Immigration Myths (part 2)

Before I proceed, I need to issue a correction/apology. These articles are called “Immigration” myths. This is a misnomer. From this point on, although immigration is in the title and would indicate legal activities, we will refer to this topic as “illegal alien” issues. My apology to true immigrants. Welcome home.

Another myth was discussed in the car this weekend on the way to the Husker game, that immigrants take the jobs Americans won’t do. Not only is this a flawed argument, it is a way of justifying the presence of illegals in this country at the price of lower salaries for all. The argument was made that illegals, for example, cut meat for $9 an hour. The counter to that is, of course, that I would do the same job, but for more money. The counter came back that because the meat packers are only paying illegals $9 an hour, rather than an American $20 an hour for the same job, they are able to sell ground beef at $2.19 a pound. If they had to pay an American twice as much, the price of that same pound of beef would double.

This actually demonstrates a flaw in the thinking. The meat packers do not set the price of meat, the consumer does. If the price of meat spiked to $4.50 a pound to cover labor costs of American workers, the market would collapse on the price of meat. This goes to the basic economic principle of supply and demand. The demand for $4.50 meat would simply not be there, and the beef packer would have to re-evaluate its budget.

Businesses make huge profits, but the market dictates those profit margins. Sure, the margin would shrink in the meat industry if they hired American workers, but they would figure out a way to make the cuts (pardon the pun) without losing too much of the market or they would fold up because they were running on too thin of a margin to begin with, banking on a low cost ILLEGAL workforce. Frankly, if you are banking your business success on breaking the law or an illegal practice, you deserve to fold.

Illegals contribute nothing. What extra cash they have, they send back across the border to whomever in Mexico. They do not contribute tax revenues, or economically beyond the basic needs. They are not consumers. The solution to collecting from all income, even illegal or unreported activities, is going to be covered in the next post. What we need done is to quit punishing the illegals. If they come through the already porous border, then that’s the way it is, and the Homeland Security or INS should deal with it. The INS should also fine businesses SO heavily, that the mere prospect of hiring an illegal is completely unattractive. Minimum fines of $200,000 on a second offense per illegal employee should be imposed. A lawn service, construction company, or packing plant could easily lose every thing with a few missteps. They will receive one warning every 3 years to quit hiring illegals, as one may slip through the cracks, but then they are on a probation period. Any violation during that probationary period results in the aforementioned fine. This will scare employers straight, and dry up the illegal alien issue. If America is no longer the land of opportunity for those who enter illegally, they will stop coming here for work.