Zero Sum Game

Immigration Conflagration -- Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter
I'm a bit perplexed by the intense opposition that has been stirred up around immigration recently, particularly in the Southwest Unites States. Given that the status quo has hardly changed in 100 years, cannot say why it suddenly has become such a big issue.

The anti-immigration reasons I've heard fall into categories that are sometimes economic and sometimes nationalistic:

• Illegal immigrants take jobs away from native Texans
• Native Texans must foot the tax bill for education and health care of illegal immigrants
• Illegal immigrants are taking over Anglo-American culture by insisting on bilingualism

The major player in this whole discussion is the dollar bill. If not for that, we wouldn't be having the discussion. Undocumented workers are abundantly willing to do jobs that native Texans don't want to do. Here are some of the major employers of illegals, by category:

• Building and construction -- all phases of construction trade
• Hotels and property management -- for maid service and janitorial jobs
• Restaurant industry -- cooks, chefs, servers, busboys, wait staff
• Highway and Road maintenance -- all phases of construction and maintenance
• Lawn and garden -- landscapers, gardeners, tree pruners, sprinkler installers
• Agriculture -- farmers, harvesters
• Meat industry -- all phases of cattle ranching, slaughter, preparation, transportation

Some of the biggest companies in America profit from low wage Hispanics. We are talking Marriott, Wal-Mart and Centex -- big rich and usually, ironically Republican entities. If you summarily made these companies fire all the illegals and replace them with native Texans, you would see what I call the "6 of one" effect:

• Prices on everything would go up as competitive wages would go up. Prices also would go up dramatically because in addition to higher wages, you would have introduced a labor shortage and many jobs would go begging.
• Employers would likely have to provide better health coverage and insurance to native Texans taking the vacated jobs, so health care costs would also go up.

I'll have to make some concessions here. Parkland Hospital would have a less crowded waiting room. Wouldn't directly impact most anglo Dallasites who never set foot there, to wait in its 4 hour lines. Maple Springs Elementary would conduct classes in English -- might even close its doors if the "barrio" emptied out enough. We would satisfy our xenophobic fears by stripping our city and our state of Hispanic diversity.

Welcome to Tex-land where everyone says "Howdy" and everything is predictably Anglo-American. I don't think Tex-land sounds like a very nice place. Who will they decide needs to go next? Couple of things worth noting -- Hispanic immigrants are not trying to force a culture, religion or language on us. They want some accommodation while they become naturalized. The biggest beef that anti-immigrants have should not be so much with the illegals. It should be with the Wal-marts who are offloading their labor cost to you the tax payer. In the final analysis, the immigration ban is financially a zero sum game -- six of one and half a dozen of the other. What you save in taxes will be more than gobbled by price increases. What you sacrifice in good will and diversity is irreplaceable.

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