Original story "We've got to biuld a wall because they're all criminals, er... wait... uh, hold on while I find another reason to hate anyone who doesn't look like me"
Building a wall has more to do with immigrants not paying taxes and using the ER as a free clinic. The fact that Mexican illegal immigrants are totally sapping our healthcare system while not paying the taxes back into the system is causing lots of problems. I'm totally for building a wall. The argument that "it won't work" is complete horse sh*t. It has nothing to do with skin color and everything to do with dollar signs. However, the business lobbyists will never allow it because they get cheap labor if the border stays open.
Actually, immigrants do pay taxes, they just never get the benefits. Most, though not all, employers withold taxes from their check, but not having an SSN the worker never files and so doesn't get the refunds to which they are entitled. Numerous studies have shown that undocumented immigrants contribute more to a society in taxes than they recieve in services. The contributions they make to business, namely their willingness to work in the fields and other menial jobs that would be impossible to fill with white people, also contributes to the economy. As for using the ER as a free clinic, everyone has to have health care, going without is not an option. If other, more appropriate, clinics were available then that wouldn't be the only option for workers.
Ah, deceptive statistics... While it looks quite damning, consider what was said just a paragraph earlier: In other words, there are roughly twice as many natives as foreign-born men in California - no wonder they're getting incarcerated more! Even taking the population difference into account, there's still a higher rate of incarceration among natives, but it's roughly 25% higher, not 150%. That said, though, the solution to the immigration "problem" is to make legal immigration easier, not to make illegal immigration harder. It's just as simple as that.
Some do, most don't. Most undocumented workers work in regular companies and get a paycheck every two weeks just like everyone else. The difference is that while they have taxes deducted from their check like the rest of us, they never file and so get no refund. In fact, an undocumented making the same wage you do would in fact be paying more in taxes than you do. As for what the employers are doing with the money, I'm sure the vast majority submit it to the IRS, and as for the rest, that cannot be held against the workers. I'd have to go searching for it, but i posted an article some time back about lettuce growers in Arizona whose crops were rotting in the firlds because they couldn't get anyone to pick them. They were paying something like $11.50 an hour, but still couldn't find anyone to work in the fields. I thinlk you'll find the same thing from most business owners across the country, they simply cannot find enough employees, legal or otherwise. The reson for this is partly the fact that most people don't want to do backbreaking work in the hot sun for any price, but also that the workforce is actually shrinking as more and more people retire. Something like a third of the entire working population will be eligible for retirement (62 or older) in the next 10 years. Well, when you consider that 75% of people without health insurance work full time, I think this is a much bigger issue than just about immigrants. that said, immigrants contribute more to a society than they take out, so it seems reasonable that they should get some benefit. Also, if you look at the costs of clinics versus the costs of ER visits, especially if problems can be treated before they become emergencies, the clinics start to look like a pretty good idea. If you magically stopped the flow of immigrants tomorrow it would have a huge negative impact on the national economy. you yourself said that it would tend to lead to significantly higher prices. In addition, I think we would probably also see in increase in the number of jobs moving overseas because they can't find enough workers. You'll notice that business is not advocating for stricter border policies, and in fact i've seen a number of business leaders saying they will support measures to increase the number of immigrants because they cannot stay in business without them.
I agree with most of your points - especially the clinics. But I'm mainly playing devil's advocate. I do think there is a point where I no longer want to pay for services for non-citizens, and I'm not completely sold on the idea that native US citizens won't do the manual labor. People would do it for enough money. It's just hard because once you're born here you get used to the standard of living and it's not fair to use almost slave-labor to undercut US workers. However this all does stem with the businesses hiring them. And in our capitalist economy I can see exactly why things are the way they are. No politician is going to be able to crack down on hiring illegal immigrants and impose meaningful penalties. Oh well, that's just how it goes. But I think there is an argument to be made for building a fence. As far as immigrants paying taxes but not receiving government benefits - beats the hell outta the alternative!
40 hour week x $11.50 = $460/week...... [understatement]i think this is enough money [/understatement], if i had the possibility of going there to work on those fields i would jump to it.......
No, that's not true. They're talking about the incarceration RATE - I.e. the number of people incarcerated per unit population. It's nothing to do with the size of that population. It could a bit misleading though - perhaps US born crims are more likely to get caught as they are easier to trace? Obviously they don't have data for who actually committed the crimes in the first place, but that would be more relevant.
Minimum wage over here finally got raised last year. It has been $5.25 an hour since like forever. Not sure what it is now, but I think $7 something. And for the record, I make less than $10 an hour as an EMT. You can live on that working full time, but it doesn't leave much left over.
Do you know the cost of living? A wage figure is meaningless without knowing what the essentials of life cost in that part of the world.
On the other hand, it could just as easily mean the number of people incarcerated per unit of time - the word 'rate' is ambiguous.
I suppose they could have worded it more precisely but I think most people will understand what they mean.
I beg to differ. From my background (both parents are mechanical engineers), "rate" always means "per unit of time" unless otherwise specified. Isn't the fact that we're disagreeing about this proof that there's ambiguity in the meaning, though?
I think this is another case of ambiguous statistics being used to further a point of view they may or may not support. Too many details missing from the article. A more interesting comparison might be the relative number immigrants committing crimes versus overall population. How many illegals are simply deported or skip out and aren't traced before they are institutionalized? I'm definitely not saying that a higher number of illegal immigrants are out there perpetrating crimes. There is, however, the small detail that they are breaking one or more laws by simply being an "illegal" immigrant.
