Even beyond the issue of work ethic, the real problem is demographics. People are having fewer and fewer kids. Meanwhile the population is getting better educated and aging. This is not an issue of a bunch of able bodies not wanting to do work. The real issue is that there are no able bodies. Illegal immigration is the quick fix to our demographics problem. There are not enough willing and able bodies to do the hard jobs that need to be done, at ANY price. If illegal immigrant left this country, there would be millions of jobs that could not get down no matter how much anybody would pay.
You are making an argument for increasing the numbers allowed in as legal immigrants. Might I suggest that we can get all the folks we need, with degrees too, without bringing in more Mexicans and Latin Americans.