NEW YORK (CNN) -- 'Jobs Americans just won't do.'
I can't stand that line, but more importantly, I don't even understand it.
Americans spend months at a time at sea fishing for crab or drilling for oil; two of the most dangerous jobs in the world. Americans clean bathrooms, subway stations and crime scenes. Americans man toll booths, pave roads, embalm bodies and inspect sewers. Yet people really expect us to believe that they won't pick strawberries or oranges?
It just doesn't add up.
Earlier this week The Wall Street Journal published a story about a shortage of H-2B visas, which are issued twice a year to nonagricultural seasonal employees. Because our government can't get out of its own way, they recently let an important 'returning workers' provision expire resulting in thousands of foreign workers being shut out of the country this summer.
That's inexcusable. I know this will come as a huge shock to those who only like to hurl insults, but I think we should be issuing more work visas, more student visas, and more green cards. And I think we should cut the red tape and bureaucracy that's constantly blocking the front door.
But until that happens people are left looking for loopholes and excuses, and 'jobs Americans won't do' is the gold standard.
The Journal article offered an example of a couple that sells food at fairs around California each summer. They say that because of the H-2B visa shortage most of their seasonal employees aren't able to enter the country.
So why don't they just hire Americans instead? Good question. Her answer? 'This is a hard job.'
I find it pretty hard to believe that there aren't a few college students who wouldn't want to drive around California and work outdoors all summer, but let's assume that's true. Let's even assume that none of the other 1.1 million Californians who were unemployed as of April are interested in the job either. Isn't anyone wondering why?
Well I'm not a labor consultant, but I am a thinker. Maybe the problem isn't that the job they're offering is 'too hard,' maybe it's that the wages they're offering are 'too low.'
No one paints the undersides of bridges for fun, they do it for the money. That's how capitalism works.
How capitalism does NOT work is when we collectively look the other way as companies exploit illegal labor for their own benefit.
The unspoken truth is that these businesses don't hire illegal aliens because they can't find American workers, they hire illegal aliens because they don't want American workers. And it has nothing to do with wages.
Illegal aliens mean no workers' comp claims, no age, race or sex discrimination lawsuits, no healthcare premiums, no unions, and no demands for raises, vacations or bigger offices. In fact, illegal immigrants are the perfect employees because they're not employees at all; they're corporate slaves. ....
