elects the Congress?). Passing the test, you swear an oath of loyalty to the United States. I didn't have to take the test, because both of my parents were naturalized before I was.

It happened to me, and I didn't have to slink across the border. Then again, its kinda hard to swim from Taiwan.

I don't have a problem with immigration as long as you come over legally. I realize that might not be possible sometimes (such as fleeing an oppressive third world dictatorship that doesn't let you go to the local US embassy), but last time I checked, Mexico wasn't run by a tinpot dictatorship.

[Bobacanoosh]

Mexico is better than some countries, but part of the problem is that many of the immigrants aren't Mexicans, they have come up through Mexico from South America, and many of those countries are pretty bad, so guess what happens when the INS drops them off in Mexioc. Hmm... I wonder if I should travel back to my wartorn native country or just try to go over the border again...

[LoCo]

"Work permit"

Is that like the work permit I had to get so that I could work in NZ before I got my PR (Permanent Residence) which I need to get before I get Citizenship in NZ? From what I can see it is. It's not a new thing, not by a long shot. America is behind the times if you guys think this is new.

In NZ it works, it gives the government money and lets the people wanting to move in work. After a bit of working they have enough money to put in for a PR (Which I now have {About time too}). Then if they want to become a Citizen they have to be in the country for 4 years or more and give up some more money. (None of this is small amounts either, I mean, they have to work and save up for the PR alone, around $1500 NZD give or take which is a lot for a kiwi ...)

I don't see the point of becoming a citizen. I get a vote as it is because I am a permanent resident of this country, I get most of the benifits too. I consider them my due after spending so much money (And time, four years it took me to get my PR). I don't feel the need to be called a Kiwi. I don't feel any want to be a NZer. I don't need a country to define me. (Something I think most americans need.)

While I was waiting to get my PR I was illegal once or twice (Permits ran out and didn't have money to get new ones and such.)

The US should look to other countries once in a while, they will surprize them.

[ceejayoz]

They reward the people who sneaks across the border, and punish those who try to deport them(See special order 40).

http://www.aclu.org/WorkplaceRights/...?ID=7804&c=183

"Special Order 40 is essential. Immigrants are disproportionately the targets of crime. Victims and witnesses concerned that they will be questioned about their immigration status - or arrested and turned over to INS officials by the police - will refuse to come forward. The result is inevitable: immigrants will become easy prey for criminals who know the victims will not report offenses to the police for fear of being deported."

As for "punishment," no, it doesn't punish those trying to enforce immigration laws. It leaves immigration law enforcement up to those responsible for doing so, federal officers - not local law enforcement.

I mean it's a lot easier for a person who came from Guatemala a week ago to get service than a US citizen who is in US for 40 years.

Oh? What service would that be?

[n0z3k1ll3r]

Oh? What service would that be?

Presumably getting deported.

[Mac_Bug]

Illegal immigrants should be treated as terrorists

[Italka]

pffft. ACLU.

Oh? What service would that be?

Presumably getting deported.

Oh no man.
They actually get government benefits that comes from US citizen's tax money which here in california, the state and federal budgets are being overwhelmed.

From my point of view, they steal services that a US Citizen(including legal immigrants) has to pay large sums of money for.

Lets say for an example, the people who applied and successfully got a legal permit to live in the USA and cross the border by going through the immigration procedure is like correctly solving all the math problems on a homework and getting rewards for that sounds legit.

The people who crosses the border without going through the immigration procedure(ie illigally) is like filling in mostly wrong answers on a math homework and in reality, they ACTUALLY get rewarded for that.

Illigal aliens are not always alga culture(sorry for crap spelling) workers, but are criminals as well. There has been problems where an non-us citizen illegally here, commits horrendus crimes against US citizens, and then flee back to mexico because the mexican government refuses to extradite them back into the USA.

Illegal immigrants should be treated as terrorists

Well not exactly that but more like law breakers.

There are some extremely violent terrorists that did cross the US/Mexico border illigally.

[Nurizeko]

one draw-back of living in a first world democratic nation is everyone wants to come here, and we wont have the balls to really crack down on illegals, lightning arrest raids, and instant deportatinos and what not, lol.


in britain illegals abuse the asylum seeking rules way too much, and we do have a bit of an issue that in some bigger cities, maybe others, that groups of young illegal alien young men doss about but saying that, our chav population cant complain either =/.


im all fine for legal immigrants to come and work here if thats what they want and are willing to take the legal route to it, but i think, purely based on maintaining our country as a nation for british (including legals which count as british, so no nazi bashing me) we have to seriously crack down on illegal immigrants and asylum seeking liars and deport them, its not good for ethnic tensions, it isnt fair on successive generations of british, white or black ,that have born here, grown up here, and made britain as desirable a nation it is today, to just let everyone come in as they please and live off the dole, and it isnt fair on the legal immigrants who have worked hard legally to come here and become british.


also that muslim cleric guy, was he in britain legally?.....i dunno, but he was all fine and happy to live off of our hard earned good economy, yet he was just as ready to preach destruction of the western world, and the length of time it took for the police to do ANYTHING boggles the mind.


watch out for racism, surely, but, need to loose the stigma on people just stepping up to a serious issue which needs to be addressed, and wanting the best for the country.

[ceejayoz]

pffft. ACLU.

Yeah, an organization dedicated to preserving civil liberties. What assholes.

They actually get government benefits that comes from US citizen's tax money which here in california, the state and federal budgets are being overwhelmed.

Again, give me an example. What benefits do they get?

Illigal aliens are not always alga culture(sorry for crap spelling) workers, but are criminals as well. There has been problems where an non-us citizen illegally here, commits horrendus crimes against US citizens, and then flee back to mexico because the mexican government refuses to extradite them back into the USA.

Every bit of that post applies to legal aliens, too. There are plenty of legal alien (and American citizen) criminals who flee to a country that doesn't extradite to the US.

"OMG illegal aliens commit crimes" isn't much of an argument when American citizens do the same thing.

[kongxinga]

Guys the problem is not illegal immigration, it is the minimum wage and other"social reform".

Lets say a company looks at its running cost and needs to decide how many workers to hire. Ok using simple production demand curves, let's say they need to hire 200 workers, which will mean from their budget paying them $3 an hour, below minimum wage. If some nanny government comes and says, no you must pay minimum wage, what do you think the company is going to do? It redraws its demand curves, and finds the new optimal amount of labour, which will be hire 100 workers at $6 an hour "for example" (I am perfectly aware this is not right, as the theoretical situation will be even WORSE). What does this mean, some 100 people who would have gotten work gets laid off jobless. So stop complaining about illegal immigrants making American's unemployed, those Americans are already made unemployed by minimum wage.

With less labour, the company produces less output and hence less profit, so GDP is lowered a lot. With GDP lowered, economy grows slower, so industrial capacity increases slower, so those jobless people will not get jobs for a long time.

Compared with, all those 200 get $3 jobs. Sure, they might have to forego eating meat, or watching baseball or someother luxury, but the economy grows much faster due to higher production from the factory, eventually, the economy will be good enough that the company can afford to raise wages or increase employment without fear of lowering output (as the wages are so low, the raise will not lower the opportunity cost for liesure, so people work more, instead of being like those wanna be rich corporate workers, who have so much money, that they take "vacations" and leave the company to rot).

Illegal immigration argument IMHO has always been misrepresented, just like those jingoists who like to say how "war improves the economy" (it is broken window fallacy. Suppose a boy throws a stone and breaks a window. The glassmaker has to come and repair and is paid some wage. Stupid people will say, look how breaking windows created jobs for the glasssmaker, when actually, it just wasted the glassmaker's time because if the window was not broken, he would have more time to work on redecorating the stained glass in the cathedral for an overall positive benefit to society, instead of a net effect of zero for the window case)

It is in many ways a thin veil for the real ugly racism, which smacks of the laws discriminating Chinese in Victorian times, which were also backed up with faux arguments then as well, when in reality the US population just felt a general sense of mistrust.

Immigration was one of the reasons Mexico is now 3rd world while USA is Capitalism Empire. Back in 1836 ("remember the alamo?) Mexico was a world power, arguably even stronger than the fledgling USA. During the Victorian age, many immigrants came to USA, many of them very skilled. According to my history text, there were many German and IRISH, so that now the largest amount of White people in USA has German blood, then Irish blood. LOL and US people thought they were Anglo Saxon during WW1 and WW2. The skilled immigrants filled up the factories, the unskilled ones displaced the residents, who took low level jobs in factories, which was better for all involved, as the residents had a absolute advantage in factory working (at least they spoke English) while the immigrants had a relative advantage in manual labour. So it was better for everyone, while European countries fretted over their lack of manpower, and the Chinese emperor watched thousands of his skilled craftsmen leave.
This good circle continued and the economy grew. No there were not a lot of social reforms at that time, and because of the low cost of everything, Capitalist were not afraid to invest and build more factories.

This is in direct contrast now, where Company owners are scared of firing their incompetant people because of the riduclously large severment packages, face all kinds of lawsuits all day, all which increase cost of operation. Americans have become extremely whiny since the days of the Alamo.

So fellow Americans, welcome every single immigrant with open arms. We need a growing economy. I am sure Americans can grit their teeth and bear it with a few social reforms removed, not some crazy place where everywhere is a deathtrap for would be investors. Why do you think people outsource?

[TheDeadlyShoe]

Voodoo economics. Historically the minimum wage rate has little or no effect on the number of minimum-wage employees; businesses need a minimum number of people to run, and that's the number they will hire - regardless of the rate. If the rate is lower, they're not gonna hire more people when they don't need more; it would cut into the bottom line.

edit: some sources

[Mac_Bug]

Wow, talk about shitty economics 101.

Do you know why we have minimum wages in the first place? Do you have the faintest idea about what poverty is like? Why don't we go back to the good old days of having blacks work in the plantation as slaves because it's good for the economy? Oh wait, we have sweatshops in third world countries to do that now.

Even if we lower the minimum wage, there is still no reason for a company to not hire the best people for their money. If a Mexican worker can do twice as much work for the same cost (or willing to do the same work for half the pay), guess who's going to get hired?

Since these immigrants are illegal, who would hire them? Nobody on paper. Everything is under the table paid in cash (this isn't restricted to illegal immigrants) and the minimum wage? Never heard of it.

Of course everyone who comes across the border properly has to prove to uncle sam that they won't be a burden on society - you either have money to invest from raping your home country, or you have skills developed and paid for by your home country - illegal immigrants on the other hand, are illegal for a reason.

[edit]


The minimum wage does have an overall impact because the whole would you like fries with that job market caters most specificly to teenagers and most people already get paid above the minimum wage.

[kongxinga]

Yup deadly Shoe, there is always the opposing school of economics. Thanks for the link. Ill find those papers and give them a read through. At any rate it will give me good practice for my econometrics summer job.

My opinion is that I would shut down my business if because of the minimum wage increase I cannot afford the minimum amount of workers. That seems reasonable theoretically, so I accept that. Of course, it seems here that there are statistical evidence this does not happen, but then I would really appreciate some theoretical basis, by way of graphs. My experience with Econometrics tells me that you can interpret the data in any way you want.

[Mac_Bug]

I think they forgot to teach you the elasticity of supply and demand curves

[kongxinga]

Mac bug the curves I am using are not from your Econ 101 text supply and demand curve, but from an intermediate Microeconomics text. Refer to intermediate Microeconomics A modern Approach by Hal R. Varian 6th edition Published by W.W. Norton Chapter 26. The only case where imposing a minimum wage may increase employment is with an monopsonist.

I fail to see how elasticity solves the problem.

I see your a Canadian, where there are lots of social reforms, so naturally you may feel insulted by my views, but they were in no way meant to offend you.

** Edit: Discussing Economics seriously in a game forums is a bit off, so we should really spare each other the graphs here.

[Mac_Bug]

Of course the cost of labor impacts the number of people you employ, but it doesn't have an effect on the market as a whole because the MAJORITY of people already get paid better than the minimum wage.

Try living on 500 dollars a month. What does your intermediate econ text tell you?

[LoCo]

kongxinga: What did you think the GD was for? You do know what general means right? Quit trying to back out, this is a topic people want to talk about. If you don't want to take part anymore then don't, but don't run around screaming about this being a gaming forum so we shouldn't talk about anything else ...

[Bobacanoosh]

Changing minimum wage wouldn't hurt people who already get paid more than that, and lowering it would push those who are working at minimum wage farther into poverty since they likely don't have a skill. The farther a group gets into poverty, the harder it is to get back out, and eventually much of the group will be forced to rely almost entirely on social programs. Also, your example that says that more workers increase productivity doesn't really create a strong economy, because with these low wages all profits would acrue at the top until you end up with a few wealthy people and a lot of poor people, which is bad and very unstable. Finally, this line of reasoning ignores the cost of outfitting workers with the necessary equipment to do their jobs. If I can hire more workers but to do so I will have to buy more expensive machinery to set them up and I'm not sure that there is enough of a market to offset these costs then I still shouldn't do it. Your glass example is also flawed because if no stained-glass windows are being ordered then the glass worker is not wasting his time and the flow of money is generally good for the economy.

[kongxinga]

Mac Bug, you would have to agree that although it seems that most people earn above the minimum wage, there is a significant portion of people at whose wages are tacked to the minimum wage? From what I know Macdonald sets its wage at some amount above the current minimum. Raising the minimum wage would still lead to some people being laid off, and their labour replaced by machines for example ( no labour union for fast food workers unfortunately, so MacD can do this).

Ok MacBug for your second query. In case you think I am an overpriviledged person, a capitalistic pig dog as some might put it . Think again. Let's convert the below minimum currency 500 USD to some other currencies I know and what can be bought with that. 500 USD will be 1500 reais. The salario minimo there is 260 reais from what I remember. So this US below minimum wage figure would put your Brazilian comfortably into the upper middle class there. I would presume it is similar for the mexicans. Which is one reason why they are willing to work for below the minimum wage, not because they have "no human dignity" or some other generally racist reasons that supporters of limited immigration tend to say.

But for a person unemployed because of the minimum wage, try living on 0 USD a month. I am sure you would feel great about the other JOE getting a share of your wage just because he happened to be there first or some other inane reason. For these unfortunate souls we have social security, which is a touchy issue best handled elsewhere.

Another rather off topic subject somewhat related to this topic concerning your college UBC. Three things I know about it. 1. Great school, home of esteemed Prof. Krebs. 2. Highly subsidised tuition, which was greatly attractive to me while I was applying. 3. Denied me, for the sole reason I was unable to afford to go to the American School there due to their high tuition rates. I went to a local Brazilian high school. I won't list my credentials here.
Limited immigration is a bit similar to that, in that people seeking jobs in the US are thrown out for a silly reason of they are not American, under the guise of protecting jobs already lost to the minimum wage.

At Loco I am very aware of the GD forum. Experienced forumers know you do not win forum arguments, so you do not back out as you put it, but simply state your opinion while trying your best not to offend the other party. This being said, I do not understand the relevance of your post. You must have misinterpreted my meaning. If I posted my graphs, I am sure others will post their counterarguments with their graphs, and Economics being what it is, no one will agree (not even the leading economists agree), and this thread will be a bit richer by a few graphs meaningless to most.

I would choose to ignore your thinly veiled insult of no relevance.

**edit At Boba, just as a clarification, in the glass example, we are assuming the glassmaker is making stained glass when he gets the call to fix the window, which is quite reasonable assumption for a functioning economy. THus he wastes time fixing the window in that case. Your other points I do agree. eventually social reforms may be necessary, if only to keep the workers happy. But if too much are implemented at the wrong time, it will retard economic growth.

[Bobacanoosh]

Using currency exchange rates to determine status doesn't work because they rarely accurately show buying power. For instance, a worker in Japan who makes more than his American counterpart may still have a lower standard of living because that country is significanly more expensive to live in, which is one reason that many jobs in Japan pay more than in the U.S.

[kongxinga]

Sorry boba, I have to clarify again.

I lived in Brazil before. I am aware of the purchasing power of the reais. 1500 reais a month makes the person upper middle class no doubts about it. I hope you can take my word on it, I hate putting up figures showing how much various consumer goods cost. Some goods are subsidised, so more confusion is added in.

Thanks Boba for bringing up Japan. One more advantage of immigration is to alleviate the aging American society. Japan has one of the most uniform societies in the world. Being a post industrial nation, they have a quickly aging population. There is a huge debate going on there about whether to import foreign Philipino labour mainly to take care of the elderly. Some there argue that the Philipinos can take the menial labour in taking care of the elderly, freeing the better educated Japanese for other jobs. Others have lots of counterarguments, mainly on grounds of social stability. Needless to say, the former view is to my advantage for USA, as the USA has a heterogenous society already, and it is working quite well. Sooner or later USA will start aging as badly as Japan. It is best that something be planned for that.

[Mac_Bug]

Nobody's saying you don't know what 1500 reais can buy you in Brazil, it's what it can buy you in the US of A that really matters, since you know, in order to work here, you'd have to live here. It's apparently a very common thing for immigrants to think US of A is the land of financial freedom because they don't need calculators to convert USD to whatever currency, but in reality, well, I think The Simpsons portrays the typical family pretty well financially.

I knew you'd bring up the whole what about ppl who aren't employed argument, but that's exactly what unemployment insurance and welfare is for in the US and Canada. In fact the big laugh is that North America has more social safety net than Communist China. Increase in minimum wage induces a larger demand for low tech jobs and perhaps lowers the supply of them, the result is a more competitive market place, not at all what you would call inane reasons. Granted, we are talking about burgers and fries, then the argument can be turned both ways and you can ask yourself why should someone else not have your job.

If you are joe brown looking for a job in a town and there are 10 new ppl from outside who are now applying for the same jobs, what exactly do you think is going to happen to joe's chances?

[kongxinga]

Very sorry Mac Bug, you lost me in the simpson argument. Are you saying that the Simpson's which if I remember portrays a fairly well to do familiy living in the suburbs, is a typical American family? I don't watch Simpson's too often. Does the Simpson's mean American's are fairly well to do? Or does Homer worry about someone taking his nuclear plant job, and thus they are considered fairly poor? Are the simpson's only rich in debt? I really don't know.

I don't want to touch the Social security benefits thing yet. That deserves a whole new thread and someone more informed about that than I. Just like to put that Social Security is great in some cases, but when implemented poorly, may lead to situations like in some European countries now.

I still must stand by my original view that there is some economic loss from minimum wage. Yes you are right, there will be increased demand for the low tech job. As we all know, in a normal market, people will bid down the wage to the equilibrium rate, but the minimum wage sets an artificial floor. So some people who want the job and would have gotten it in a competitive market will not get it. This is very similar to rent controls in Apartments in New York, which is quite a famous historical example of government intervention gone wrong.

Back to Joe. Joe's chances of getting the job will drop all things being equal. This is not the case in "theoretical real life". Let's say nothing illegal takes place (below minimum wages). Joe will probably still get the job, due to home team advantage (informational or social advantage on his own turf). Problem is, the immigrants, due to the high demand for the job, are willing to bid down the price, and this has nothing to do with them lacking human dignity or sth else, as I have illustrated. While an American will say Pffft, 3 dollars cannot buy even a Big Mac Meal (sorry about this, in no way do American's think of Big Mac all day) the immigrant will be thinking, this 3 dollars will be enough to (buy medicine for the family, repair the bicycle, help my family get enough money to fix their roof). In other words the 3 dollar job is worth Much more to the immigrant than to the local. Since its worth more, more economic surplus is satisfied and THEORETICALLY the economy is more efficient by definition ONLY.

Now if Joe had no saftey net, was hungry and everything, AKA Grapes of Wrath family. He will also value the job more, and will go underbid the others. He will still get the job if it is worth more to him than others. Problem is American's refuse to do that (and its illegal). Maybe it may be because of their National spirit or just cultural difference.

For example I get glared at when I give 1USD as tip for a $10 meal. Apparently American's must get more than 15% unlike the optional 10% that exists in much of the rest of the World. The guy looked like he wanted to fling it back at my face (I was just back at America, so I do make these mistakes. Things had changed a lot since I left).

That 1USD would be treated with absolute reverence in many developing and newly developed countries. I accidently mistipped a USD to the porter while in Brazil. (I was inwardly groaning. Overtipping is very crude and crass, especially outside the US. In the US it seems fashionable?) The porter was clutching it and saying Obrigado Senhor so many times I was embarassed. The scary thing was that that porter recognised me in a different setting (local Brazilian Fast food chain) and still remembered me!

While the same USD will be small enough to fling back at someone in the US. Glad to know it was appreciated.

Ok granted, this could happen only in Pre Bush times, so don't try it now. (Antiamerican sentiment is on the rise. Somehow the general picture of the Yank as a mostly harmless gentleman is changed to all Yanks are Bush? I got fingerprinted like a terrorist (or simple foreigner in the US case) while entering Brazil). The recent diplomatic blunder of calling Lula a drunkard did not help at all.

Americans must stop this irrational zenophobia, which is what I believe is the REAL cause for all this controversy over illegal immigration. There are some members in my family who are not citizens. While travelling THROUGH the US to Brazil from another country, we were asked why we had no return ticket. When I tried explaining how we were not going to the US, but to another country, the official called 2 security officials over and we were told to step out of the line (one of my relatives not being able to speak English did not help at all). Not willing to endure the nonsence over us either being terrorists or illegal immigrants, I had to say the stupidest thing ever in front of a lot of people.

" I am a American citizen, this is my passport, these people are part of my entourage, and I expect that they will be granted the same rights and protection as bestowed to a citizen, as stated in the Passport."

That miraculously solved things, even though our workplace in Brazil called them and verified we were going there, with no success. Apparently, American's are somehow unable to bring either terrorists or illegal immigrants into the country. Now I am quite sure that if we had lighter complexions, or spoke some sort of American accent (none of us did, the nearest sounded a bit like RP) we would have no problems at all, as many of us were citizens.

My points being.
1. Illegal Immigrants do not destroy American Jobs. THe jobs were already lost to the minimum wage or were not wanted by Americans.
2. They do have human dignity.
3. Legalization of most immigration, or at least some legal protection is very needed. This is to prevent exploitation of the immigrants, who as statistics show, are usually single, by themselves, and far from their family and their social network, and usually send money HOME for the immense purchasing power of the dollar there. Legalization will prevent the snakeheads and similar situations from happening. If you are forced to work for wages you do not want to pay off an invented ridiculous amount of debt, that is not economic efficiency, not to mention the social and humanitarian reasons.
4. Aging society will be alleviated somewhat, both from the immigrants taking up jobs for care of elderly, and the immigrants being mostly young.
5. Someone working for USA in a job he is very happy with, earning say 3 dollars an hour, is much less likely to hate the US/be a terrorist/ and is more likely to return home and make more people pro US. This solves the whole Zenophobia craze here. Well off people do not become extremists, unlike the men hungry without jobs in their own country who get the notion USA might be behind their plight (May or may not be true).
6. Tech Know How. Every country needs this. You can brain drain another country of their educated human resources. What's bad about that (for the US of course)?

[Mac_Bug]

So if you were paid $500, how much money can you mail home after living expenses?

[ceejayoz]

It should be noted that making $500 a month is actually worse than making $0 a month in many cases.

When Jen first started getting her headaches, we had an insurance snafu - her school had cancelled her insurance without telling her. To get on Medicaid (to help pay for the $3000ish per month her meds cost) she'd have had to make less than $400 a month.

Essentially, for her to get medical care, she had to work about four days a month, maximum - more than that, and every penny she made would've gone straight to health care because she no longer qualified for assistance.

People ranting about the minimum wage have most likely never had to survive on it.

[trebmal_ca]

"George W. Bush has drawn up the "work permit" plan. This would allow foreigners and illegal immigrants to obtain work permits and work legally in the United States for a certain amount of time. After, I believe, 6 years their work permit expires and they must obtain a green card through a background check or return home."

They have had this for Canadians for years.

L1A's or L1B's

if you have a L1, your called a non immigrant worker. this allows you to live in work in the US, for 3 years, after that you have to renew it. Owners of L1A's dont even have to go through customs, they simply go to a small room, and your hand is scanned.

Proud owner of a L1B

[yetanotherplayer]

Uh, if I may say something about the original topic:

These people have broken the law. Does anyone debate that? Does anyone debate that it SHOULD be illegal to immigrate thusly? Does anyone disagree with punishing those who break the law?

[Ash]

If I disagree with a law, I would disagree with punishing the people who break that law.

[Mac_Bug]

The only problem with legal immigration is that often if these people COULD do it legally, they wouldn't be bothering to sneak across the border. Getting into another country sometimes cost thousands of dollars in lawyer and application fees, not to mention for the most part they only want skilled (not minimum wage workers) labor.