As the Trump administration has doubled down on its hardline immigration agenda, behind the scenes senior Trump officials and the president himself have grappled with the consequences of that crackdown against a key portion of the workforce: migrant workers.
You are correct, but those issues have no bearing on the fact that those people still would have no idea what their food would cost if they were paid a fair wage, and would likely not be willing to accept it even if you could mathematically prove that it was correct.
The gap between what most undocumented immigrants get paid vs. what a US citizen or permanent resident would get paid for the exact same work (assuming everything was above board) is absolutely gigantic. Especially in the agriculture and construction industries. Even if you took 100% of the rest of the corporate greed out, the price increases associated with paying them a fair wage would still send prices far higher than most people would be willing or even able to pay.
Look at it this way.
A quick google search shows that the average construction worker gets paid $25 an hour. Factor in benefits and you’re figuring $35 effective. Let’s say that, among the rest of the crew, A construction company hires 2 undocumented workers to do the low-level stuff for $10 an hour to cut a few corners and keep within budget. (A not-uncommon practice in the industry, to say the least. I’m sure some hire many more than that.)
A house takes about 6 months to build. So those two workers would work 40 hours/week for 26 weeks, for a total of 1040 hours, or 2080 hours between the two of them. The company pays them $20,800 under the table.
Had that construction company hired two union employees to do the same work, those workers would have been paid $72,800 in pay and benefits. That’s over $50,000 difference. Those costs would be tacked on to the cost of the house. A house that normally would sell for $150k would now be priced over $200k. That’s not corporate greed. That’s just math, and the true cost of what it would take to pay them a fair wage. If the owners were planning on renting out the property, this would probably result in the resulting rent for the property being about $500 a month higher, and even if the property were broken out into several apartments, you’d probably be still talking about tacking on a couple of hundred a month per apartment.
Whether it’s morally right is irrelevant. The price increases even after you factor out the things you correctly mention also have an impact would still likely be significantly higher than most people would be willing to accept and would likely cause severe negative impacts in the economy.
That last part is where we disagree. You are underestimating the wealth extraction that has taken place during the post-WWII boom. I’m not going to argue further because I’m going to bed, but I’ll suffice to agree to disagree.
I’m not underestimating it at all. I’m saying that my point would still fully stand even after the corporate greed and wealth extraction was taken into consideration. People severely underestimate the impact that this has on prices.
You are correct, but those issues have no bearing on the fact that those people still would have no idea what their food would cost if they were paid a fair wage, and would likely not be willing to accept it even if you could mathematically prove that it was correct.
The gap between what most undocumented immigrants get paid vs. what a US citizen or permanent resident would get paid for the exact same work (assuming everything was above board) is absolutely gigantic. Especially in the agriculture and construction industries. Even if you took 100% of the rest of the corporate greed out, the price increases associated with paying them a fair wage would still send prices far higher than most people would be willing or even able to pay.
Look at it this way.
A quick google search shows that the average construction worker gets paid $25 an hour. Factor in benefits and you’re figuring $35 effective. Let’s say that, among the rest of the crew, A construction company hires 2 undocumented workers to do the low-level stuff for $10 an hour to cut a few corners and keep within budget. (A not-uncommon practice in the industry, to say the least. I’m sure some hire many more than that.)
A house takes about 6 months to build. So those two workers would work 40 hours/week for 26 weeks, for a total of 1040 hours, or 2080 hours between the two of them. The company pays them $20,800 under the table.
Had that construction company hired two union employees to do the same work, those workers would have been paid $72,800 in pay and benefits. That’s over $50,000 difference. Those costs would be tacked on to the cost of the house. A house that normally would sell for $150k would now be priced over $200k. That’s not corporate greed. That’s just math, and the true cost of what it would take to pay them a fair wage. If the owners were planning on renting out the property, this would probably result in the resulting rent for the property being about $500 a month higher, and even if the property were broken out into several apartments, you’d probably be still talking about tacking on a couple of hundred a month per apartment.
Whether it’s morally right is irrelevant. The price increases even after you factor out the things you correctly mention also have an impact would still likely be significantly higher than most people would be willing to accept and would likely cause severe negative impacts in the economy.
That last part is where we disagree. You are underestimating the wealth extraction that has taken place during the post-WWII boom. I’m not going to argue further because I’m going to bed, but I’ll suffice to agree to disagree.
I’m not underestimating it at all. I’m saying that my point would still fully stand even after the corporate greed and wealth extraction was taken into consideration. People severely underestimate the impact that this has on prices.