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December 02, 2005
Immigration -- is it a problem?
These days, illegal immigration, mostly across the Mexican border, has become the bandwagon issue of the year -- every politician, from both parties, seems to agree that Washington needs to "do something" to stop the flow of illegal immigrants into this country.
Certainly, it's not good to have untold numbers of undocumented people (who you can't identify or keep track of) streaming across the border.
But I'm coming around to the idea that what we should be doing is just allow the free market to decide where people want to live and work. Let's face it -- no one is hiring Mexicans to do white-collar professional work; they're hiring them to pick vegetables, clean house, do landscaping, pound nails, and that sort of thing. That's work that needs to be done -- and if it can be done cheaper and better by immigrants, maybe it's time to let them come in legally and do it, rather than try to keep them out (which won't work anyway).
These people are not crossing the border to go on welfare -- not in any numbers, certainly. I'm sure there are a few that do, but there are lazy Americans, too -- almost everyone I've known who was on SSI disability, for example.
My grandparents came over from Greece because they could get jobs making shoes, selling vegetables, and so on (my grandfather had a horse-drawn wagon from which he sold strawberries, tomatoes, cauliflower, and stuff). The country needed labor, and they came over and provided it. Maybe the market is telling us that it needs more low-end labor. (Forget "maybe" -- the market is telling us that. Companies are offering jobs, and people are crossing the border to take them.) NAFTA was supposed to fix that, by moving jobs to Mexico, but that obviously hasn't worked very well -- a lot of employers want to stay here, but still want cheap labor from hard-working immigrants. Maybe it's time to recognize the economics of the situation and stop fighting it.
Posted by Urbie at December 2, 2005 12:05 PM