[torpfactory]

There’s a very sizable number of low paying, dirty, dangerous, and/or boring jobs that we can’t find enough locals to do. Think farm hands, home care aides, meat processors, etc. Unskilled immigrants do those jobs because that’s what is available to them (I.e unskilled). If they weren’t doing those jobs, we’d have to pay significantly more for the goods and services that labor depends on. Immigrant labor is disinflationary or at least prevents or ameliorates it.

[sensanaty]

They're low paying because (often illegal) immigrants from other countries either

A) are happy to put up with what is a luxurious salary for back home, but barely liveable locally

Or B) don't have a choice once they're in, since they practically become indentured servants

In the Netherlands, no dutchie wants to work construction for example, because immigrants from Eastern Europe often take under-the-table deals where they get paid drastically less than what a Dutchie would command, though still much higher than any job they'd get back home. The same happens everywhere.

The answer is NOT to bring the country down by mass-importing low skilled workers, but by forcing these hugely profitable companies to actually invest in the country and its citizens by paying all employees as it should.

[suzzer99]

> The answer is NOT to bring the country down by mass-importing low skilled workers

My great grandparents came to this country as low skilled workers. I work with a second generation computer programmer whose parents came as unskilled workers. I know a guy from Guatemala who cleans houses and put his three kids through college. He just about explodes with pride when he talks about his kids.

Not everyone shares your views.

[switch007]

> since they practically become indentured servants

Yup. A lot the cheap fruit + veg in the EU is thanks to back-breaking work by immigrants and the farm owners breaching their human and labour rights..

Who do you think is picking the fruit in the massive green house of southern spain? Not well-paid Spaniards I'll tell you - https://www.ethicalconsumer.org/ethicalcampaigns/agricultura...

[kwere]

anecdotally, as an Italian i worked summer jobs in the rural side few years ago being paid 4$ an hour off the table, and it was considered a very good pay. I hear all the time of illegal migrants being paid 2/3 $ an hour without any contract

[systemtest]

Both Dutch natives and EU-migrants are to be paid minimum wage, however it is a common trick when hiring migrants to charge them a ridiculous amount of rent for very sub-par accommodation nearby the jobsite. For example €600/month for a bunk-bed in a room with eight others. That is a way many temp agencies earn extra from migrants.

[sensanaty]

> Both Dutch natives and EU-migrants are to be paid minimum wage

In theory, yes, but I know a decent number of my own countrymen (Serbians) that most definitely aren't legally employed in NL, but they're still working construction. It's vile, but it is what it is. (Not them, the companies are vile for what they're doing, the workers are simply surviving however they can)

[15155]

Could it be possible that this bunk bed is then made a required (verbal - nobody put it in writing, of course) condition of employment?

[systemtest]

I don't know the contract details but these workers are picked up at the facility every day with an 8-person van and brought to the job site. Not only will it be very difficult to get a rental apartment for 2 months at less than €600/month, you also miss out on the transportation if you do.

And these jobs are usually picking strawberries out in the rural sections or working for Amazon at some industrial estate that doesn't have public transit late at night.

[np-]

I’m always deeply uncomfortable with this argument. It sounds like justification for a “slave” class to do undesirable jobs with no legal protections and sub minimum wage, just so Americans can save a few bucks at the supermarket. But at what moral cost? We can’t have it both ways—if they’re here working, then it needs to be at full American wage with full American regulation/oversight. But that itself defeats the purpose of hiring undocumented workers.

[kjkjadksj]

Part of what perpetuates this sort of thing is a general idea in society that one can’t do or learn something because that’s not possible for them. I’m of the opinion that if sufficiently motivated and with sufficient constraints removed, anyone can learn and do anything. The only difference between an engineer and someone breaking their back for work is that the engineer was probably coddled from birth into being told they can do anything including engineering. Not as a pipe dream but a clear path: take these classes, apply to this college, take this internship, take this job.

Meanwhile the laborer was probably told all their life they don’t have what it takes, either explicitly or not, and that thinking held them back their entire life. Why try hard in school if I am “not smart”? Why try and go to college if I can’t pay for it? Why not just do what my neighbor or my uncle does that I know is possible? Many people need to be reminded that everything is possible if they aren’t dissuaded by unhelpful ideas or people.

[A4ET8a8uTh0]

<< I’m of the opinion that if sufficiently motivated and with sufficient constraints removed, anyone can learn and do anything.

Anyone can do anything if they believe enough..

It is a nice sentiment and I cling to it myself more often than not, because there is something soothing about it. The unfortunate reality, however, is that being forced onto thing for which I have no predisposition, is, uhh, counterproductive at best.

In short, I disagree with pre-supposition that your position requires ( we are all amorphous blobs that can be molded into whatever with sufficient amount of force ). And that is before we get to the question of whether it is even worthwhile to teach a kid with down syndrome calculus? Not possible. Worthwhile.

<< Many people need to be reminded that everything is possible if they aren’t dissuaded by unhelpful ideas or people.

No. People need to understand themselves. They need to experience their limits and then cater to their strengths and weaknesses accordingly. It is unhelpful to think that billions people on this planet are interchangeable cogs. We are not.

I am extremely unlikely to ever be like Georgi Gerganov. I simply do not believe I have the brain capacity needed.

It is fine to aspire, but I am not changing the world tomorrow.

[ahartmetz]

If you believe that anyone can do anything, you have never done something properly difficult and watched yourself and / or others fail despite trying hard.

Inappropriate dissuasion surely exists, but you don't help your case by making such claims.

[mrsalt]

Why is it uncomfortable? It is the reality, and no one important wants to change it.

There are plenty of immigrants working under the table. And there are plenty of employers willing to hire them.

We do have it both ways.

[Barrin92]

>It sounds like justification for a “slave” class to do undesirable jobs

It's the exact opposite. The slavery is being trapped in Cuba which the person decided to leave by their own free will to make it to America, where working a terrible factory job is going to make them ten times richer than they would have been otherwise.

Is you being uncomfortable with this idea actually more important than giving that person a shot to work himself to a normal American life within two decades and certainly for their kids?

[bart_spoon]

It’s shocking to me that the argument that consistently gets trotted out as to why we should accept illegal immigration is that they perform jobs too dangerous and poorly paid for non-illegal immigrants to do. Perhaps if there wasn’t a never ending stream of people so poor and powerless to take advantage of, these industries might be forced to pay livable wages or provide better protections.

It’s insane that the supposedly progressive faction of American politics is arguing in favor of a system that amounts to a modern version of indentured servitude and systemic violation of labor rights, all for the sake of cheaper fruit and meat.

[zozbot234]

These jobs are low-paying because they're broadly unproductive. If some of them weren't doing these jobs, the wages paid for them at the margin would increase. We are vastly better off importing more skilled immigrants to high-income countries, compared to unskilled ones.

[energy123]

That's an economically illiterate comment. You're confusing scarcity of labor, which determines price, with the utility that that labor generates.

[stale2002]

This isn't the 1900s, dude.

If supply for labor goes a bit down, wages will increase a bit, and then companies will be incentivized to replace these bad jobs with automation.

Those jobs going away, and wages going up, is a good thing not a bad thing.

As few people should be doing those bad jobs as possible, and for the ones that do them, they should be paid more.

[lrem]

How can you call literally feeding the people “broadly unproductive”? It’s low margin, but you can’t have a society supporting your margins without someone doing the bottom jobs.

[petesergeant]

Labour productivity has a specific meaning

[gertlex]

Enlighten us, then?

And does "broadly unproductive" have a specific meaning, too?

[s0rce]

If we didn't have lower wage workers doing farm work food would be way more expensive and less diverse. I'm not sure how you judge the productivity of the worker...

[csomar]

Construction in a tight real estate market is broadly unproductive?

[markdown]

They are skilled. Try taking the best and brightest out of Silicon Valley and put them on farms, orchards, and in construction, and see how well they do.

This elitist attitude that low-paid workers are "unskilled" workers is bullshit and needs to go.

[herewulf]

As a software engineer who has done plenty of home improvement, gardening, automotive repair, etc, I think the best and brightest would learn quickly.

Now, let's take the average farmer, orchard worker, construction worker, and then chuck them into a software job. They wouldn't know where to start and wouldn't get anywhere without the same educational basics that 99% of developers have gone through. That's not elitist, it's just reality.

So, there's a clear distinction to be made and it's not necessary to water down every word in the English language because we're afraid of hurting someone's feelings.

[kjkjadksj]

I’m struck how you can’t see that both situations are exactly the same. Go to a strawberry field. Would you have any idea what to do as soon as you arrived? Absolutely not. No one is born knowing how to manage a farm from instinct. You’d need to learn how the farm works too.

[remixff2400]

I think the argument isn't "engineer" vs. "farmer", but rather engineer (or doctor, interpreter, commercial farmer/farm manager, industrial project manager, any other specialization that realistically requires years of training) vs. lower-skilled labor like farmhand, non-management/unspecialized construction worker, stuff that can be taught and learned relatively quickly.

I wouldn't call "low-skilled" workers _unproductive_ per se, and personally think they're incredibly valuable, but economically, the cost/difficulty of replacing a "low-skilled" worker is relatively low: it's a lot easier to find a replacement farmhand than it is a replacement farmer that manages the farm itself.

[bavell]

I went strawberry picking a month ago with my 4yo and she picked it up pretty quick. She'd have much more trouble joining me in my day-to-day dev job.

[kjkjadksj]

Picking strawberries is different than managing a farm. Imagine your 4 year old being a shot caller at the farm and how that might go. Would you have strawberries next season to even pick? Does your 4yo know how to sell thousands of pounds of strawberries?

[MisterBastahrd]

Uh-huh. Let's see all those soft keyboard jockeys be efficient at hanging drywall and working on a roof all day long with no air conditioning in Texas or Arizona. They won't. They don't have what it takes.

[bavell]

Not all of us "keyboard jockeys" grew up soft and sheltered in big cities. The dry heat of TX/AZ isn't that bad compared to the sweltering humidity of the southeast ;)

[MisterBastahrd]

I'm from the bayou. I know damned good and well what I'm talking about. Roofing and construction for a living is not the same as occasionally going outside and sitting around in the heat.

[zozbot234]

You're absolutely right that 'skilled' is merely a relative term and ultimately a social construct. But nonetheless, the fact remains that those skills are so much more abundant and are not soaked up by existing demand (which would drive wage increases at the margin).

[slothtrop]

It means, invariably, that they work positions that do not require high education. That's it. Any other euphemism in its place would just be in service of the same meaning.

[mixmastamyk]

They're not all unskilled. Well-paying construction jobs, which used to be a path to the middle class, have been gutted (in the western US at least).

[coding123]

Meat processors. No wonder listeria incidents, salmonella and a bunch of other food born diseases are on the rise.

[rangestransform]

I think it would be better to legitimize migrant labour for those types of jobs a la Singapore