Liberals love to tax business, blame business and vilify business. But what they can't seem to comprehend is one simple principle of business that is as certain as a law of physics - and that is that business NEVER pays the expenses - be they wages, taxes or fines. ALL expenses are factored into the price of the goods or services produced. So if the government levies a fine of $100,000 for hiring an illegal as you suggest, guess who ultimately gets stuck with the tab? Yup, the customer.
Come on Merlin. Aren't Republicans the ones that are "big" on taking responsibility for ones actions? If businesses are hiring illegals, they are breaking the law. They need to step up to the plate and take responsibility for it. If a business is fined $100,000 for each infraction of hiring an illegal, and they try to pass these accrued fines on to their customers, guess what is going to happen? Yes, you got that right, they will go out of business. Their competitors will have a competitive advantage and drive the offending businesses out of the market.
Your argument is like saying businesses should not be fined for illegal dumping of toxic waste because they would pass that fine onto their customers (through added costs). That is absurd. Why do you want everybody to take responsibility EXCEPT businesses?
Second, you are treating business as if they were a law enforcement agency. They are not. That is not to say that businesses have no responsibility to ascertain employee status, but the cost of detailed background investigations, especially in high-turnover jobs, would be enormous.
I totally disagree. Here is an excerpt from an article in the LA times:
The vacillation over how to effectively control illegal migration drives a senior immigration investigator right up the wall, because he believes the bureaucracy has the answer in its own hands. The investigator has more than 20 years' experience with the INS. Still, he believes he must remain anonymous for fear of retribution.
Currently, he explains, the law requires an employer to make a good-faith effort to ascertain that applicants have valid identification. However, he considers that law a political con job because it gives unscrupulous employers an easy out: They can't be held responsible for not having the expertise to identify illegal or forged documents, so anything short of those being written in crayon can pass muster. The biggest abuses, he says, are of forged immigrant registration cards (green cards) and Social Security cards.
What frustrates him is his conviction that a procedure is already in place that would "immediately identify 70% of the illegal workforce." He explains that as a part of the 1986 immigration law, a voluntary employee verification pilot program was established, and is still operating. Under the program, the validity of Social Security cards and green cards can be quickly checked on all new employees by phone or online. He says the system could easily be expanded into a mandatory nationwide computer hookup by cross-indexing the data bases of the immigration service with the Social Security Administration. The effect would be that honest employers could instantly ascertain the legality of their workforce, and dishonest employers would have no excuse for hiring undocumented workers.
Bill Strasberger, a spokesman for the immigration service, says the pilot program is considered successful. "Employers using it are pleased, and so are we. It provides verification with confidentiality." Asked if it would be expanded or made mandatory by Congress, he laughed briefly, then said, "It really is the direction we need to move in."
Why, then, aren't we doing it? The investigator says that Congress refuses to make the program mandatory so as not to offend big agribusiness and other industries that freely employ illegal workers. These industries then take some of those profits and give generously to members of Congress.
Third, instead of fining the company for hiring illegals, let's try something a little more effective. If a company has failed to exercise due diligence in its hiring practice, then prosecute the CEO and/or the human resources exec. If they think their butts might actually get sent to prison, I believe their interest in verifying the status of employees would take a quantum leap.
I like this idea. But I still believe fines should be levied. I am sure that if your idea was implemented without fines, businesses would simply lobby the government for light jail sentences for the offending CEOs and HR execs. Again, the disincentive wouldn't be strong enough.
Eventually we can work on making it less attractive to sneak into the country. Let's prohibit illegals from collecting any kind of social service benefit. Let's stop giving illegals free medical care. Let's stop the practice of conferring citizenship on the children born of illegal immigrants in this country. How stupid is it that on the one hand we tell people that they are obliged to respect our immigration law while on the other we reward them for breaking it?
I agree with all of what you said with this last quote. I still believe that businesses that break the law must be held accountable, and that illegals should be fingerprinted and their DNA collected. Once identified, an illegal should be deported and never allowed to legally migrate to this country.
Unfortunately, what you have now in many border states is a situation where businesses are getting basically subsidized labor. Businesses here in California are paying illegals peanuts ($5 to $8 per hour). Most of these illegals are breeding like rats - they are having 4 to 8 kids a piece. Even if they are being taxed, they are usually only pulling in around $20k per year. It costs taxpayers $6000 per year to educate one child in our public schools here. So if an illegal has say 5 kids, he is costing the state (just for educating his litter), $30,000 each year. Mutliply this by a few million illegals, and you break the bank. They are drawing way more out of the system than they are putting in.
And this is just education. Also consider health care, maternity care, law enforcement, etc.
In summary, businesses are getting the labor for nothing, and then the middle class is having to foot the bill through increased taxes. WE ARE SUBSIDIZING BUSINESSES TO GET CHEAP LABOR AND SUBSIDIZING MEXICANS TO BREED. This is just not right.
