"Dwight Stewart" wrote in message link.net...
"Dave Heil" wrote:
Dwight Stewart wrote:

(snip)

Salaries are going up.

Compared to the cost of living, salaries are going down. The minimum wage
is a good example. To keep up with the cost of living increase over the last
twenty-five years (to have the same spending power as 25 years ago), the
minimum wage should be over $19 per hour. By the same token, a person
earning $19 an hour twenty-five years ago should be earning well over $50 an
hour today. Check it out yourself. Look at the minimum wage 25 years ago (or
any typical wage 25 years ago) and increase it by the same percentage that
living costs (rent, house payments, utilities, food, and so on) have
increased over the years since.

There are all kinds of indicators that both support and contradict
your point, Dwight. But what I see is that the general trend is for
some necessities (housing, medical costs, college education,
insurance, *taxes*) to be increasing in price faster than wages, and
for other items, mostly "luxuries" but some necessities (computers,
electronics, energy, food) to be increasing slower than wages. So what
you get are people who can afford a really sweet ham rig but cannot
afford a house to put it in.

The trend is further muddled by the increasing number of
two-career-by-necessity families. People forget that 30-40 years ago a
family of four could live a very nice middle-class lifestyle on one
middle-class income - and you did not need a master's degree to get
such a job.

There's also the increasing number of things to spend money on. I can
remember a time when, for most people, things like a second car, cable
TV, a computer, and many other things were luxuries. Today they are
almost essentials.

I can think of one, Dwight. Those folks work and
pay social security taxes so that you can retire and
draw SS benefits. They also pay State and Federal
taxes. Many of them are very bright individuals.
Some are doctors. Some do computer design work.
Some do menial labor which most American workers
don't desire.

Americans working at those jobs would do the same things (pay taxes and so
on), Dave. Why do we need immigrants to do that? Some of those Americans are
even bright. As for the "menial" jobs, the only reason those jobs are menial
is because employers choose not to pay decent wages to do those jobs. And as
long as employers continue to find cheap labor to fill those jobs, there is
no incentitive whatsoever to increase those wages. If anything, a ready
supply of cheap labor only drives down wages for other jobs, increasing the
number of menial jobs and decreasing jobs that pay decent wages. The direct
result is less well paying jobs for all working class Americans.

Then what's the answer? Shall we eliminate all immigration, or just
the illegals? Who gets to decide who should be kept out and who should
be admitted, other than obvious threats to security?

There's also an important factor being left out: Many of the "good"
jobs of former eras are being exported. Try to buy a shirt or shoes or
computer that's "Made In USA". If you think immigrant labor is cheap,
look at what the wages are in the developing countries. Remember
NAFTA? Remember the demonstrators at the GATT meetings? What do you
think they're demonstrating against?

How about this example:

Almost 100 years ago, my grandparents came to the United States from
Italy. They left in part because of the 1906 earthquake, but mostly
because they wanted a better life than they could get in Italy at that
time.

They were admitted through Ellis Island, like millions of others. They
wound up in Philadelphia, where they found jobs, learned the language,
built businesses and lives, etc. I don't think any of them even had a
grade-school education. They were from southern Italy, not northern or
western Europe. They didn't speak English when they got here, and some
of them never learned to speak it without an accent. They were Roman
Catholics, a religion widely despised in the US for various reasons.
They had to deal with all of the usual stereotypes applied to their
ethnicity.

Today their grandchildren all have college degrees, good jobs,
successful lives, etc. Typical American dream stuff.

Should they have been admitted to the USA or not?

(I'm sure some folks here would be really happy if they had been kept
out ;-) )

73 de Jim, N2EY