Comments about ‘Immigrants always a good gamble’

"... policies humans make without caring about the general welfare..."

Actually, immigration and employment laws help ensure the general welfare. Those who oppose such laws do not care about the "general welfare," caring instead about their own, selfish, special interests.

"...entrepreneurial instincts to retool to compete in their environment, including hiring foreign workers."

"Instincts?" You mean the Greed Instinct -- of putting profit over principle.

"With each wave of immigrants, the American economy became stronger, Utah included."

I guess that would explain the ruin of California, and also Utah's high unemployment rate, weak schools, and various economic problems.

"...its ability to benefit from diverse cultures..."

You mean it's ability to exploit a non-citizen sub-class, whether illegal (currently), or "legal" (HB116 amnesty), and avoid having to pay its fellow American a fair wage.

"During tough times, such as we are now experiencing, Americans have always pulled together."

Actually, we have special interests fighting the people of Utah.

"Undocumented immigrants have become the easy target to blame..."

The implication that they are innocent is a bald-faced lie.

"...They were immigrants, and the Native Americans did not ask for documentation."

False analogy. Pure propaganda. Another rationalization for Amnesty.

How about the employer who gambles by hiring illegals at lower wages? He is gambling on a "leg up" on his competition who hire legal immigrants at lawful wages and benefits and taxes. As long as we have no enforcement he is making more than the employer who does things legally and continues to thumb his nose at our laws. I say shut him down and make e-verify mandatory for all employers. Also a SUSTANTIAL fine so that he complies with the law in the future.

There are existing US programs for hiring foreign workers. How many farmers use that program? How many farmers decide it is just too hard to follow the law and just hire illegals? Why exactly should we be supporting the use for cheap foreign labor with no or little benefit to anyone other than the employer? How does the farmer pay back the rest of the US for any costs associated with the presence of that illegal and any dependents that happen to tag along?

Are you picking and choosing your history? After WWII, to free up jobs for returning servicemen, President Eisenhower rounded up illegals and deported them.

We have 12 to 20 million illegals and their US born children that could be deported to free up jobs and resources to help our own citizens in need. Why isnt this being done? Due to people like your spineless boss Sen Hatch who wont do the hard things needed to get this economy back on its feet by removing the freeloaders who pay little or no taxes but use up finite resources like money from entitlement programs, water, land, etc while this country has 14.3 trillion debt.

Republicans dont want to raise taxes, wont pass change to birthright citizenship, want to gut medicare / caid and still wont address the illegal immigration problem so they plan on hurting the poor, disabled, minorities while helping the rich.

The Democrats are not any better at facing reality.

Both parties need to go so we can get people in Congress willing to do what the people of this country have wanted for years. (deportations and stopping people from gaming the system ie 14th)

The anti-immigrant crowd is short-sighted. Do any of you people buy fruit? Do you think fruit willingly jumps off the branches into packing crates? Have you ever tried picking fruit? Have you ever stopped to think what fruit would cost without immigrant labor? Sure we could pay Americans to do it for $10 an hour, but only if you want to pay vastly higher prices at the grocery store. But it's hard to put a pricetag on the value that we get from immigrant labor and much easier to put a pricetag on what it costs to educate their children, so the demagoguery continues.

"If gambling in Utah is illegal, how come farmers are still in business? They gamble on the weather, gamble on having a workforce, and still have to meet the bank loan payment."

What a ridiculous analogy!

John, you are gambling every second of your life that the conditions will continue to exist allowing you to live. gambling that we won't have another tornado, or an earthquake; or when you're on the road gambling that the other drivers will obey the rules and thereby keeping the roads safer.

No, the real reason we decry what we normally define as gambling is because by some quirk of chance one can TAKE something from someone else who is willing to take the risk of losing because they have a chance to take something from the first party.

Unfortunately with illegal immigration it goes beyond gambling, because those from whom the jobs are being taken do not willingly enter into the game and they have no chance of winning anything. It is nothing more than thievery.

Gambling implies getting something for nothing. Farmers WORK for their crops. They RISK their time, their money, their land. Business owners RISK their capital to buy machines and to hire people. There is no "gamble - something for nothing" involved.

Illegal immigrants are gambling. They want something for nothing. They want to walk across the border and receive all the "blessing" of citizenship without paying the price, without getting on the list, without waiting their turn. Yes, they truly are gambling.

The thing that gripes me the most is the phony aggrandizement given to certain groups. In this case farmers.

In my 75 years I have never heard a farmer say anything good about America, our government or non-farm people.

All my life farmers have gotten subsidies and grants from the government (taxpayer).

Farmers are exempt from labor laws that protect workers.

Farmers tie up lands and waters from public access or use.

Farmers pay less that the market price for government land and services.

Farmers pay less property tax, even on residential property.

Farmers should be treated in the same vein and other businessmen.

Ultra Bob,

Farmers provide produce and food that feeds an entire country and make very little profit from it. That's why they depend so much on immigrant workers; otherwise, they can't harvest it.

Farmers pay hundreds of thousands of dollars on property taxes because they have to pay for every pasture they use, not just the quarter acre on which their house sits. These taxes are often much higher than their actual profit.

Farmers are some of the most patriotic people I know. A farmer's wife recently passed from cancer and some of the final acts she did in life was to institute school children learning and singing the Star-Spangled Banner every morning, learning the facets of the constitution, and making sure they knew the names of all of the presidents.

Farmers are dependent on not only the market value of their crops, but the elements as well. Every early frost and every drought means that they are very likely going without that year.

Farmers are a vanishing breed. When they are gone, so is a wonderful asset to our country. Perhaps we should give them a bit more respect!

Like I said. Phony agrandizement.

Working mothers and fathers work just as hard as farmers to put food on the table, and don't get the phony propaganda. Their risks are every bit as disasterous as those a farmer has and they get a lot less help from society.

@Invisible Hand
Based on replacing illegal workers with legal workers - reported by the NY Times - it appears your assertion regarding produce prices is incorrect. (NYTimes, 10 July 2010):

In 2010, Immigration and Customs Enforcement conducted an audit of employees at Gebbers Farms, an apple producer in Brewster, Washington. ICE found evidence that more than 500 of its workers, mostly immigrants from Mexico, were in the country illegally. ICE then advised Gebbers Farms of Social Security and immigration numbers that did not check out with federal databases. The workers were then fired.

John Morton, the head of the immigration agency, said the goal of the audits is to create "a culture of compliance" among employers, so that verifying new hires would be as routine as paying taxes.

After completing a federally mandated local labor search, Gebbers Farms applied to the federal guest worker program to import about 1,200 legal temporary workers most from Mexico. The guest workers, who can stay for up to six months, also included about 300 from Jamaica.

USDA Nat'l stats on apple prices at fresh market:
Average price for one pound of apples: Q1 2010 - $0.81 / Q1 2011 - $0.87

invisible hand

why can't you distinguish between legal and illegal immigration? Is it a skill you haven't yet mastered?

Why do you falsely (knowing you are false while you're at it) accuse those opposed to ILLEGAL immigration to be opposed to immigration?