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No, it doesn't work that way. You have it backwards. Builders already know how many man hours it takes to complete a project, and typically bid on a conservative, 'most case' scenario in terms of what it will take. They certainly don't pass their labor savings on to the customer. The number on the estimate will likely be the number on the invoice (Barring change orders). So the money saved on labor simply goes into the builder's pocket.
The other thing to realize is that construction firms do not have standing staffs of people. There is a core staff, but the laborers get hired on an ad hoc basis. And they certainly wouldn't be hiring dry wall guys on a permanent basis. They'd be hiring managers and bookkeepers instead.
So the citizen day laborer who played by the rules gets hosed while the illegal gets a job. Not a very fair arrangement in the least.
This is extremely short-sighted. You don't think that there might be a second builder, a guy who's a better planner, who might be more confident in his ability to secure illegal immigrant labor, and then just blatantly underbid the first builder?
Builders do know how many man-hours it'll take to do a job. They also know a thing or two about the labor supply available to them (many of the guys they hire are guys they work with repeatedly). The numbers on the bid might be competitive, but the numbers on the bid will also reflect the actual costs incurred by the builder, which includes the lower wages of the immigrant. If they don't, then another builder who is better at estimating his final costs will undercut everyone and earn all of the contracts. That's a huge win not only for the second builder, but also for the buyer.
Except, in a free market, the businesses who employ illegal immigrants are competing against each other, so the savings do get passed to the consumer. Thus, everyone can afford to buy more stuff. This is elementary stuff, here.
You're not looking at the whole picture. If an American is out of a job due to illegals taking them how can he buy "stuff", cheap or not? Then add on the social costs of these illegal aliens in the form of increased taxes and where is the savings and how can an American buy more "stuff" with no job and increased taxes?
You're not looking at the whole picture. If an American is out of a job due to illegals taking them how can he buy "stuff", cheap or not? Then add on the social costs of these illegal aliens in the form of increased taxes and where is the savings and how can an American buy more "stuff" with no job and increased taxes?
Actually, the correct term is 'undocumented workers'. Gotta keep up with the times.
To tell you the truth, the economic arguments, or a subset of them, seem like an honest try to me. If it sounds like a good trade-off to be in favor of bringing in 10-20 million people, with all the social and environmental cost (along with the downward push in blue collar labor rates) so that you can get a cheap Tyson chicken, well then, you go girl.
Generally, there's always been a strong push for voting your self interest anyway. Want cheap concrete work and produce regardless of other societal cost? Vote massive immigration by whatever means. Want free health care that you put very little into? Vote for un-means tested Medicare (most are in favor of this one, so look in the mirror). Want to buy gas for cheap? Vote for no environmental regs in states with refineries. It's all good.
Whose correct term? It isn't the immigration law term for them. Those who use that term have an agenda to play down the fact that they are illegally in this country. Sorry, I don't play those PC games.
Voting to change laws is one thing but breaking them before or if they are changed is a whole different ball of wax.
The cliff notes are that according to the Social Security Administration, about 75% of illegal immigrants pay payroll taxes and the withholding on their federal and, if applicable, state income taxes. The SSA gets this estimate from the amount of money they collect that gets submitted from bogus SSNs. However, illegal immigrants virtually never file their income tax returns to get their tax refunds, and they will all-but-certainly never collect on Social Security or Medicare benefits, benefits they're paying into but will never receive. Thus, they end up paying more than citizens, due to never collecting their refunds, and they receive fewer benefits.
The typical argument is that poor people in the US basically pay no income tax, they pay the same sales tax as undocumented workers, and the undocumented workers pay into a Social Security number that they've swiped and will never see benefits from.
The typical argument is that poor people in the US basically pay no income tax, they pay the same sales tax as undocumented workers, and the undocumented workers pay into a Social Security number that they've swiped and will never see benefits from.
This is the "typical argument" because it's true. Illegal immigrants also pay gas taxes, property taxes (usually indirectly via rent), any corporate taxes that corporations pass onto consumers, tobacco taxes, alcohol taxes, tolls on toll roads they use, higher prices on certain imported goods due to tariffs, and virtually every other tax that we as citizens pay.
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