Here I wrote about the coming political earthquake due to immigration, both legal and illegal.  Some objections have come up that deserve a little bit of attention.  Some respond that socialist subsidy and give-away programs are a function of our society, rather than the fact that an employer hires immigrant workers or illegal aliens.  Change the laws to undo the socialism rather than the hiring practices.  Some also respond that not only does the employer benefit from reduced wages paid to the low-skill worker; we benefit as well due to lower prices on common food stuffs and other products and services.

[Breath ... sigh].  The fact that our society has socialist give-away programs does not justify adding to the rolls of the recipients.  Besides, either way you cut it up, in terms of the productive worth of the unskilled or low-skill worker, America’s economy will not benefit long term from people who are capable of only manual labor (picking crops, mowing lawns, landscaping).  We have denuded our industrial and manufacturing capability in America.  For instance, to get large-scale steel fabrication and welding done, one must go overseas (e.g., Japan, the Rotterdam shipyard, etc.).  If we have only intellectual capital and services to market, we are not helping ourselves by bringing in people who cannot even speak English.

Regarding the second argument, let’s cover this once again … more slowly this time.  The employer is in favor of illegals because it helps his bottom line.  Period.  There isn’t any more to it than that.  The financial advantage he gets from illegals does not all go to reduce the price for goods.  If it did, then the employer would have no advantage in hiring illegals (since we would get all of the benefit), and he wouldn’t do it.  The employer is the primary recipient of the benefit of hiring illegals.  And once again, the costs associated with these illegals (health care, auto insurance, welfare, medicaid, social security, high rates of prison occupancy by hispanics, gang activity, teaching English, etc.) redound to the tax-paying, premium-paying public.  This is corporate welfare on the backs of the middle class, pure and simple.

A friend reminds me of a quote by Frederic Bastiat:

“But how is this legal plunder to be identified? Quite simply. See if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them, and gives it to other persons to whom it does not belong. See if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime.”—from The Law

Indeed!