Note to self: Do Not Fly on any Indian Airlines.

RDoug said:
And that's kinda the point. If farm immigrants weren't here picking strawberries at $2 an hour then U.S. citizens would be doing it at $12 an hour
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But it is the citizens who set the wages at $2 because other citizens want to have strawberries for $3.50/box. Jack up the price and you better find a retailer who will sell it at Whole Foods at 13.5 a box or you're out of business.
 
xargos said:
But it is the citizens who set the wages at $2 because other citizens want to have strawberries for $3.50/box. Jack up the price and you better find a retailer who will sell it at Whole Foods at 13.5 a box or you're out of business.
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You really believe it takes on hour or so to pick one box of strawberries, thus raising the cost by $10 if you raise labor costs by $10 an hour? Really? I seriously doubt upping the cost of labor another $10 an hour would increase the price of a box of strawberries by much more than even 50¢.

That's a bit like saying citizens set the wages for airline pilots at less than half of what they once were. Those savings didn't go to the passengers; they went to corporate profits. And pilots' wages weren't set by passengers; they were set by broken-down bankruptcy laws that never should have been perverted as a labor contract escape clause.
 
RDoug said:
You really believe it takes on hour or so to pick one box of strawberries, thus raising the cost by $10 if you raise labor costs by $10 an hour? Really?
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Of course not. We're making up the figures. But farmer does not sell it to the supermarket at 3.50 either, rather much less. In my opinion it is the traders who make the money. My cousin used to grow carrots,tons of it.He could barely get ahead until he got into a contract with a zoo. One time a local trader told him right out that if he ever wanted to win he should be trading rather than producing.It is unfair to say the least. I concur with you opinion on the corporate world, but even in small business, where there's more leeway , business owners exploit the worker.
 
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Derg said:
I've literally had more problems with controllers in SLC than I had in VABB, even during monsoon months.
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Yeah, well, kinda makes sense, hmm. SLC has it's own particular cultural issues then, donnit? :P ;)
 
xargos said:
No American will pick strawberries for $2/hour while a Mexican might. When I had my first calculus encounters there was a Russian guy digging foundation at my friends house. Turned out to be a math professor , but would much rather work in construction because he could make more money for the family. Mind you he was only 300 miles west of his home and making multiple yearly salaries in a month. Guess what, no local guy would dig for the same money, let alone teach you calc on a smoke break.

Why would a large corporation pay more to hire H1B? In any case, some scholars recognize a different advantage of H1B:

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Your Kaku sounds more like caca. He makes a lot of valid points, but arrives at the wrong conclusion. H1B or no, America is destined to collapse if we do not improve our public education system. H1B is no secret weapon. It is a way to buy on the cheap in an unsustainable and exploitative fashion. I know, American companies would NEVER do that! H1B is no substitute for sustaining our intellectual and physical infrastructure in this nation. Culture is the only sustainable competitive advantage in the long term. EVERYTHING else becomes commoditized. Maybe not today or next week, but right soon now. And even culture is unsustainable if it becomes top heavy and exploitative. America's historical culture of maximizing individual freedom in the context and womb of the common good has made us more creative and more flexible and more accepting of innovation - and therefore, stronger - than probably any other nation in history. However, when the concept of freedom loses focus on the common good, when freedom devolves into "every man for himself"; the dream is lost.
 
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