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[Shadowlord]

But would they take the jobs?

[smjjames]

It makes economic sense to have Mexicans do that. It's seasonal, and if locals were tied up doing it, you'd have to pay them unemployment the rest of the time. So, just think if you want 100% American produce-pickers what are they going to do the rest of the year?

That explanation makes less sense than you think, because there's unemployed Americans who could be employed for a short time to pick crops rather than immigrant workers if there was enough infrastructure to transport them to and from the area affordably.

Except that those people don't want to do those jobs.

Not if you want to stay cost effective with automation, it isnt.

That mean paying a wage that is not livable. You cant do that to citizens.  That's why mexican produce pickers are a big controversy.  There isnt an automated way to pick strawberries because of how fragile the berries are.  But they have to sit on a shelf, with group pricing next to fruits that ARE mechanically harvested. 

There is work being done to mechanise harvesting though.

[wierd]

For min wage? Many people would.  People clean up literal shit at nursing homes for min wage. Picking berries is much cleaner, and just as brutally physical labor. (ever try moving a human around who cant walk good, to get to and from a chair? Brutal. How about moving a 400lb bariatric resident every 2 hours they are in bed, so they dont get pressure sores? Brutal.)

[smjjames]

For min wage? Many people would.  People clean up literal shit at nursing homes for min wage. Picking berries is much cleaner, and just as brutally physical labor. (ever try moving a human around who cant walk good, to get to and from a chair? Brutal. How about moving a 400lb bariatric resident every 2 hours they are in bed, so they dont get pressure sores? Brutal.)

Then why don't more Americans do harvesting work? Aside from it being seasonal.

[wierd]

the farmers wont hire them, because then they have to pay social security, and min wage. Not enough profit margin.

In healthcare, it is expensive. People expect to pay a lot for that care. People dont expect to pay a lot for a 1lb clamshell of strawberries.

[Reelya]

It makes economic sense to have Mexicans do that. It's seasonal, and if locals were tied up doing it, you'd have to pay them unemployment the rest of the time. So, just think if you want 100% American produce-pickers what are they going to do the rest of the year?

That explanation makes less sense than you think, because there's unemployed Americans who could be employed for a short time to pick crops rather than immigrant workers if there was enough infrastructure to transport them to and from the area affordably.

That doesn't make economic sense. Because crops don't exist in a vacuum: they're competing against imports. Building the infrastructure needed would cost a lot of money, and paying the wages would push up the price of the commodity. Therefore they'd lose market share vs imported products, and you'd find everyone in the USA paying more for produce, while also paying higher taxes. Higher food costs and higher taxes would destroy other jobs.

[Rolan7]

It makes economic sense to have Mexicans do that. It's seasonal, and if locals were tied up doing it, you'd have to pay them unemployment the rest of the time. So, just think if you want 100% American produce-pickers what are they going to do the rest of the year?

That explanation makes less sense than you think, because there's unemployed Americans who could be employed for a short time to pick crops rather than immigrant workers if there was enough infrastructure to transport them to and from the area affordably.

Except that those people don't want to do those jobs.

Yeah, what weird said.  I'm tempted to get angry...

Thing is, in America, we have minimum wage and various protections extended to workers.
Illegals DON'T
And that is why they get hired over us.  My little brother isn't part of some lazy fucker class, he literally can't get a decent job because they're taken up by people willing to work off the books.

I respect the hard work of people who come here for a decent wage and to live the American dream.
I really do.
I ALSO respect the hard work of people who, I'M SORRY, DESERVE to be here first, both legal immigrants and also natural-born citizens.

I still support full amnesty for pragmatic reasons but eh, I guess that's over now.  It was only a compromise to fucking criminals who skipped the line, anyway.

[Vilanat]

Did the USA benefit, or did it suffer, when all those german and jewish rocket scientists came in the late 40s and early 50s?

Even if they dont get jobs, they still bring useful insights from their different experience base to the country. Kind of high-thinking, but still true.

For a real, and present example:  Jack o lanterns.

We did not do this custom until AFTER the irish potato famine, that brought literal boatloads of refugees here. Originally, it was a carved turnip. It mutated on exposure to pumpkins.  Now we have a new cultural fixture. Would not have happened if millions of poor irish people had not literally sold themselves to get here, even though they could not find work.

This day and age we don't necessarily need immigration to exchange cultures. there are gazzilion Italian, Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese and Thai restaurants in Israel and no major immigration from those countries. There are all sort of international events that got spread through facebook and twitter and there are all sorts of cultural quirks that got transferred without immigrants transferring them.

I find it hard to understand the argument for immigration to developed countries in the face of the automation revolution. why would a country want more people if they can only provide less and less jobs.

Because it's cheaper to import skilled people than to train locals to have those skills. Building high-tech schools is a long-term prospect. If those skills are going to be automated soon, then it makes sense to poach skilled people from other countries rather than to invest in training infrastructure. So ... a skill that's on the verge of being automated, but not quite yet is actually the #1 thing you'd want to use immigrants to fill the gap, while you close down existing training of locals.

But that's not a mass scale immigration that will demographically make a difference, not when speaking about the amount of workers needed to run an automated country.

Also, immigrants are consumers. Without immigrants you would see price deflation and therefore no investment.

I am not an economist, but i think the costs of having more unemployed people in your country is also a factor that needs considering when debating immigration. again, remind you, we are talking about a near future where millions in the U.S gonna find themselves out of work so a sort of universal basic income is inevitable, but its rate will depend on the number of recipients, the less recipients, the higher that basic income. if that basic income will be low, there will also be little investment. this is all need to be in proportion to the country's economy obviously, but i just wonder whether we in the developed world are already beginning to stretch those boundaries.

Statistically, Japan is in "Oh shit, sweet mother of god, we are in serious SHIT!!" territory there. Historical numbers indicate imminent cultural collapse, but then again, old data is for a world with much higher mortality rates.

Cultural collapse? how so? Japan is a good example of how a country makes itself more suitable to that technological change. high "machine trusting" culture and rich consumption culture. the Japanese problem is that they maybe culturally outpaced technology by a decade or two.

the farmers wont hire them, because then they have to pay social security, and min wage. Not enough profit margin.

In healthcare, it is expensive. People expect to pay a lot for that care. People dont expect to pay a lot for a 1lb clamshell of strawberries.

Why don't they pay social security and min wage to the mexicans? what's the difference between them and americans? or are we speaking about mexicans pickers in mexico?

[Frumple]

The undocumented immigrants don't have legal protection, by and large. They don't get that stuff because they have no way to fight for it. Min wage, anyway... social security is something else.

[Reelya]

Why don't they pay social security and min wage to the mexicans? what's the difference between them and americans? or are we speaking about mexicans pickers in mexico?

I would have thought this is obvious. Why would you pay more than you have to, especially when your competitors are paying less. It's a competitive market, therefore you need to use all the same tricks as the other farmers, or your product will be more expensive and you'll go out of business extremely quickly.

[Vilanat]

Well, that's not immigration per se then. it's just exploitation. and i don't see any reason for a country to want to have that either.

[smjjames]

And of course, amnesty would make all of those people legal citizens and thus entitled to min wage and healthcare and all that.

Well, that's not immigration per se then. it's just exploitation. and i don't see any reason for a country to want to have that either.

Because capitalism? There really isn't a good answer to that.

Though once someone makes a machine that harvests strawberries with an acceptably low rate of loss of fruit, then we'd probably be seeing more farmers change over to mechanical harvesting.

[Reelya]

The alternative isn't farms run by local labor, the alternative is no local farms and import everything from Mexico, where the workers are paid even less than they get here (which is why they travel).

Saying "End exploitation" is all well and good, but the Mexican laborers won't be getting USA minimum wage if you do that: they'll go back home where they're only earning half of what they could get picking produce in America. Think about the effect on people's actual lives here.

[Sergarr]

It makes economic sense to have Mexicans do that. It's seasonal, and if locals were tied up doing it, you'd have to pay them unemployment the rest of the time. So, just think if you want 100% American produce-pickers what are they going to do the rest of the year?

That explanation makes less sense than you think, because there's unemployed Americans who could be employed for a short time to pick crops rather than immigrant workers if there was enough infrastructure to transport them to and from the area affordably.

Except that those people don't want to do those jobs.

Yeah, what weird said.  I'm tempted to get angry...

Thing is, in America, we have minimum wage and various protections extended to workers.
Illegals DON'T
And that is why they get hired over us.  My little brother isn't part of some lazy fucker class, he literally can't get a decent job because they're taken up by people willing to work off the books.

I respect the hard work of people who come here for a decent wage and to live the American dream.
I really do.
I ALSO respect the hard work of people who, I'M SORRY, DESERVE to be here first, both legal immigrants and also natural-born citizens.

I still support full amnesty for pragmatic reasons but eh, I guess that's over now.  It was only a compromise to fucking criminals who skipped the line, anyway.

Hmm, what about repealing minimum wage, then? Or weakening its legal definition enough so that there isn't any de-facto? In Russia, there's a thing called "wage rate", which is a multiplier on your wage, and while your nominal wage technically cannot be lower than minimum one, the real one totally can.

I bet you can even get most Republicans on board with that proposition!

[Frumple]

The alternative isn't farms run by local labor, the alternative is no local farms and import everything from Mexico, where the workers are paid even less than they get here (which is why they travel).

It's exploitation, but the Mexican workers come here because they get more than they would otherwise. So "end exploitation" is all well and good as a line in the sand, but sometimes people agree to be exploited because they're benefiting as well.

Eeehhh... not entirely true. There's still a market for local and in-country grown stuff, after all. It'd just be more expensive and produce would mostly be imported