As CTKeith pointed out, most of the undocumented workers do earn more than the minimum wage (in many parts of the country, the legal minimum wage is below the minimum market wage, which is why even McDonald’s and other establishments known for paying low wages pay significantly higher than the minimum wage).

As for previous immigrations, we focused heavily on assimilation and American exceptionalism – two things that are sorely missed today in the debate. People came here to become Americans – people today come here to be [Fill in Your Country of Origin]-Americans. A return to the idea of Americanism would be helpful.

We also cut it off after a while – we allowed groups to assimilate before letting in large numbers of more immigrants.

I think GC and LenS hit the nail on the head – we need to encourage Mexico to abandn its statist system to encourage growth.

It’s heart-warming to learn that you’d employ an illegal immigrant to mow your lawn at $2/hour, but that you might think twice about employing him or her at the current minimum wage of $7/hour.

And I have to agree with you, that I’d employ many more workers at $2/hour, than I would at minimum wages. I mean a butler might make sense at $10,000/year, but at $30,000/year it might be more of a luxury than a necessity. But does that matter when referring to sold-your-soul politicians?

And I agree with you that illegals can’t be exploited. I mean the minimum wage lawa are written for American citizens, and not those trying to finagle their way into our superior system.

Most of the undocumented worker in this country are being paid at or above minimum wage.

A good portion even get paid time and a half over 40 hrs because they’re “on the Books” using false documentation. Employers want happy and motivated workers and most treat their employees pretty well.

I know plenty of people in the Resturant business and most start their dishwashers at about 8 bucks an hr and if they show up and work hard they’re at ten an hr in no time and helping with the food preperation.

Construction and landscaping jobs start at 10 an hr or better and advancement is earned the same way,By being reliable and working hard.

Are undocumenteds holding down wages? YES

The Best way to fight this is to give them documentation so they’re not afraid to be organized and mobile in their employment.

I’m not an economist but I think the availability of jobs suggests a need. Are they being exploited? Yes. That’s why I would advocate a path to citizenship. I’d also like to see these workers be able to form unions.[/quote]

There is a need for the jobs at the wages being paid to the illegals: we know this because the illegals are working for this wage and people are hiring them.

However, some of these jobs would go away if they had to pay the minimum wage (either through better enforcement or the lack of illegals willing to work for below the minimum wage). I may be willing to pay a guy $2 an hour to mow my lawn. But if I had to pay him $7, I’d probably just mow the lawn myself (in real life, I mow my own lawn).

So enforcing the minimum wage or deporting all the illegals wouldn’t mean that every job currently held by an illegal would go to a legal American citizen at minimum wage.

Are they being exploited? I don’t know if I’d use that term. First, if an employee can freely change jobs, I don’t think he (or she) can really be exploited, since the market sets wages for various skills and professions based on supply and demand. However, illegals may not be able to change jobs relatively easily for fear of getting deported, and thus some workers could be exploited in that they could intimidate the employees into not changing a job and pay them a below market rate. However, low rates in and of themselves don’t really prove anything other than there’s a lot of supply relative to the demand. And obviously, the illegals are here, not back in their home country.

Not only that but many of the things we think of as being American are of Italian, Irish, and Chinese origin. And again, this isn’t a new argument. The nationalities have changed but the fears have not.

[quote post="608"]Illegality, though, is a major stumbling block for me and others. The first rule of being an American citizen is to have respect for the laws of this country.[/quote]

I don’t get this at all. Americans break laws when they find them unpractical all the time. As an example, I jaywalked at least twice today.

One frequent argument for changing a law is impracticality. Clearly some of our own laws about immigration are impractical. Otherwise there wouldn’t be a problem. Again, migrating to where the resources are is often necessary for survival.

[quote post="608"]Amnesty, plus some sort of path to citizenship which involves somehow paying off their debt to society. Which, despite everything, they do owe. Community service seems like a start. Lots of it.[/quote]

Which I’m sure they’d have plenty of time for, especially with all the extra hours people will have to work to pay the accompanying fines we’ll probably also impose.

[quote post="608"]We do need secure borders. And we do need those who come here to respect our laws. I think that unlike Iraq, we can remain level-headed enough on this topic to find a workable compromise that really addresses the problem.[/quote]

We can’t even agree what the problem is. Jim Himes pointed this out at last month’s DFA meeting. He said that almost everyone he talks to about immigration has their own view about what the problem is and how to define it. How can we solve a problem we can’t yet define as a nation?

Being 1/8 Native American I’ll just say I wish you’d all go back where you came from.[/quote]
Back to Wales, huh? Hm. I could blog about raising sheep…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQLFfTd2l44

He’s right, when a country’s economic future is dependent on the exportation of it’s own citizens it’s in serious trouble.

Being 1/8 Native American I’ll just say I wish you’d all go back where you came from.

They’ll become different, too. It was long thought that Italians, Chinese and Irish couldn’t integrate into our society. They did. It took a couple of generations. Give it time.

And remember: Mexicans, Dominicans and Puerto Ricans (because that’s who we’re talking about–not Africans or Turks or Laotians) are also the cultural heirs of the West, just as we are. They aren’t so different. This debate shouldn’t be about race, language or culture. We’ve been there before, and it worked out fine. It’s already working out fine in places like South Florida, with its vibrant, respectable and very Republican Cuban community.

Illegality, though, is a major stumbling block for me and others. The first rule of being an American citizen is to have respect for the laws of this country. And yet, so many people are desperate for a better life. It’s hard to really blame them. They broke the law. No question. But maybe they did it for a good reason. It’s not an excuse, but we can understand that this isn’t a class of hardened criminals or welfare freeloaders sucking off the public teat. These are human beings who work to support their families. And yet, they did break the law, and they should, like anyone else, suffer consequences for it.

You see? I keep going back and forth on this.

Should we talk about a general amnesty for those already here? Maybe we should, if it’s coupled with a national database of who with visas are still in the country (heard at the GOP debate last night) and tight border security. Amnesty, plus some sort of path to citizenship which involves somehow paying off their debt to society. Which, despite everything, they do owe. Community service seems like a start. Lots of it.

We do need secure borders. And we do need those who come here to respect our laws. I think that unlike Iraq, we can remain level-headed enough on this topic to find a workable compromise that really addresses the problem.

The problem with comparing immigration today versus immigration in the past is that we have a very different society today. In the laisses-faire environment during the turn of the century when we saw most of our mass immigration, you, I, nor anyone else saw to it that immigrants were taken care of. Immigrants came for the opportunity and the chance at the American Dream. I’m not saying many aren’t coming for that today, they are, but may are also coming for the welfare state that we are creating that didn’t exist 100 years ago. The more strain we put on that system the worse the system functions.

I think everyone feels for these illegals. I wouldn’t want to live in Mexico, in that sense we’re all part of the lucky sperm club to have been born in such a wonderful country. But the fact remains, we can’t absorb everyone who wants to come here. So what do we do? Deport the ones who are here? I don’t know, is it possible? Probably not, but if you don’t deport ANYONE, there is no bite to your law. The reason you have punishments is largely for deterence. We’re not going to have a success catching 100% of the violators of any law, does that mean we shouldn’t enforce those too?

Let’s also not forget that this particular group of people was targeted by the Fugitive Operations Teams for apparently already missing a hearing. I’m not getting the sense that this particular group is full of all law abiding model immigrants. Also, I see TrueBlue is far more concerned with an illegals getting a good night sleep rather than the safety of our ICE Agents. Maybe we should schedule our next raid with the community so they know when we’re coming.

There is a difference between being xenophobic and racist and simply wanting the laws of your country respected. Quite frankly, I’d love it if we had an open border policy and allowed millions of immigrants in. Learn english and good luck to you. But we don’t, we have laws, and right now we’re rewarding those who have said they don’t respect them, rather than those who have worked within the system that do.

But you have yet to provide any valid reason why we should not enforce our immigration laws. I repeat: any suffering to the families in these situation is caused by the parents, not by the government.

Eff the ‘wingers.

Well, Jack, I hope you never get pulled over for speeding, or for not having your papers on you proving that you’re an American citizen when you need to be getting home to meet your elementary school child when they get off the bus and expect to find you waiting.

I hope no one ever burst through your door in the early morning without a search warrant.

I cannot believe that you’re giving a free pass to the parents and bashing the government over this.

As with any law, if you don’t like it, contact your Congressman — but it’s still a law until it isn’t a law, and it must be followed. My grandparents waited in line at Ellis Island; why can’t they?

If you read our countries history you’ll see the exact same fears you have today, which Lead People calling Irish immigrants Micks and Italian immigrants WAP(which stood for without a passport), didn’t lead to a downfall of the USA but the Brightest times in our history.

I don’t fear those who speak a different language than I do. I marvel at their bravery. To travel to a country were that fact alone puts them at a disadvantage and to struggle as hard as they can to improve the lot of their children shows me that these are exactly the kind of people America needs.