<p>At least 12 million illegal immigrants live in the U.S. Most pick crops, wash dishes, build houses, cut lawns and do other jobs for between $6 and $15 an hour. They make up about 5% of the total U.S. work force. But </p>
<p>What if we threw them all out?</p>
<p>Lettuce and strawberries would rot in the fields. Dirty dishes would pile up in restaurants. Thousands of farmers and builders would go bust. Predator aircraft drones would prowl the Mexican border. And chunks of Los Angeles and Houston would look like ghost towns.</p>
<p>The biggest losers would be middle-class families with two working parents, living in high-immigrant states such as California, Texas, Florida or New York. Why? They would pay more for food, housing, entertainment and child care as a shortage of low-skilled workers drove up some wages, and therefore, some prices. Meantime, their own pay would remain the same. What’s more, the ripple effect of thousands of businesses shrinking or closing for lack of staff might put one of the parents out of a job. Not to mention the garbage collection going to pot and no one to polish the missus’ nails.</p>
<p>Wow, I didn’t know that illegals picked up garbage in other parts of the country. They have a very strong union here in New York and aren’t illegals.</p>
<p>I guess the outcome would depend on where you live. In my neck of the woods, the young black men who can’t get hired might be able to wash those dishes and cut those lawns. Perhaps our bankrupt hospital would be able to get back onto its financial footing and provide excellent care to those of us who are here. One functioning and one bankrupt hospital aren’t enough for 500,000 people. Perhaps the no-man’s land a couple of miles down the road could be cleaned up of crime and dysfunction. Perhaps our schools could do a better job without the overcrowding and extra expenses.</p>
<p>In the long run, there would be incentive to improve technology in the agricultural arena. Perhaps we could then see whoand how many immigrants we need to bring here going forward.</p>
<p>Perhaps those hardworking people would turn their talents and energies to making their homelands more prosperous, while living with their families and children and maintaining their own culture.</p>
<p>Here is what the fourth paragraph of the article says - only 8 million of the 12 million illegals are employed. The US has 22 million less educated unemployed adults!</p>
<p>"The winners, for a change, would be the low-skilled unemployed, living just about anywhere – if they were willing to move. Of the 12 million illegal immigrants, about 8 million are employed, mostly in low-skill jobs. The U.S., meantime, has about 22 million less-educated jobless adults, many of them blacks and legalized Hispanics, according to a 2008 report from the Center for Immigration Studies, a research group based in Washington, D.C.</p>
<p>“Some schools might even offer smaller classes. Steven Camarota, the research director at the Center for Immigration Studies, calculates that 3.3 million children, or 6% of school kids, have at least one undocumented parent. It costs about $10,000 per year to educate a child. So if all these kids left the U.S., too, it’d save $33 billion, Camarota says. “It could take a lot of pressure off the school system,” he adds. Of course, some near-empty schools would have to close.”</p>
<p>Perhaps Social Security would go bankrupt much faster if you eliminated really substantial contributions relating to people who will never be able to make a claim for benefits.</p>
<p>One can argue that cheap labor is keeping U.S.-based industries from further automating and reducing their labor content…In essence, cheap labor is providing a disincentive to fund research and development that reduces labor content of products and services.</p>
<p>Along with the Homeland Security benefits of halting illegal immigration, we could see an increase in good ole’ fashion American ingenuity that would lessen our dependency on cheap labor. Our future would see more innovations like: </p>
At least 12 million americans are on welfare or unemployed so don’t worry, we’ll be just fine, somehow Canada and many other countries manage just fine without a huge influx of illegal immigrants. Besides no one advocates throwing them out all at once anyway so the entire argument is a strawman. But it can certainly be done gradually without any noticeable damage to American economy.</p>
<p>And there will be no permanent damage to middle class families either as labor shortages and growing wages of low-skilled workers tend to have a ripple effect on the entire labor market so the wages/salaries of members of this middle class family will also grow.</p>
<p>By the way, the same argument could have been and probably was made in favor of slavery - it would go like “we can’t abolish slavery cause we won’t have people to pick crop and wash dishes and if we have to hire workers and pay them living wages the prices will go up and middle class families will suffer”.</p>
<p>My daughter is descended from immigrants. Six of her eight great-great-grandparents on my side of her family arrived here in the early 1900s; all four of her great-grandparents on her other parent’s side of the family arrived here in the early 1920s. All were legal immigrants.</p>
<p>America is a nation of immigrants, but it has become a sanctuary for a burgeoning population of foreign-born criminals. Illegal aliens are criminals, and there are no euphemisms, explanations, or excuses anyone can use to get around that fact.</p>
<p>I don’t care who these criminals are, or where they are from, or why they are here, or how long they have been here, or how hard they might have worked while they have been here. If they are here illegally, then they are criminals. Round them up and boot them out. No amnesty.</p>
<p>We’ve had this dance with China where they provide us with cheap goods for paper money so we go deeper and deeper into debt for cheap products. And we lose a bunch of jobs in this industry and that industry but it’s okay because we can buy cheap goods. The problem arrives when your job gets outsourced.</p>
<p>There’s a lot of talk about the short-term effects but what about the long-term effects? Maybe those here legally would have more kids given the bigger demand for labor which could wind up legally helping out social security.</p>
<p>^^and don’t forget to factor in billions more for the really long, tall, deep wall and permanent armed surveillance that would be needed to keep them out.</p>
<p>Suppose we start catching employers who hire them and slapping them with a $20,000 fine per illegal for the first violation and $100,000 fine and a jail term for the second violation. We can probably collect more than $12 billion while virtually all illegals will leave on their own and will never come back.</p>
<p>Suppose American welfare recipients and unemployed start working and paying federal, state and local taxes, suppose they start spending the money they earn in this country instead of sending it overseas.</p>
<p>I absolutely do not support wholesale deportation. Deport criminals, fine employers, stop welfare, support endeavors in the home countries to provide education/healthcare/employment. Attrition seems to be beginning to have an impact.</p>
<p>sad thing is that alot of unemployed, less educated people really don’t want to work for minimum wage. they want free stuff. Free money, free insurance… Not everyone is going to be a Phd or rocket scientist. We need to stress the importance of work at every level. Doing your best no matter how low your skill level. Everyone (imo) can contribute something to the common good.</p>
<p>I think ANYONE who works full time should be able to afford food and shelter and basic health insurance for their families. Seems like we need incentives for the uneducated to actually work and/or penalties for those that don’t.</p>
<p>I can’t even fathom what happens to the thousands of LEGAL AMERICANs who drop out of high school. They are a drain to all of us that work for a living.</p>
<p>Modern picking technology has ruined the tomato. What would be next?</p>
<p>One thing that would happen is that the schools would suffer a major reshuffling and teacher layoffs. The state pays the schools by the head, regardless of the immigration status. Would help with the overcrowding at the high school, but a lot of friends might lose jobs.</p>
<p>Well, Sue. My husband is one of those. He did graduate from high school, barely, but is functionally illiterate. He’s always worked at least two jobs, including now that he does very well as a NYC san-man. The people at his second job are the folks you described above and I can tell you that they work very, very hard and aren’t a drain on anyone. LIfe is certainly not easy for them, but stocking shelves in a supermarket can be stable and does provide benefits. He’s also had similar jobs over the years where the same was true. I don’t think there are that many legal Americans who, absent mental illness, drug abuse or social pathology don’t want to work. Living that life, I can tell you that they myth isn’t true as presented. The issue isn’t jobs Americans won’t do, it’s that employers don’t want to pay wages/benefits/taxes if it’s easier not to.</p>
<p>“somehow Canada and many other countries manage just fine without a huge influx of illegal immigrants.”</p>
<p>Yep. Canada finally took control, many years ago, when they saw how the momentum in immigration was affecting the country. Again, progressively steady increase (momentum) is quite different from a numerically stable immigration factor. Canada’s was not stable, before their change in policy. Ours is not stable. Otherwise this would be, if not a non-issue, of minimal importance. Change the multiplication and physics of it all, and it’s a very different story.</p>