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I'm not talking about visas, just make them citizens with the same rights as the rest of us. Then they can join those unions on an equal footing.

dominotw 5y ago
> legitimized the immigration status of those people, > I'm not talking about visas So only "legitimate" immigration status according to you is full citizenship? Like hand out citizenship at the port of entry ? > Then they can join those unions Its not about the footing. Union's main concern is high unemployment among its ranks. " In one city where 91% of our current #union hotel housekeepers are still out of work, a major hotel company is asking for more H-2B visas. Why is this necessary?" edit: Looks like you are trolling here based on your flagged/downvoted comments
JPKab 5y ago
Legitimizing people's status would definitely help to a degree, but not fully. The wage to earn a significantly higher standard of living than that found in the poorest Central American nations where most of these human beings come from is significantly lower than the "living wage" that we on the left talk about frequently. "so why not just raise the minimum wage, that'll solve the issue!" is what many say to this. Yes, it would, if the construction, meat packing, agriculture industries were remotely capable of having enforcement against hiring "under the table" workers, which based on my experience in these industries growing up in a rural location of the southern US, isn't possible. At the end of the day, in the short term, demand for labor is relatively fixed, and increasing the supply, even if you ensure that the human beings that are added to the supply are given the rights they deserve, is going to lower the price of labor. Supply and demand doesn't care about our morals. It's indifferent, because individual humans and businesses are going to make rational economic decisions when they rent labor from human beings, and will go for the quieter, cheaper, far less likely to complain about working conditions person than the American who they tell themselves (as they choose the undocumented person) didn't capitalize on the opportunities they were offered being born here and therefore doesn't deserve it. (This is a rationalization I've encountered numerous times, and often it was uttered by people who chose to hire undocumented folks instead of a crew from LaborReady, a short-term labor business that is compliant with the law.)

dominotw 5y ago

> legitimized the immigration status of those people, > I'm not talking about visas So only "legitimate" immigration status according to you is full citizenship? Like hand out citizenship at the port of entry ? > Then they can join those unions Its not about the footing. Union's main concern is high unemployment among its ranks. " In one city where 91% of our current #union hotel housekeepers are still out of work, a major hotel company is asking for more H-2B visas. Why is this necessary?" edit: Looks like you are trolling here based on your flagged/downvoted comments

JPKab 5y ago

Legitimizing people's status would definitely help to a degree, but not fully. The wage to earn a significantly higher standard of living than that found in the poorest Central American nations where most of these human beings come from is significantly lower than the "living wage" that we on the left talk about frequently. "so why not just raise the minimum wage, that'll solve the issue!" is what many say to this. Yes, it would, if the construction, meat packing, agriculture industries were remotely capable of having enforcement against hiring "under the table" workers, which based on my experience in these industries growing up in a rural location of the southern US, isn't possible. At the end of the day, in the short term, demand for labor is relatively fixed, and increasing the supply, even if you ensure that the human beings that are added to the supply are given the rights they deserve, is going to lower the price of labor. Supply and demand doesn't care about our morals. It's indifferent, because individual humans and businesses are going to make rational economic decisions when they rent labor from human beings, and will go for the quieter, cheaper, far less likely to complain about working conditions person than the American who they tell themselves (as they choose the undocumented person) didn't capitalize on the opportunities they were offered being born here and therefore doesn't deserve it. (This is a rationalization I've encountered numerous times, and often it was uttered by people who chose to hire undocumented folks instead of a crew from LaborReady, a short-term labor business that is compliant with the law.)