Thread: Could illegal immigrants be taking teens’ jobs?

Originally Posted by Captainron

This is all pushed by the "higher ed" idiots who believe that every kid is somehow destined for at least one college degree, a desk job, high salary, comfortable retirement paid for by surging stock prices, etc. Why do any 'work' until you're at least twenty-three. It might stunt your intellectual and "moral" development.

I certainly agree with you. With this college bound culture we seem to be pushing so hard in education we are telling kids that jobs like construction, welding, mechanics, etc etc are below them and they must go to college. Since these jobs have to be done we have allowed illegals to come here to fill the gap.

Not everyone is going to college and American education needs to accept this. We need to teach kids skills that they can be productive in. Let's face it, we need people to build houses, repair our infrastructure, weld, repair cars, do plumbing etc. Americans need to fill these jobs and they deserve a fair wage for their trade.

The sooner we drop this miserable failure of a program "no child left behind" the sooner we quit leaving so many behind and unable to make a living. Everyone deserves the chance of a college education but not everyone is going to go.

Clearly illegal immigrants are taking summer jobs away from teens. Even part time school year jobs are disappearing. Teens need these jobs to understand what it is to earn a buck. Maybe, someday, these jobs will return.

See this:

http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-117618.html

and this:

Teen jobs are going to illegal immigrants, analyst says

http://www.detnews.com/2005/business/05 ... 256543.htm

Not everyone is going to college and American education needs to accept this. We need to teach kids skills that they can be productive in. Let's face it, we need people to build houses, repair our infrastructure, weld, repair cars, do plumbing etc. Americans need to fill these jobs and they deserve a fair wage for their trade.

I do agree with Dems and liberals that the US has to develop alternative energy as a new industry. We need exports that we can sell at a reasonable price to developing countries. That is how the US became the major industrial power in the 20th C. and it has continued on: the information technology industry became a major source of exports, our educational system has provided a certain amount of income from foreign students, biotechnology has promise to become an export. But green energy ---windpower, solar power, electrical motivation, ----would also become a source of exports if we seize the initiative. If we don't it will be taken by other countries. And we certainly don't need unstable countries building nuclear power plants and producing fissionable material.

The green energy industry would need people skilled in crafts and trades to produce the exportable products.

bigtex wrote:

I certainly agree with you. With this college bound culture we seem to be pushing so hard in education we are telling kids that jobs like construction, welding, mechanics, etc etc are below them and they must go to college. Since these jobs have to be done we have allowed illegals to come here to fill the gap

This seems to be a ripple effect of our education cutbacks. I remember when our highschools also taught classes that were geared towards trades. These classes kept alot of kids in school that knew they couldn't go on to college. They developed interest in different trades that carried many onto their careers.

Now we send the message that you have to go to college or get a minimum paying job. We no longer tweak their interest in trades. We tell them those jobs are for illegal immigrants. Who wants to take a job where they are constantly competing with illegals, where English isn't the norm, where pride of craftmanship isn't appreciated.

I just don't understand the lack of common sense or understanding of our politicans. Our leaders maybe booksmart but they definitely lack any wisdom.

This seems to be a ripple effect of our education cutbacks. I remember when our highschools also taught classes that were geared towards trades. These classes kept alot of kids in school that knew they couldn't go on to college. They developed interest in different trades that carried many onto their careers.

Maybe it isn't just for the ones that "can't" go on to college. I was going to college on a scholarship, but, to ecape an impoverished family, managed to buy a home when I was twenty y/o. This was my ticket out of a financially disastrous life; the college curriculum I was in would never have led to anything worthwhile. As a homeowner I learned a lot of crafts and skills and then went into a trade. There are many tradesmen in the construction crafts who become real estate investors or form their own businesses. Thankfully, home construction has entered into the offerings of a lot of public schools.

Our country could place nearly every American young person in a profession, office or service job---but the levels of immigration would have to be so fantastically high there would be no quality of life left. And this is just what these liberal "educational experts" fail to see.

I know my own kid says this is insane to spend this money and she has no guarentee she will get a decent wage or even a job. So far, every single thing these kids are paying big money to be educated in are going overseas or dummied down or getting booted out for CHEAP labor. Why spend double for an education than what you hope to make in a lifetime? They had a scale which stated you never get the financial payoff for an education till your 40's......heck by then we all know they bring in the next new wave of cheap labor. Rules change....everybody change seats now!!!!!

So what is the answer CrazyBird? Tell them to not get an education, to compete with illegal's for minimum wage jobs. Or do we tell them to get an education and to keep fighting to take back our country. I still think as the next generation hits this wall that our generation of politicans have created that they will fight back and we will need an educated, but wiser generation to restore America.

nashuatelegraph.com
Article published Jun 3, 2008

Summer jobs may be scarce for teens

Put disadvantaged teens into summer jobs. Hook them into the world of work. They'll come home with new skills, discipline, contacts and, yes, money.

Seems pretty obvious – but apparently not in Washington, which in 2000 gutted the Summer Youth Employment Program. The program had been helping 600,000 mostly low-income young people find jobs.

The labor market is now caving for teens from all backgrounds. But for low-income, black and Hispanic kids, it's the "Great Depression," according to a new report by Northeastern University's Center for Labor Market Studies.

Andrew Sum, an economist who heads the center, recently testified before Congress that a jobs program for teens makes superb economic stimulus.

"You can create jobs more cost-effectively for young people than for any other group," he told me, "and you're getting an output as opposed to paying something for doing nothing."

This may sound all backward, but kids from rich families are more likely to have summer jobs than their poor cohorts. Last summer, only 29 percent of teens in families with incomes under $20,000 found work, while 50 percent of young people in families making $75,000 to $100,000 did.

In the inner city, minority kids work at extraordinarily low rates. Only 15 percent of poor black teens had jobs last summer – versus 60 percent of white teens in affluent suburbs.

Upper-income kids have an easier time finding summer work, Sum explains, because "Mom and Dad still play important roles brokering you into a job." They or their friends know who is hiring.

The suburbanization of retail has cut off many minority teens from the stores and restaurants that traditionally employ people their age. The new commercial strips are often miles away from black and Latino neighborhoods. Teens without cars can't get to them – and studies show that the longer the commute, the lower their employment rate.

But the job hunt is getting tougher for all young people. In the first three months of 2000, 45 percent of teens held some kind of paying work. By the same period of this year, only 34 percent did. This is the lowest teen employment rate since the government started collecting this data in 1948.

Of course, the current slowdown in consumer spending has made things worse. Stores and restaurants need fewer cashiers and servers – while older laid-off workers are swelling the number of job applicants.

But the downward trend in teen job-holding predates today's weak labor market. One decades-long factor has been the dive in factory employment, which has hurt young men more than women.

"When I was 18, I was able to work at U.S. Steel," said Sum, who grew up in Gary, Ind. That was in the late '70s.

Immigration has also played a role. In many areas, the kid who used to come by with a mower has been replaced by teams of immigrants. It's exceedingly hard for outsiders to join them.

Construction and landscaping services that depend on foreign crews typically screen new hires through people already on the truck. (The screening for immigration status may be less careful.) As a result, Sum adds, "you don't have posted jobs anymore."

Sum sees programs that combine a paying summer job with academic work as a tremendous boon for lower-income kids. Disadvantaged teens tend to lose more of their school learning over the summer than do their affluent counterparts.

One hopes that the new leadership in Washington will address the tragic, ongoing waste of America's precious human resources. A summer jobs program would seem a superior alternative to letting unemployed teens drift all summer – and the payback is no-brainer obvious.

Economy / Low-income,

minority teens facing

an even bigger challenge.

Froma Harrop serves on the editorial board of The Providence Journal and is a syndicated columnist.

http://www.nashuatelegraph.com/apps/pbc ... /opinion01

Originally Posted by MontereySherry

This seems to be a ripple effect of our education cutbacks. I remember when our highschools also taught classes that were geared towards trades. These classes kept alot of kids in school that knew they couldn't go on to college. They developed interest in different trades that carried many onto their careers.

Now we send the message that you have to go to college or get a minimum paying job. We no longer tweak their interest in trades. We tell them those jobs are for illegal immigrants. Who wants to take a job where they are constantly competing with illegals, where English isn't the norm, where pride of craftmanship isn't appreciated.

I just don't understand the lack of common sense or understanding of our politicans. Our leaders maybe booksmart but they definitely lack any wisdom.

We can surely thank George Bush and the past Secretary of Education Rod Paige for this one. Paige was the past superintendent of Houston ISD and you can see first hand how this idea is a miserable failure.

We certainly need to bring craftsmanship skills as well as technology back to our schools. Even local business here in Houston are complaining that schools are doing nothing to train kids to enter the work place. They too agree these technological skills need to be taught in our public schools.