Dunno man. Weren't we talking about "they're taking our jobs!" ? If that's your argument, wouldn't you rather have a bunch of people who aren't competing against you for your desired type of employment?

Or, if you think that 2 million educated professionals are a net benefit to the US economy, why don't you think that agricultural workers are?

I'm in favor of just letting the market figure it out. We need workers of all types to be maximally productive. How do you know exactly how many workers we need of each kind? I'm down with criminal background checks, but I see no good reason for Jose to prove at the border that he's a rocket scientist and not a lettuce picker, or Maria that she's an accountant and not a maid. It's good for the economy to have enough maids and lettuce pickers, too.

Plus, as more people immigrate here, more people have an incentive to stay home, as demand for labor in their home countries goes up and demand in the US goes down.

I was wondering if anyone was going to read my post.

Yeah, I thought that the government always screwed up at this sort of thing. Socialism is bad, a command economy is doomed to failure, government officials can accurately figure out how many people of each profession a country's economy needs and allocate them in an efficient and sensible way.

One of the above statements is not like the others. Lets see if we can figure out which one and why...

the interesting question would be what percentage of those 10% International students go on to take highly qualified jobs that previously might have gone to American graduates.

How is this any different than the lettuce picker who takes the lettuce job from an American dropout?

the only difference is they're taking more lucrative jobs that americans want.

The point was that American's are losing high end jobs overseas as well because of the high cost of American labor. You can pay an american IT worker $60K a year or hire a guy with the same education and skills whose willing to do it in India for a quarter of that.

This all circles back to kicking out illegals who do jobs for less isn't going to save american jobs.

Market forces: unable to stem the unassailable tide of the billions who will move here the instant we open our doors.

the hysteria by the anti-immigration forces just gets more and more ridiculous the more one looks into it.

illegal immigration is the lowest its been in years. Entry is harder then ever before. And more illegals are being deported then during previous administrations.

Despite all this, suddenly its a huge issue. Our society can't spend enough time and energy battling nonsensical hysteria.

frbsf.org/publications/economics/letter/2010/el2010-26.html fed study over the effects of immigration. Cliff notes: it is good

Quote from a Sarah Palin speech that I find relevant:

"They talk down to us. Especially here in the heartland. Oh, man. They think that, if we were just smart enough, we’d be able to understand their policies. And I so want to tell ’em, and I do tell ’em, Oh, we’re plenty smart, oh yeah—we know what’s goin’ on. And we don’t like what’s goin’ on. And we’re not gonna let them tell us to sit down and shut up.”

Because, suddenly, unemployment is a huge issue. Makes sense actually.

Well, I agree in the sense that in periods of decline (at least historically) bigotry has alway risen. People need to find someone to blame for their woes.

So I agree that unemployment is an issue. But it doesn't make sense to blame it on illegals.

It makes sense inasmuch as "Scapegoaters gonna scapegoat," but blaming the illegal immigrants for losing your job at GM makes no more sense than blaming the Jews for Germany's economic troubles at the end of WWI.

The racist card works in these cases only after you meet the burden of showing that race is the motivation behind the opposition (by Congress and others) to uncontrolled immigration. This you have not done, only made unconvincing assertions.

It makes sense as long as illegal aliens have jobs while Americans don't.

Concerto,

If the illegals are taking our jobs, why don't we see Americans outside Home Depot looking to earn a quick buck?

Also, we've gone to great lengths showing how good for the economy illegal immigrants are. Yet you continue to hate them for reasons that you think aren't bigoted but that are logically invalid. So, it's time to start looking at irrational reasons why you and others might hate them.

Those quicky jobs don't offer compensation Americans consider adequate due to the intense competition. What would be the other explanation? That there aren't really any unemployed Americans?

My point is that they're not "taking" jobs from anyone if they're doing jobs that no one else wants to do. Blaming illegal immigrants for costing you a job that they weren't competing for, and for taking a job that you're unwilling to do, is 100% scapegoating. The most harm they've done to you is save you a few cents on a head of lettuce in the grocery store so as to help you make ends meet during some rough times.

But the people who have lost their jobs have not lost their jobs because of illegals. They lost their jobs because of the recession due to bank failures, overvalued housing markets, deficits, etc.

As many have shown in this thread, the illegal immigrants have had many net positive effects on the US job market, salary ranges, etc.

Also, the influx of illegal immigrants has actually decreased. So again, it would appear that its illogical to blame their problems on the immigrants.

As I pointed out, historically bigotry (and related violence) has risen in times of financial decline. If past patterns are valuable for assessing the current situation, a rise in various forms of bigotry is expected. From what I've seen, all the reasons people have stated being pro-anti-immigration have been wrong at worst, very suspect at best... we're left with the most likely reason being related to race.

Probably because illegals are enterprising enough to have made that niche for themselves. This does not make your point since the Home Depot aliens only show that some of the jobs illegals take are ones which Americans won't do. I haven't seen anyone dispute or object to that here.

You still have not shown that all of the jobs illegals take involve work Americans won't do, which is what is required to refute the claim of injury.

Feeble arguments all, usually including, in tacit admission of the failure of your logical stance, unfounded hot-button ad hominems like:

You can't show any post of mine in all the threads on this topic that includes hate for anyone.

Ah, now I understand. I am a bigot because I like laws and do not want the entire population of some 3rd world country to move here every time we start to blow one of them up over oil. Got it. Thanks for clearing that up for me.

Do you guys think actual racists think to themselves "Boy I hate ***** I sure hates them ****ing ***** I wish they'd die"? And since you don't think that, you clearly can't be racist?

Because I don't think that's how it works. Instead I think you believe implausibly bad things about the effects of illegal immigration. That's how it works.

was she talking about illegals or about men with IQ above 100 in general?

Dude, i am not sure where you get that from. I am all for allowing as many immigrants as market can support when we talking about unqualified work force. ITT I've maintained only one position: Give them work permits, make them pay taxes, create a "road map" to citizenship where employment and criminal record would be key points.
With that being said, you have to protect mid-upper job market and thats just simple economics. If you open your mid-upper job markets to immigrants you are pushing natives in economically unfair condition. After paying 200-300K for education they simply cannot compete with immigrants on the job market when it comes to salary.
It is extremely advantages for a country to cherry pick best brains in the world and have them work for companies in US but they key is to pick few and protect your market while you doing it.

So in your mind it all boils down to "implausibility" of certain events or actions?
If Person A can prove his point to person B using facts, numbers and visual aids he is ok but if he can't then he must be racist? Any thoughts about person B?