Monetary Tsunami In America!!

Overpopulation is a global problem, not an American one. Immigration is not a real problem - it's only an issue for racists who what to keep the brown people out of White America (tm).Immigrants, even illegal ones, pay taxes. They pay sales tax every time they buy goods. They pay gasoline taxes every time they buy gas. They pay all the same fees and taxes that you or I do on public utilities, property tax, etc. Many even pay income tax, using fake or stolen identity info for their employers (only actual cash-only employers can really pay under the table, and those are mostly limited to day-laborers and private residents hiring maids or gardeners; nowadays you need identity documents to cash a check and to file tax info for your employees and avoid an IRS audit, so illegal immigrants get paid and file taxes just like the rest of us, the only difference being their identities are false - the money still goes to the right places).Illegal immigration has never ever been a problem for the reasons the media and especially the Republicans screech about. Illegal immigration isn't a threat to the US - it's a threat to the illegal workers, who are exploited by their employers under the threat of deportation providing the pressure to avoid seeking legal assistance.They don't "take" jobs from anyone. Immigrants come here seeking jobs that are available, not jobs that are filled. Since the economic downturn started, there has been a mass exodus of illegal immigrants because of the sudden drop in work available for the jobs they tend to fill, like new home construction. It's a self-limiting problem when it comes to jobs - if there is work available, people will come, legally or illegally, to do it and get paid. When work dries up, lo and behold, immigrants don't have an incentive to come here.Unemployment for legal citizens is a far more complicated issue that isn't explained magically by "they took our jobs." It's not even just a matter of who is or isn't "willing" to do certain types of work.And when it comes to natural resources - what a silly thought. Illegal immigrants aren't the ones driving around in Humvees, and when they do have trucks, they tend to actually use them as designed, as opposed to idiot soccer moms and macho assholes who just like driving huge vehicles for no reason. The energy crisis in the US is one of political bullshit like opposition to new nuclear power plants and the deregulation of the energy industry, not because people are having too many kids or because too many immigrants come here.Immigrants help the economy. When there are jobs available, they come and work, and spend the money they earn, and pay taxes. Instead of stigmatizing them and setting them up for exploitation, we should embrace them, let them work and pay taxes and live here and spend money legally, with the same protections under the law that you and I have.

Construction is a wide-ranging field. Plumbers, crane operators, electricians, and other skilled labor all fall under the "construction" label, and so can unskilled basic laborers.But it's still a myth that illegal immigration somehow costs American jobs. It's just not true. At all. Illegal immigrants don't come to take jobs from already-employed Americans. Illegal immigrants come to fill open positions. They'll continue to come as long as there is work available. When new housing construction basically stopped in 2008, illegal immigrants started leaving the US in droves, and it's continued as other market sectors have been affected.US immigration laws fight a problem that does not exist. The only reason to get so riled up about illegal immigration is that you don;t want more brown people moving in. They don;t lower your wages. They don;t take your jobs. They use the ER, but on average you probably do too because you can't or won't spend the money for a normal doctor's visit. They pay taxes, frequently even income tax. They don't use social safety net programs like welfare or food stamps. They earn money and spend money, helping to drive the American economy.The problems with illegal immigration stem primarily from designating them as illegal in teh first place. Give them full legal rights like you and me, and they won;t be taken advantage of by employers because they won;t be able to be threatened with deportation. Give them social security numbers and they'll pay income taxes (and many of them already do using stolen identifications) in addition to the sales and other taxes they already pay anyway. Give them access to normal healthcare (hell, give it to the rest of us, too) and they won't go to the ER all the time. Give them drivers licenses and they can get car insurance.Give them legal identification paperwork at no charge when entering the US so that they can enjoy the rights we all do, and you won;t have a few million anonymous and un-tracked people hiding out and being exploited in the US.And the ones who still try to hide will obviously be people like drug runners (we can talk about the absurdity of the War on Drugs in another thread) and terrorists, who right now can sneak in pretty easily.Do you see where I'm going here? We spend disgusting amounts of time, money, and political hot air whining and bitching about illegal immigration, and we're causing the problem, not them. Yes, they're breaking the law. Yes, that's bad - but the law is counterproductive, too. It doesn't excuse willingness to break the law, but neither is there any real justification for current US immigration policy. It's all just a bunch of stupid racism and scapegoating.

Phat, there is always pressure to lower wages. Paying employees less for the same amount of work increases the profit margin, and that pressure exists regardless of the presence or absence of undocumented workers.Undocumented workers simply represent a class of labor that employers can exploit illegally (paying less than minimum wage, demanding unpaid hours, etc) and get away with it. That's all. The solution is not to stop them from coming, because you can't, and because those jobs do still need to be filled. The solution is to document them so that they can easily become a full part of the system like you or me. Even if you don't grant them citizenship, you need to be able to easily and for free give them a legal status where they don;t need to fear their employer reporting them to immigration and where labor laws are equally enforced.At my last job I took a severe pay cut as new housing construction tanked. So did everyone else in the company. It had nothing to do with illegal immigration, it had to do with the company losing money due to lack of work.That pressure will always exist to varying degrees depending on management, the current state of the company, labor laws, the presence of a union, etc. If the employer sees an opportunity to lower pay without sacrificing productivity, chances are they'll take it. Most employers don't do that over fear that underpaid employees will leave to find employment elsewhere (less a concern in a down economy, but it costs a lot to train a new employee), union contracts, minimum wage laws, etc.What makes you think you should blame undocumented workers? What's your rational basis for determining that they even might be at fault? Do you even know whether your floor workers are actually undocumented, as opposed to simply not speaking English well? Maybe they just prefer their first language?

Your assertion, unless I misunderstood, is that possibly-illegal but definitely-English-not-preferred workers are the cause of pressure to lower your wages. Please correct me if that is inaccurate. Hi, I live in literally the most culturally diverse city in the US according to the 2000 Census. This means not only do I get access to an amazing variety of cultural food (who knew that Ethiopian food was so damned delicious?!), but I also hear a lot of languages.You seem to have this misconception that American as a "melting pot" means that all of the different cultures that make us up must somehow be subsumed by some "dominant" (read: traditionally white, English-speaking, Protestant...) culture that you define as "true America.""Assimilation" does not need to mean that you stop speaking languages other than English, or that you stop following the traditions of the culture you came from.If all of the floor workers speak Spanish, and they're more comfortable speaking Spanish, who the fuck are you to tell them they can't?Assimilation means fitting in with the rest of the population, not subsuming and suppressing your cultural heritage and pretending like you're a WASP. I'm sorry, that's just an odd statement. What does your being a veteran have anything to do with anything? I've worked with veterans, and it's typically not a factor in their employment except that their military service granted them training that is sometimes useful in the civilian world. Do you feel you deserve extra special consideration beyond your actual value defined by your skill at your job for having previously been in the military? Why? Do you really feel so threatened in your job by these other people? Why?You never answered my earlier questions. What makes you think these people are actually illegal immigrants, as opposed to people who simply prefer not to speak English? What rational chain of thought leads you to believe they are somehow threatening your job, or that the pressure to lower wages has something to do with them?Why do you feel the need to identify them as an "other?" Why are they different from any of your other coworkers?Wouldn't your employer find it just as easy to hire less-experienced but still-legal employees to do your job for less pay? Or perhaps simply fire some of you and make the rest of you work harder? Why do you specifically think that hiring possibly-illegal immigrants to replace employees in good standing is your employers preferred choice?My guess would be that your employer doesn't like working with the union, as the union contract limits their ability to lower your pay/benefits or fire workers in favor of cheaper labor. Is that true?If so, how are illegal immigrants any different at all from any other group of non-union workers that your union similarly protects against? Why blame the maybe-illegal immigrants when a random citizen off the street could be just as much a threat if your employer breaks the union?

Hi Buz,Where did you get your tinfoil hat? I'm wondering if one vendor is better than another. Do you prefer a single contiguous sheet of foil, or do you prefer hats made from multiple separate pieces? Is there a particular shape that's more effective at blocking the Obama-nation atheist Muslim communist mind control rays?

As a person who worked selling computers around a decade ago...average PC purchase prices were above $1000. Most people would spend around $1500 on a new PC. Edited by Rahvin, : No reason given.