The past 2 weeks really have just been the Democrats doubling down and saying the quiet part out loud.
The past 2 weeks really have just been the Democrats doubling down and saying the quiet part out loud.
Yes, it's a PCM meme, but still accurate as fuck.
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I don't understand. Is the statement incorrect? Or are you hoping that the wages for pickers will go up enough for "real Americans" to take the jobs?
I'm hoping the wages will go up, yes.
why hope when you can vote for people who will pass laws to make the wages go up?
Most people did.
most people didn't vote.
True, I should correct my statement: more people who voted did than didn't.
Did they though? Will we get laws to raise wages?
Yeah.
Notably there’s these promises from Trump:
- mass deportations of illegal immigrants
- tariffs
Neither of those things are laws that raise wages.
The first one will reduce supply of all sorts of things, which will raise prices. And it's back to hope again that the suppliers raise wages.
The second one is a tool to raise prices, with no direct way of raising wages so that's kinda the opposite actually.
Any Republicans out there putting forth laws that directly raise wages?
You're half right. Tariffs are likely to lower wages actually. But deporting illegal immigrants would probably raise the average wages of the people working in the fields that had those displaced jobs, either through supply and demand (few employees so there's more money to go around), or by citizens replacing non-citizens and getting paid full wages as a result.
All of that is in the realm of "hopefully" and none of it is in the realm of "will happen because a law says it must."
If citizenry is the magic spell that makes employees pay people more money, why not make all the undocumented citizens with jobs citizens?
Creating a sudden and violent work shortage across a large swath of industries sounds like blowing a hole in the country's foot when the requested results is just a few dollars higher wages. Why not make those industries pay higher wages by law? You could even mandate that those industries verify citizenship before hiring new people if you really wanted to, and provide a path to citizenship for the people who are already here and proving they can do a job and pay taxes.
Paying more wages is going to raise prices in either case, why choose to leave positive outcomes to chance when lawmakers can literally mandate the positive outcomes.
Yeah probably
Ah, so you're back to hope, got it.
Oh my gosh y'all are so ridiculous 😂😂
Is it a likely progression? And how long do you believe it will take? Also, I'm curious what you are basing your hope on and what the you believe the knock-on effects will be. It would be good to know if something similar happened in the US or another country in order to compare.
I'm not an psychic, but I'd imagine the more we deport, the more wages will go up. Hopefully in 4 years, we'll be in a much better place.
The biggest side effect would be higher rates for fruit/veggies and for landscaping. But I'd pay extra for fruit I know is grown ethically. I already do, as much as I try.
Setting aside all the other issues, if you think creating a worker shortage (which might increase wages short term) will do anything good for your economy: it won't.
Historically economic growth is pretty closely tied to population growth. More hands create more value. Removing hands will make the remaining hands more valuable but there is still less value created. And the people that hold economic power aren't going to give up their share easily, so one way or another it will eventually mean even less for the workers.
There was population growth in the late 1800s, it wasn't until the population got paid more that the economy took off.
While that's true, the capitalists where getting richer and richer even before the big economic growth. They don't really care. Also, the wage increases had to be hard fought for by a united working class. I don't see american workers unite right now to fight the rich.
Without exploitable labor employers will have to pay employees more. Workers won't have to fight, they can do nothing and wages will still increase.
Creating an under class of people doesn't help. Look at the South vs the North. The south had slaves, the north largely did not. The north has much more industry.
I'm not an psychic, but I'd imagine the more we deport, the more wages will go up
I think it's a reasonable assumption, but the reason I was asking for the basis for that hope is because I was hoping you had done some research and found some data to base that assumption on. It could have been a solid basis for it. In the UK, where Brexit was touted to achieve the same goal, the wages did go up (not a very good source, but well) however they ended up asking for the pickers, truck drivers, and handiworkers to return (EuroNews 2021, BBC 2023, Le Monde).
If you were to take a look at Germany (3rd biggest economy in the world), it struggles to get workers for elderly care and instead of increasing wages to attract more people, they are instead making easier to hire abroad e.g India.
The biggest side effect would be higher rates for fruit/veggies and for landscaping. But I'd pay extra for fruit I know is grown ethically. I already do, as much as I try.
I agree that the cost of food and landscaping will go up, which could be troubling for some who hoped for the opposite. Given how wages have not risen at the same rate as inflation, it is difficult to share your hope for increased wages - be it for the pickers and landscapers or the people paying for the produce and services. But, I may be wrong, I'm not a psychic either.
I do commend you for willing to pay more for ethically grown (and harvested) fruit. Whether your fellow countrymen and women are is yet to be seen.
In conclusion, my fear is that while there might be mass deportations and a real chance of wages going up, IMO the most likely outcomes are
- a drastic labour shortage in under-regulated and low-wage jobs previously held by the deported
- a quick increase in products and services of said jobs
- following options:
- lobbying to simplify and speed up the return of said workers to keep wages / costs down
- prison workers being forced to do the jobs (some places already do that) --> prison industrial complex growth
- wage increases starting from minimum wage to attract US citizens to do the jobs
- lots of businesses going bankrupt followed by consolidation by larger businesses and acute risk or establishment of monopolies
Whether those are all good, whether they happen together or separately, I don't know, but my hopes aren't very high that the total outcome will be positive.
Good luck though.