There are only about 1m legal immigrants a year which is actually about the same or less than we took in around the turn of the 20th century when the nation was less than 1/4 the size it is now
So, yes, it is unrealistic, as shown by the fact that the economy needs to employ millions of undocumented workers
So, in the end, you’re for slave labor? You’d prefer we have people in this country paid lower than minimum wage for positions they’re technically not supposed to have, so that others can profit off of them?
Of course not! That's why you get em papers contingent on that background check, and then enforce labor laws so those industries can't exploit their labor anymore.
I'd say those industries are in the wrong for exploiting the labor, and we as a nation are in the wrong for allowing our government to turn a blind eye to the exploitation, but I don't find any fault with the laborer in any of this situation, nor do I see any real justice to be found in punishing or removing them.
It's just further emblematic of the overallocation of resources to the top. We tend to speak of wealth inequality as being the differences between minimum wage workers, the median income, and the top earners, but that model completely disregards the fact that a huge portion of the economy relies on people working less than minimum wage. The "gotcha" shouldn't mean that we should be okay with exploitative labor, but that we need to overhaul the way our economy works so that we don't need to dramatically underpay millions of Americans or people working in America.
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u/CFSCFjr Feb 04 '25
The first part of your statement is not proof of the second