← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · JoseyWales
Thread ID: 19695 | Posts: 2 | Started: 2005-08-17
2005-08-17 14:47 | User Profile
Im not totally opposed to using mexican labor for farming, but I am against giving them social security or free, taxpayer funded medical care. This should be the sole responsibility of the employers. Hey if the plantations had to take care of the darkies from cradle to grave then so should the farmers.
I believe other countries use foriegn labor but they bus them in for a set period of time, then boot them out. They dont become a burden on the taxpaying citizens.
this all might be moot, since things have come so far.
2005-08-17 15:12 | User Profile
The entire problem is rent-seeking. If the consumers of foreign labor had to bear its entire cost, there would be a lot less foreign labor. If landlords and other businesses refused to contract with mestizos because they harm property values and are poor credit risks, then the farmer wanting his strawberries picked would have to house and feed his foreign workforce himself and account for it as part of his costs. This would be trade based on comparative advantage, as opposed to what Paul Craig Roberts calls absolute advantage.