The random political thoughts thread (Part Deux)

[Disneyphile]

So, in reality, if the nation supports this, and we ship all those people home, are we also in support of much higher food costs?

To the people who support this law: Are you willing to pay double to triple price for your current groceries? Or, are you willing to bend over all day in the hot sun, picking fruits and vegetables for only $2 per hour? If you are, then great. If not, then I really hope you think about the impact of this law some more. Every time you sit down to eat, think about who brought that to your table.

And, this is coming from someone who lives in CA, with a much higher concentration of illegals than AZ can even imagine.

[scaeagles]

Are you willing to keep exploiting people who will work for less than minimum wage off the books? Same sort of rhetoical question that is meaningless. Ever hear of Cesar Chavaz, a champion of hispanic labor? He wanted those working here legally to report those who were here illegally because he understood that the illegal population was pushing wages down. It's funny that the same people who think Walmart is despicable (I'm not saying that's you, DP) also think it's OK to exploit illegal labor pushing wages down so they can have cheap food. And no, I don't want to pay $10 for a head of lettuce (as you wrote in an earlier post), but that is, of course, a ridiculous and extreme example. Even paying legal labor 3 times what an illegal laborer makes would do no more than triple the cost, but probably far less because labor is only one portion of the cost of produce.

From this story -

With 6.6 million residents, Arizona's illegal-immigrant population is estimated to be half a million people.

So approximately 1 in every 13 people in AZ is here illegally. CA has a population of 37 million people, so the same ratio would put just shy of 3 million illegals in CA. The info I find on estimates of the CA illegal population averages out to about 2.8 million, so it's the same. It doesn't seem CA has a higher concentration of illegals.

And as far as polls and anger, reading this very recent polling data would seem to suggest that there isn't as much outright anger as you might believe.

When asked if the Obama administration should try to stop the new Arizona immigration law, or if the administration should wait and see how the law works, Republicans and Independents by large margins want the law left alone.

Interestingly, so do Democrats. And it's not a squeaker either. By a two to one margin (52-26), Democrats said the law should be left alone to "see how it works."

I don't know what to say about the anger out there. The numbers don't seem to support that there is widespread anger. I think those that are mad are just exceptionally vocal about it. Which is fine.

[Ghoulish Delight]

Originally Posted by Disneyphile

So, in reality, if the nation supports this, and we ship all those people home, are we also in support of much higher food costs?

To the people who support this law: Are you willing to pay double to triple price for your current groceries? Or, are you willing to bend over all day in the hot sun, picking fruits and vegetables for only $2 per hour? If you are, then great. If not, then I really hope you think about the impact of this law some more. Every time you sit down to eat, think about who brought that to your table.

Even as someone who is against the law, I don't really find that a very compelling argument. What I pay for vegetables has no baring one way or the other on the basic human rights I think people deserve. The same "you'll pay $4 for lettuce" scare tactics were used in Cesar Chavez's era as justification for treating migrants like slaves and letting them exist in squalor. So yeah, I am willing to pay more for vegetables.

How US agriculture might operate in a world of reasonable labor control and enforceable border policies is an entirely separate issue from whether a particular attempt to enforce immigration law is fair or just.



Going on a different tangent, I recently saw a couple of interesting stats. Immigrant contribution to violent crime rates is a common justification for this law. Let's examine that claim. First off, in the last couple of decades, when the illegal immigration problem has, as the narrative goes, grown to epidemic proportions and caused all of this horrible violent crime, violent and property crime country wide has decreased. Okay, that's country wide, what about cities with large illegal immigrant populations? Violent and property crime in those cities has dropped even more. According to one reference I read, over a certain period (I believe it was something like 1990-2005), US violent and property crime rates dropped by ~35%, while over the same time frame it dropped by ~45% in Arizona.

Here are just a couple sources that seem to indicate that, while it's very difficult to get an accurate measure of effects on crime for various reasons, most of the broad estimates that can be used show no negative, and perhaps a positive, trend in violent crime rates in areas with heavy illegal immigrant populations. PPIC (pdf), CNN.

[scaeagles]

Originally Posted by Disneyphile

To the people who support this law: Are you willing to pay double to triple price for your current groceries? Or, are you willing to bend over all day in the hot sun, picking fruits and vegetables for only $2 per hour? If you are, then great. If not, then I really hope you think about the impact of this law some more. Every time you sit down to eat, think about who brought that to your table.

As I reread this, the more angry it made me. You think it's acceptable to pay $2/hour for people to pick fruits and veggies? Who are the real racists - the ones who would rather they not be here illegally or the one who think paying them $2/hour is acceptable because they will?

[Alex]

I agree with scaeagles, a boycott is unlikely to have any real effect simply because economic boycotts very rarely do (though someone writing on Twitter "I think we should all also boycott Arizona Iced Tea because it is the drink of fascists" is hardly an organized boycott (even if the guy wasn't joking) though it made for amusing headlines").


Missed a page of discussion. Yes, I'm willing to let people work for $2 an hour picking vegetables, but that is simply because I don't particularly support minimum wage laws. That said, while it is the law, I am willing to pay the rates for vegetables such laws would indicate. That said (again), over time paying legal wages for farm workers wouldn't necessarily increase prices by multiples because there are plenty of forms of automation that could be developed easily enough -- in fact many of them were invented decades ago -- that would be cheaper than legal labor but are more expensive that black market labor. So in the end we'd end up in many cases with nobody picking (or rather one guy driving a big machine) the vegetables if current labor law was effectively enforced.

[Disneyphile]

I'm fine with people making what they're willing to work for, yes. How that makes me racist, I honestly don't know. Please tell me. If they want to make more, they'll make it happen for themselves. It's why I'm not against Wal-Mart either. People are willing to take the jobs.

But, if we want everyone to have a "fair wage", let's start with paying everyone even "living wages" across the board, like say, $15 per hour. But, that would make me a Communist.

And, for those of you who support it, then please make sure you're purchasing food and other products from companies who only pay living wages. Put your money where your mouth is, and then I'll listen to you. Most products made in China and other countries are made by people working in deplorable conditions, yet most Americans don't think twice about buying that stuff. If you don't buy just "fair trade" items, then you support child labor, sweat shops, etc. That could be labelled as "racist" too. Sure, it's not ok for a farm worker to be paid $2 willingly, but man, if it's made by a 12-year-old girl in India because she's forced into it, that's ok. (Yes, that's sarcasm.)

But, I do understand the anger statements can make. I get angry every time I think about a woman being abused in Arizona, but can't speak up because she can be deported now. I get angry thinking about someone's shanty burning down, and they can't call for help out of fear of being deported now. I get angry when I read supporters comments such as, "We're tired of them murdering our people! We're tired of them taking our jobs and resources! We're tired of them crowding our schools!" Yep. I understand the anger completely.

(This is precisely why I hardly ever enter political discussions - they lead absolutely nowhere and aren't going to change anyone's beliefs anyway. Well, maybe except people's beliefs on who is racist and who isn't.)

[scaeagles]

I don't know how to do that, actuall, DP. I know they sell cage free chickens, but I don't think they sell certified illegal labor free food.

You make a good point about sweat shops in foreign countries that pay pennies/day.

I personally don't support minimum wage laws, but the fact is they are there, and the fact is that illegal labor does drive down the overall wages paid to unskilled labor.

I don't think you are a racist. I don't think that everyone who supports the law is a racist as they are typically portrayed.

[Disneyphile]

Originally Posted by scaeagles

I don't think you are a racist. I don't think that everyone who supports the law is a racist as they are typically portrayed.

And I don't think everyone who supports the law is racist.

It's a sad situation that hopefully will work itself out, but it just seems that it's too extreme and flawed.

As for imported stuff and all, it's gradually getting better as people are made more aware, and more folks are buying directly from the artists or from fair trade vendors. For example, I bought two head scarves from a street booth today that sells stuff made by his friends and family in Peru. I actually paid $5 each for something I paid $12 for at the spa a few months ago. The latter was in a nice package, and I'm betting the spa made a nice profit, and the dealer they purchased it from made a decent profit as well, and the artisan barely made anything. Cutting out the middleman might be a good key to supporting more families worldwide. Who knows.

I wish farms were subsidized more in order to pay better. But, at least the illegals do have a chance to make a little something, whereas back in their own country they wouldn't even have a chance to make that. They really do help our country in a lot of ways. It would just be better to work with them on a solution than against them.

[Ghoulish Delight]

Originally Posted by scaeagles

I don't think you are a racist. I don't think that everyone who supports the law is a racist as they are typically portrayed.

The majority of people who support the law are not racist. However the law carries a not insignificant potential to aggravate incidents of racist behavior, and to be enforced in a way that increases the likelihood of law abiding citizens running into difficulty with legal authorities simply because of their race.

ETA: to complete the thought - while the majority are not "racist", a large portion are ignorant of, or willfully ignoring, the racially charged reality of enforcing the law as written, which may not make them "racist" but does mean they are contributing to a deterioration of racial relations (I hate the term "racial relations" but I can't think of a better way to phrase that right now).

[Alex]

Originally Posted by Disneyphile

I wish farms were subsidized more in order to pay better.

Man, I hope not. We already subsidize farms to the tune of $16 billion a year (many of which are designed to keep produce prices elevated) and that is just direct subsidies not even including the fact that we pretty much give away grazing land and water. It is probably true that those most subsidized are the least likely to have any interest in elevating wages.

It is one of the great sillinesses that we subsidize agriculture to keep prices stable and elevated and then subsidize poor people so that they can afford to buy it. But sadly, being opposed to the current structure of subsidization is generally something politicians are only willing to do when they have no actual power to accomplish any change.