Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

Well sure, but price is a factor. 

Look, I know how to install drywall but I freaking hate it and my job pays more so I don't do it.  Now if drywallers got $150k (that is good money in Ohio), I might get my drywall tools out and do that instead of what I currently do.  For that matter, if it paid that much I might take on some side jobs. 

There is demand for $5/hr illegal immigrant unskilled labor and there isn't demand for $25/hr native unskilled labor. 

And if drywallers were making $150K, the next time I needed drywall hung I'd be doing it myself. 

One of the things we might be about to learn here in California is that fast food workers "deserve" a "living wage" so the wages start at $20/hour now. And it might actually not turn out the way everyone hopes. Early data is already suggesting that due to the price increases in fast food, it's having a negative effect on people eating fast food
due to the price increases in fast food, it's having a negative effect on people eating fast food. Probably too early to determine if it'll be a single shock and then normalize to the higher prices, or if it's going to simply reduce the number of fast food restaurants [and therefore fast food jobs]. 

There are other jobs that unskilled laborers (whether legal or not) do. Yard maintenance / gardening, for one, which is very common here. I don't exactly remember what our gardener charged when I owned my house back in 2016, but I remember it being something like $75/month. (I don't know if he was legal or not; I ended up just using the same guy the previous house owner used. I also don't know if ours is legal now; the property management company hires them and pays it.) I was happy to pay it. You know what would have happened if gardeners were charging $200/month? I would have bought a damn lawnmower and done it myself. I've done it before. I grew up mowing my parent's lawn and I mowed my own when I lived in GA. It's not something I can't do. I just hire it out if it's cheap enough because I can afford it and I don't want to do it myself. 

There are some jobs for unskilled laborers that will NOT be filled at the prices natives want to earn. Because every person asking whether they need that job done for them is making an economic calculation not between hiring an illegal immigrant or a native born American, but making the calculation of "do I hire this out or do I do it myself?"

Congress can fix immigration. Congress can fix abortion. Congress can fix a lot of shit.

But they don't.

How do you mean?

And if drywallers were making $150K, the next time I needed drywall hung I'd be doing it myself.

One of the things we might be about to learn here in California is that fast food workers "deserve" a "living wage" so the wages start at $20/hour now. And it might actually not turn out the way everyone hopes. Early data is already suggesting that due to the price increases in fast food, it's having a negative effect on people eating fast food
due to the price increases in fast food, it's having a negative effect on people eating fast food. Probably too early to determine if it'll be a single shock and then normalize to the higher prices, or if it's going to simply reduce the number of fast food restaurants [and therefore fast food jobs].

There are other jobs that unskilled laborers (whether legal or not) do. Yard maintenance / gardening, for one, which is very common here. I don't exactly remember what our gardener charged when I owned my house back in 2016, but I remember it being something like $75/month. (I don't know if he was legal or not; I ended up just using the same guy the previous house owner used. I also don't know if ours is legal now; the property management company hires them and pays it.) I was happy to pay it. You know what would have happened if gardeners were charging $200/month? I would have bought a damn lawnmower and done it myself. I've done it before. I grew up mowing my parent's lawn and I mowed my own when I lived in GA. It's not something I can't do. I just hire it out if it's cheap enough because I can afford it and I don't want to do it myself.

There are some jobs for unskilled laborers that will NOT be filled at the prices natives want to earn. Because every person asking whether they need that job done for them is making an economic calculation not between hiring an illegal immigrant or a native born American, but making the calculation of "do I hire this out or do I do it myself?"

On the minimum wage, it is a typical "progressive" solution in that it:

• Doesn't work, and
• Hurts the exact people that it is allegedly supposed to help.

On the rest of this:
Per my earlier post, in the short-term you benefit from legal and illegal immigration*. You get cheaper lawncare. This shortsighted analysis ignores the fact that nearly 3/4 of Central American immigrants are on welfare (see Kaus' study above). It isn't just what you pay for lawncare directly, you are effectively also pushing some of the cost onto society at large.

*It makes no difference whether or not YOUR lawn guy is legal. Either way the price is bid down by illegals.

A crux (one of) the problem is we have shrill voices on one side saying "BUILD A WALL!!!" and shrill voices on the other side saying "TEAR DOWN ANY WALL THAT GOT BUILT!" and neither is much interested in understand the other side, or the folks like me who advocate for more sensible (in my view) solutions.

Solutions, plural, not singular.

East Germany (the Soviets) built a wall to keep people IN East Germany.

We need to build one to keep people OUT of North Mexico.

How do you mean?

Abortion can be codified. But they won't do it because it will leave one less issue out of election season.

The left has weaponized abortion. It is what it is.

The Ukraine war seems to me to resemble in some respects WW One 1915-1917.  Any advances by either side seem brief and small, defense is "winning the day" as it were.

Putin has proposed that Ukraine yield the areas Russia has "annexed" and a pledge never to join NATO.  I imagine he also has in mind replacing Zelensky with someone more amenable to Putin's orders.  At least, so far, there has been no widening of the war, and the famine some predicted didn't happen due to interruption of Ukraine's grain shipments, I'm not clear how that was avoided, maybe more rail shipments in part, maybe shipping is getting through.  Either way, the worst of the worst hasn't happened (including nuclear exchanges).  

I don't see any near term end, I'd guess in a few years of similar struggle, both sides will finally tire of it, maybe Putin dies, maybe Z is voted out of office, maybe something.  Russia de facto has more or less control over the disputed areas.  Putin seems likely to get what he has proposed now eventually, but it will be after a lot more lives are lost and property is destroyed.

I don't think Trump had anything at all to do with this.

How about this?

2014 - Putin takes Crimea

2016-2020 - Crickets

2022 - Putin invades Ukraine

Pure coincidence, I reckon.