Single Payer Bill Passes Calif. Senate

[natty bumppo 297]

Figures. You like to make sweeping judgments towards those millions of Mexican corn farmers, suggesting they are too stupid to learn how to survive the market change, but you won't open yourself up to the same scrutiny. It's easier to look down on other occupations when you can hide behind that computer screen of yours.

can we back a big truck up to your place and shovel some of what you're spewing into the trailer? those farmers in mexico could probably use the fertilizer ....

you focused on corn farmers ... "the market flooded with U.S. corn pushing out millions of Mexican corn farmers out of business."

guess these millions of people didn't plant other crops to keep their farms in business ... unless the statement was misleading and the corn business ended and they adjusted to a wheat/soy/etc business and kept the farms in business ...

[Ali G. 37]

Anyone who believes they have a simple answer to complex problems, particularly if that simple answer is to berate the poor for ruining the lives of 'ordinary folks' deserves little to no respect for airing that opinion.

Never said that and these automatic left wing assumptions are getting old and idiotic. E.G. assuming someone against illegal aliens is against all immigrants period. Assuming someone speaking up against a problematic attitude of a certain community, is only doing so because of that community's race.

Illegal aliens have had the biggest impact on the 60,000,000 million Americans that are underemployed and/or living in poverty. That is how supply and demand works. If you were never taught that back in school, time to go back and pick up an economics book. As money trickles up the system, it does indirectly impact the middle-class, by driving down wages and forcing them to compete with the 60,000,000 who are no longer able to do blue-collar work anymore. Well not unless they want to be exploited too, work long 19ish type days and compete with the $6 wages paid to illegal aliens.

The only people who benefit from them are the wealthy and small business owners that exploit them. Same thing happened in the UK with this massive flood of cheap labor from Eastern Europe. For anyone without a college degree, you are basically screwed.

Edited January 29, 2010 by Booyah

[one...two...tree 2,762]

can we back a big truck up to your place and shovel some of what you're spewing into the trailer? those farmers in mexico could probably use the fertilizer ....

you focused on corn farmers ... "the market flooded with U.S. corn pushing out millions of Mexican corn farmers out of business."

guess these millions of people didn't plant other crops to keep their farms in business ... unless the statement was misleading and the corn business ended and they adjusted to a wheat/soy/etc business and kept the farms in business ...

...and so what line of work do you do? For the sake of the argument. Let's see if your logic would apply to you as well.

[Ali G. 37]

for illegals? are you on drugs ... or did you start drinking early today?

You're confusing me for Marc.

[Peikko 1,575]

At least you don't exclusively lay the blame on the poor for being poor, but apart from that, your ideas are too simplistic to take seriously.

[spookyturtle 9,466]

The only people who benefit from them are the wealthy and small business owners that exploit them.

Bingo.

[Ali G. 37]

Here's some more links for you BY (by searching under "economic impact of illegal immigration")

Illegal Immigrants and the U.S. Economy (NPR)

Illegal workers: good for U.S. economy (CNN Money)

Embracing Illegals Companies are getting hooked on the buying power of 11 million undocumented immigrants (Business Week)

Notice the dates on those articles..

Controlled legal immigration is a great thing and is practiced by every single first world country, something the majority of those against illegal aliens support. What we are against is millions of unskilled / uneducated/ unknown/ possible unhealthy people deciding at will, to setup shop in a foreign country. Heck, from the unions to police, we would round such people up in Aus and shop them back to their mommies country. If they want to apply for a visa, the government gets to decide whether they can or cannot enter the country, not them. Therefore, at a time of an economic downturn like this one, countries like Australia halved the immigration quota. Lets see how that worked for them, their unemployment fell (yet again) to 5.5%.

How is this approach working for them? Well they are ranked second in the entire world for livability, with immigration being one of the attributes used to score them. Furthermore, both Canada and the UK have implemented variations of Australia's 21st century points system.

[natty bumppo 297]

...and so what line of work do you do? For the sake of the argument. Let's see if your logic would apply to you as well.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

Once again, these professor's opinions are great and all, however, too bad no other first world country tends to agree with them.

Here's a real world example (from one of the hits in my search): (this was from 2005 so imagined the figures are a bit dated)

Inez and Antonio Valenzuela are a marketer's dream. Young, upwardly mobile, and ready to spend on their growing family, the Los Angeles couple in many ways reflects the 42 million Hispanics in the U.S. Age 30 and 29, respectively, with two daughters, Esmeralda, 8, and Maria Luisa, 2 months, the duo puts in long hours, working 4 p.m. to 2 a.m., six days a week, at their bustling streetside taco trailer. From a small sidewalk stand less than two years ago, they built the business into a hot destination for hungry commuters. The Valenzuelas (not their real name) bring in revenue well above the U.S. household average of $43,000, making them a solidly middle-class family that any U.S. consumer-products company would love to reach.

But Inez and Antonio aren't your typical American consumers. They're undocumented immigrants who live and work in the U.S. illegally. When the couple, along with Esmeralda, crossed the Mexican border five years ago, they had little money, no jobs, and lacked basic documents such as Social Security numbers. Guided by friends and family, the couple soon discovered how to navigate the increasingly above-ground world of illegal residency. At the local Mexican consulate, the Valenzuelas each signed up for an identification card known as a matrícula consular, for which more than half the applicants are undocumented immigrants, according to the Pew Hispanic center, a Washington think tank. Scores of financial institutions now accept it for bank accounts, credit cards, and car loans. Next, they applied to the Internal Revenue Service for individual tax identification numbers (ITINS), allowing them to pay taxes like any U.S. citizen -- and thereby to eventually get a home mortgage.

Today, companies large and small eagerly cater to the Valenzuelas -- regardless of their status. In 2003 they paid $11,000 for a used Ford Motor Co. van plus $70,000 more for a gleaming new 30-foot trailer that now serves as headquarters and kitchen for their restaurant. A local car dealer gave them a loan for the van based only on Antonio's matrícula card and his Mexican driver's license. Verizon Communications Inc. also accepted his matrícula when he signed up for cell-phone service. So did a Wells Fargo & Co. (WFC ) branch in the predominantly Hispanic neighborhood in northeast Los Angeles where they live. Having a bank account allows them to pay bills by check and build up their savings. Their goal: to trade up from a one-bedroom rental to their own home. Eventually, they also hope to expand their business by buying several more trailers. Matrícula holders like the Valenzuelas are "bringing us all the money that has been under the mattress," says Wells Fargo branch manager Steven Contreraz.

Growth engine

For more than two decades, America's illegal aliens have been the target of national attention -- largely for negative reasons. Their growing numbers put downward pressure on U.S. wages and new demands on schools, hospitals, and other public services. Fears of heavier social burdens and higher tax bills have led citizens and local officials to object with renewed vigor to what many perceive as an unwanted invasion from Mexico and other countries, especially to newer destination states such as Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, and Tennessee (BW, July 4, 2005). Yet all the while, farms, hotels, restaurants, small manufacturers, and other employers have continued to hire the undocumented with little regard to the federal laws intended to stop them.

At the same time, though, the fast-growing undocumented population is coming to be seen as an untapped engine of growth. In the past several years, big U.S. consumer companies -- banks, insurers, mortgage lenders, credit-card outfits, phone carriers, and others -- have decided that a market of 11 million or so potential customers is simply too big to ignore. It may be against the law for the Valenzuelas to be in the U.S. or for an employer to hire them, but there's nothing illegal about selling to them.

.....

The corporate Establishment's new hunger for the undocumenteds' business could have far-reaching implications for America's stance on immigration policy, which remains unresolved. Corporations are helping, essentially, to bring a huge chunk of the underground economy into the mainstream. By finding ways to treat illegals like any other consumers, companies are in effect legalizing -- and legitimizing -- millions of people who technically have no right to be in the U.S. It's even happening in mirror image, with some Mexican companies setting up programs to follow customers who move to the U.S. All this knits the U.S. and Mexico closer together, further blurring the border and population distinctions.

The economic impact could be significant. While most analysts peg the number of illegal immigrants at 10 million to 11 million, a recent study by Bear Stearns Asset Management (BSC ) concluded that data on housing permits, school enrollment, and foreign remittances suggests there could be as many as 20 million. Either way, experts agree that the undocumented, a majority of whom are Hispanic, are one of the nation's largest sources of population growth. They add 700,000 new consumers to the economy every year, more even than the 600,000 or so legal immigrants, according to Pew's new study. What's more, 84% of illegals are 18-to-44-year-olds, in their prime spending years, vs. 60% of legal residents. Corporate sales and profits will get a shot in the arm if more of them move out of the cash economy, put their money in banks, and take out credit cards, car loans, and home mortgages. U.S. gross national product could get a boost, too, since consumers with credit can spend more than those limited to cash.

More undocumented immigrants paying income and property taxes would help ease the taxpayer strain for the schools, health care, roads, and other services illegals use. Crime could decline, too. Wells Fargo pioneered acceptance of the matrícula in 2001 after police department in Austin, Tex., asked local financial firms for help in preventing holdups of undocumented immigrants who, lacking I.D.s to open bank accounts, tend to carry wads of cash. "The market has found a way to capture those dollars," says Robert Justich, a senior managing director of Bear Stearns Asset Management and co-author of the recent report The Underground Labor Force Is Rising to the Surface.

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/conte...43001_mz001.htm

Edited January 29, 2010 by Galt's gallstones

[Ali G. 37]

At least you don't exclusively lay the blame on the poor for being poor, but apart from that, your ideas are too simplistic to take seriously.

My ideas? Try the policies of the majority of other first world countries, including that of your mother country. They may allow those from the EU to openly move about in the UK, however, try enter and use their services from outside the EU. As I have posted before, it's a 15K pound on the spot-fine for business owners.

Bingo.

And the problem is that it then screws those owners that do the right thing by employing Americans, as they simply cannot compete with someone paying their staff $6 an hour and not paying any taxes or benefits on them. Therefore, pricing the job accordingly.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

[natty bumppo 297]

who is the one attempting to badger ... belittle ... intimidate ... in an attempt to get personal information? ^

want to buy a clue?

Edited January 29, 2010 by Natty Bumppo

[Ali G. 37]

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/conte...43001_mz001.htm

Once again check out the date.

In your opinion, does it make sense for the Philippines to open up their borders so that millions of Indonesians head to the Philippines? Will these extra poor consumers help the country, which is already suffering from poverty?

Would adding millions more people during the great depression have improved employment conditions? The thing all of these articles fail to discuss is the impact on salaries. There is no logical way in hell that 15 million extra unskilled/uneducated non-English speaking workers will help the middle class or America's poor in any way. None! Once again, it's the reason why no other first world country uses such practices.

Lets not even look at the ecological impact such a large flood of unskilled / uneducated workforce has had on the American landscape. Interestingly enough, when it comes to supporting illegal aliens, caring about mother earth goes out the window. Every single shitwhole dilapidated area in the entire Northern Virginia has a predominately Hispanic population. Coincidence? I think not. However, I don't blame them as they are dirt and considering where they came from, they just don't know any better. Nonetheless, should I just sit here and watch my area develop pockets of South American equivalent poverty stricken shitholes, all in the name of Kumbaya ideology?

That sort of idiocy is why I cannot get back to Aus fast enough and not have to see or deal with that #######.

Edited January 29, 2010 by Booyah

[one...two...tree 2,762]

who is the one attempting to badger ... belittle ... intimidate ... in an attempt to get personal information?

want to buy a clue?

You big pu$. You habitually poke fun of others here and have taken opportunities to do it to me unprovoked, but you can't take it yourself. No wonder you won't say what kind of work you do. Tsk, tsk.

[natty bumppo 297]

You big pu$. You habitually poke fun of others here and have taken opportunities to do it to me unprovoked, but you can't take it yourself. No wonder you won't say what kind of work you do. Tsk, tsk.