Are you willing to do jobs Americans won't.

[Lost in CT]

You know like framing houses or network administrator.

I am...

I have a lot of friends out of work and others like myself that are seriously underemployed and looking for a career change.

They have decent educations and no criminal history.

They are looking to feed their families and keep a roof over their heads.

They are willing to clean toilets for ten dollars an hour.

They will work as carpenters or plumbers in New Orleans.

They will run SQL Servers for small companies. (And do some IT work on the side to boot)

Why can't we allow Americans to do these jobs in America.

I think it is high time we reopened the jobs Americans won't do back to Americans who need a job.

[SoCalNative]

1. Well...

"They are willing to clean toilets for ten dollars an hour."

Sorry but that's one job I wouldn't do even for $100 an hour

"They will work as carpenters or plumbers in New Orleans."

I don't have the skills or knowledge to do either job so again, no.

"They will run SQL Servers for small companies. (And do some IT work on the side to boot)"

Again something I have no skills or knowledge of so my answer would have to be no.

[Greyhound]

4. So you are all Americans?

Is there a point to this?

I'm guessing that you have a job.

[Zywiec]

19. I'd clean toilets for $100 / hour

Where do I sign up?

:shrug:

[Rincewind]

20. Clean toilets?

When I was in High School, I worked at a grocery store and one of my jobs was to clean the restrooms. I was paid $1.65 an hour.

[Lady Effingbroke]

40. Me too, several years ago.

I was paid the princely sum of $5.15 per hour, and I'd do it again if I had to.

[Greyhound]

2. Hear! Hear! Except that there's no such thing as a "job Americans won't do". n/t

[Veritas_et_Aequitas]

3. I think you'll find many people willing to do those jobs...

just not at the $2 an hour many illegals get paid.

[pampango]

5. You seem to be blaming America's problems on a certain group of people,

but I can't put my finger on who that is. A little more clarity please as to who is at fault for our problems. My guess is that you're not looking at American politicians, banking and corporate executives and speculators.

[Morning Dew]

6. It's never been about jobs Americans won't do . . .

It's jobs Americans won't do for minimum wage... cuz they can't live on minimum wage.

[Critters2]

11. Actually, it's about jobs Americans won't do for less than minimum wage. nt

[ogneopasno]

7. You'll find lots of people who say they are willing to do those jobs...

but aren't willing to do them for crap pay. And framing houses isn't easy work.

[Lost in CT]

9. Yes but not to long ago framing houses could support a family of four

in a nice middle class lifestyle.

The actual per dollar rate for those workers has dropped in the last twenty years never mind the pay adjusted for inflation.

[kath]

28. EXACTLY - jobs that used to support a family 30-40 yrs ago (and on ONE income) now pay barely above

minimum wage - hard for one person to survive on, much less a family. The American worker has been screwed to the max.

[ogneopasno]

32. Largely because undercutting stick-framing residential was a great way to break the union in a lot

of areas. It used to be a union job. Now it's not. Even union commercial carpenters have seen their wages drop versus inflation.

[bertman]

35. Where I live framing is NON-union and exclusively illegal immigrants. Or rather WAS.

Since nothing is being framed anymore due to no mortgage money and no houses being built.

Good luck finding a framing job.

[ogneopasno]

41. Right, that's what I'm saying. In many places, it used to be a union job.

[Earth_First]

8. I'm still waiting for a response from Sen. McCain's office on that $50/hr. to pick lettuce...

(no response yet...)

[Greyhound]

29. When he said that, over 200 hundred people showed up at his office to volunteer to take one

of those jobs. It got a brief mention and disappeared.

[Lost in CT]

42. Heck $20 bucks an hour and there would be lines out the door. nt

[EFerrari]

10. Who is keeping them out of those jobs?

I've done everything from house cleaning to teaching college. No one barred my way when I went to apply. :shrug:

[Critters2]

12. Employers aren't interested in hiring people at minimum wage,

when they can get others at less than minimum.

[Lost in CT]

13. Not to mention paying Workmans Comp

Unemployment insurance or FICA taxes.

[Critters2]

16. Exactly. nt

[EFerrari]

17. If people suspect illegal hiring practices, they need to report it.

It hurts everyone. God, I still hate Ronald Reagan for doing his best to kill labor.

[Critters2]

18. How do I report the entire meat industry?

Cuz I suspect illegal hiring practices there, for damn sure!

[EFerrari]

21. No kidding. We've gone back to the days where these @ssholes

hire a group of people from Guatemala, use them and then call ICE on them in lieu of pay. It's hard to think of a more corrupt and brutal industry.

[Lyric]

23. I do more than suspect. I worked in the meat industry for years.

I was part of the three-person supervisor team that ran a large night-shift crew at a turkey plant in Virginia. All of the upper-level supervisors (and I presume the managers/execs) knew that an enormous portion of their workforce was illegal. They joked about it; the INS raided another plant in our county, and when I got to work, my own supervisor was joking about how we probably wouldn't see half of our night-shift crew that night, because fear of an INS raid would keep them away. I was only 17 at the time, and knew practically nothing about politics, so it never occurred to me to talk to anyone about what I heard and saw. Now it's too late; the company I worked for has since gone under, and no longer exists. Still--if it was that way with us, I'd say that there's a good chance of it being the same way with other companies.

What's really sad is that we folks on the bottom rungs of the ladder didn't even care so much about them being illegal; we used to talk about it, and we all pretty much agreed that if they were willing to do the work, then they deserved the job. I saw their paychecks (it was my job to hand them out every Friday night.) They made the same as any entry-level line worker per-hour, which was $7.45. However, I know damned well that they weren't getting the raises, benefits, etc. that "documented" workers got on a regular basis. Hell, I was making over nine bucks an hour after just one year; those guys should have been making a LOT more than me, but they weren't. It was easy to tell who was legal and who wasn't, just by paying attention to their paychecks.

[Lost in CT]

43. The question is who is keeping skilled labor jobs at $8 an hour without benefits. nt

[leftstreet]

14. So is this an anti-immigration thread? A pro-low wage thread? What

I can never keep these things straight.

What happened to the Hero Worship threads?

[Greyhound]

31. It's a "let's call BS on this" thread.

It's about how we've been fucked for so long many of us believe that's how it has always been.

Does that help?

[Andy823]

15. Well except for

Running SQL servers, I "HAVE" done all those jobs and more. I have picked apples, drove tractors, and done many other jobs for low wages. Work is work and I think there will be more and more people ready to do things they may not have been willing to do in the past.

The problem is like others have said, the wage! It's the employers who are the problem when it comes to hiring people with no legal status. It's the employer who abuses their workers with low wages in order to make larger profits when there are millions of workers here who would do the job if they paid a decent wage, a wage they used to pay till they started exploiting those who came here because they could not find work in their own countries after the NAFT bill was passed.

[jmg257]

22. Been there, done those. IT, toilets, construction, farm work - no biggie. The problem

these days is the contractors who use "cheap labor" to keep costs down.

[Deja Q]

24. They're all educated? Well, they're all overqualified. Nice to mention the family values reference

Republicans surely don't have families, otherwise they - when having all 3 branches of government - wouldn't have let these things get so bad.

[KG]

25. I can't live on 10 bucks an hour and I shouldn't fucking have to.

it's about time american workers get paid real-life wages again.

another sad example of how stupid americans are is how they've fallen for the anti-labor and anti-union shit they've been fed. unbelieveable.

[mdmc]

27. i hear that

[kestrel91316]

26. You mean a job like de-pooping an obstipated cat???

I WISH I could outsource those to India, but it's not something you can do over a phone line.

[Gregorian]

30. Hell yeah. I roofed houses even after I had an engineering degree.

And loved it. Even with a bad back. Fresh air, good exercise, a feeling of power.

I don't know what is wrong with the dingbats that think they're above this kind of thing. It really bothers me. So many weak and worthless people.

I think this country is due for a reboot. I hope it's severe. Sorry, I do mean it. But then I think of people suffering and I don't like the thought of it. But no pain, no gain. And we've been a bunch of measly wimps. In Lexuses. I hate it. Come back down to earth.

[4 t 4]

33. Hell yea

I can't even get a dog walking job for $10 an hour in freezing cold Chicago anymore. (who was the ass that said Americans wouldn't pick lettuce for $50 an hour) that wasn't John McShame was it ?

[Gregorian]

36. Jimmy Tingle

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_cVd1azq-E

Darn, I couldn't find the clip I wanted. He does some great routine on illegal immigration. If they swim across the border they should get an award. Something like that.

[guitar man]

34. I will do

and have done in the past, just about anything if the pay is right. I remember quitting my $2.85 an hour summer dishwashing job in high school to go to work at the stockyards cleaning out the semi trailers that they hauled livestock in for 5.00 an hour (plus the drivers would toss us some good tips). It was some nasty, back breaking work worthy of that "dirty jobs" show on cable, but I had a financial goal in mind and breaking my back knee-deep shoveling shit was a way to acheive it.

Through the years, I've done it again and again, worked my ass off WHEN the money was right, but I'm damn sure not going to do it for peanuts. The "jobs Americans won't do" is a canard, always has been.

[AwakeAtLast]

37. I want that $50/hr lettuce picking job McCain was talking about

:D

[Blue-Jay]

38. depends. Can I be a whore?

How much do whores make?

[conspirator]

44. They make a whore lot of money nt

[Arkansas Granny]

39. I've done those kinds of jobs in the past for minimum wage.

At one time I vaccinated baby chicks at a hatchery. I wouldn't want to go back to that type of employment, but I would do it if I had to.