ICE raid N.C firearms manufacturer

[GH41]

Heaven forbid your buddy should pay $17 an hour for semi skilled labor. Im sure guys like him would long for the days of pre-ban emancipation proclamation labor.

Have you ever owned a small business? Do you think small business owners are all greedy millionaires who made their fortunes off of the backs of the downtrodden? How much would you pay a laborer whose only skill is mixing a bucket of stucco mortar? It's a balancing act. Obviously you pay what you have to pay and remain profitable or you shut down the business. The overhead (taxes and workman's comp) for an employee is 18-25% depending on the trade. Every 4 employees need a truck and tools. Every truck needs tags, insurance, fuel and maintenance. With 50 employees you need an office and warehouse. You need a couple of girls in the office for payroll and accounts payable/receivable/scheduling. Don't forget building permit fees. Maintaining your business license cost a percentage of gross income. Don't forget taxes on profit. My friend is lucky if he profits a couple of bucks an hour off of each of his employees. What is so unfair about this scenario?

[26 Inf]

Have you ever owned a small business? Do you think small business owners are all greedy millionaires who made their fortunes off of the backs of the downtrodden? How much would you pay a laborer whose only skill is mixing a bucket of stucco mortar? It's a balancing act. Obviously you pay what you have to pay and remain profitable or you shut down the business.

The overhead (taxes and workman's comp) for an employee is 18-25% depending on the trade.

Every 4 employees need a truck and tools. Every truck needs tags, insurance, fuel and maintenance. With 50 employees you need an office and warehouse. You need a couple of girls in the office for payroll and accounts payable/receivable/scheduling. Don't forget building permit fees. Maintaining your business license cost a percentage of gross income. Don't forget taxes on profit. My friend is lucky if he profits a couple of bucks an hour off of each of his employees.

What is so unfair about this scenario?

Note, Nightvisionary said semi-skilled labor. Some folks might say the business model is flawed if you can't pay a wage which will attract legal workers.

What too many concrete contractors/landscapers/roofers around these parts want to do is run immigrant crews out to job sites and drop them off while they go drink coffee. If it wasn't for the immigrants, those guys would still be working on a roof, or running a float.

Not to mention the established contractors they have run out of business by undercutting prices. I have a buddy who has a drywall company, I think I've mentioned him before, he has lost several big contracts to guys running immigrant crews, no way he can pay an American worker what those companies are paying their guys.

His workers go home at night to families. The other guy's immigrant crew all jump in their community car, head to the rundown house they all share, drink beer watch TV, go to work, send money home.

Not a lot of sorrow for the plight of your friend. On the other hand, I find it hard to get angry at the immigrants whom he employs.

[GH41]

You nor Nightvisionary understand the basic laws of supply and demand. I'm out of here.

[26 Inf]

You nor Nightvisionary understand the basic laws of supply and demand. I'm out of here.

Au contraire, I can draw you the diagrams, if you like.

It seems funny that on this site, with this demographic, you are defending someone who was caught using illegal immigrants.

[GH41]

Au contraire, I can draw you the diagrams, if you like.

It seems funny that on this site, with this demographic, you are defending someone who was caught using illegal immigrants.

My friend didn't set out to employee illegal immigrants. He hired who he could with the approval of the government. Are you by any chance a union advocate? I keep thinking about Cadillac workers getting paid 60 bucks an hour to put hubcaps on the cars.

[SteyrAUG]

You nor Nightvisionary understand the basic laws of supply and demand. I'm out of here.

The actual problem is not every business model is sustainable. If you have to hire illegals to realize even the thinnest profit margins, then you don't have a viable business model. Just because debbie opens a muffin shop, doesn't mean debbie is still going to be in business 6 months later.

You are correct about overhead and cost of doing business, but if your product or service can't cover those costs and provide a profit, then you might as well open a muffin shop in the mall.

I have a popular product, firearms, but the profit potential is so slim that I can't afford to hire a single employee and doing so would shift me from black ink to red ink in a matter of months. As a consequence, I can do no more business than I can manage by myself. I would have to increase sales an additional 30% to even consider hiring somebody and honestly I don't know where those additional sales would come from.

Additionally, a federally regulated business associated with firearms, you kind of have to be a moron to hire illegals. Even hiring people who have done time and had their rights restored is kind of dark territory for the firearms business.

[NWPilgrim]

Sustainable business model is one important factor. Another is having everyone operating under the same rules. If all your friend’s competitors could not hire illegals either then they would have to pay a reasonable wage as well.

There is a myriad of issues causing the struggle of small business and individuals. Runaway govt spending and borrowing with near zero interest rate, inflation that erodes purchasing power especially for small biz and individuals, burdensome regulation that favors corporation scale but punishes small biz, rampant illegal immigration that depresses wages, on and on.

I am totally against mandatory minimum wage. Also against importing 20 million job competitors and adding a million every year Against farm and corporate subsidies. Against spending over govt budgets and the Petro Dollar. Against “free trade” that allows slave labor countries to sell in tarting free against domestic producers who have to abide by OSHA, EPA, EEOC, DOL, IRS, FDA, etc. Against crooked unions trying to make it hard to hire entry level kids, fight against right to work and basically try to monopolize skilled labor pools.

50 years ago you could buy a house for $25,000 and a family car for $2,500, and gas was $0.32/gal. It was not hard to find high school jobs paying $3-$4/hr. And entry level jobs paying $7-$8/hr. Now a suburban house costs $350,000 in the same area, family car is at least $25,000, and gas here is right at $3.20/gal; (factor of 10-14) yet high school jobs are not paying $30-$42/hr, nor entry jobs paying $70/hr or more.

That is the major disconnect. Our money has been inflated away, and foreign competitors have flooded or markets and labor pool thanks to our politicians so our wages have stayed 1/3 to 1/10 of what they should have risen to compared to goods.

How do you unwind all that burden and drag? I don’t know, we are so far down the pipe. As improbable as cutting through it is, it still does not justify knowingly taking advantage of the destructive factors.

As Steyr says, if a business can only be profitable by a wink and a nod toward the law then it is not a sustainable business model. Just like not every person deserves to have a great job no matter how unskilled they are, not every business deserves to be successful.

[26 Inf]

My friend didn't set out to employee illegal immigrants. He hired who he could with the approval of the government.

But he paid them less then market wages, correct?

Are you by any chance a union advocate? I keep thinking about Cadillac workers getting paid 60 bucks an hour to put hubcaps on the cars.

So, because I outlined a problem that is widely known - contractors running immigrant crews negatively impacting older established contractors with American crews - I'm a union advocate?

[Adrenaline_6]

My friend didn't set out to employee illegal immigrants. He hired who he could with the approval of the government.

The determining factor here is did he go through the motions, knowing full well he was hiring illegals and doing it anyway, paying them sub standard wages because he did his "due diligence" or was it an honest mistake? Just because he went through the legal motions and found a loophole, doesn't make it honest or right.

[GH41]

But he paid them less then market wages, correct?So, because I outlined a problem that is widely known - contractors running immigrant crews negatively impacting older established contractors with American crews - I'm a union advocate?

25 years ago, when the invasion started, the hispanics did price themselves below market if you paid them cash and there were contractors who did. When construction started booming labor demand increased and wages went up the contractors couldn't pay cash any longer. The cash was paid with money the contractor had paid taxes on. With higher wages paying cash was no longer profitable. That problem fixed itself years ago. Down here I'd estimate 90% of the low/no skill labor is hispanic. They set the market price. I don't know where you are but $18 an hour is more than living wage in the south.
I am not saying that didn't happen but you have to remember we have been talking about unskilled labor that most Americans refuse to do. The jobs that require skilled labor are for the most part filled by Americans. At least where I am.