Posted on 08/04/2010 4:34:49 PM PDT by Windflier
House painter here, I have for the past 12 years had a three man crew plus me, from April to October. I would pare it back to my son in law and me for the winter. We worked this way quite successfully over the years. This year I am a one man crew with part time pick up help when the job is too big or it has to be finished quickly. I use the same workers as before, but only during off hours for them, weekends and holidays. My prices are being negotiated right up until finish time on the job, with extras added on constantly. Customers know that workers/business owners are in a pickle and they are taking advantage. I see entire crews of near 5 foot tall “latino” males painting houses. They speak little English if at all, and I don’t believe they are Mexican. They are most likely from farther South. Unless the border is controlled, and America begins fighting the trade wars like other nations, we are so ffffffffffffffffff, I mean screwed.
Absolutely agreed. I have watched my own industry, environmental engineering, of all things be taken over. For years, we fought unionization of job sites, so we could always hire the best crews available, but now I see nothing but crews from south of the border (where I was also born.)
I am also born from south of the border, but I am a natural born American citizen, because both of my parents were American citizens. I am always stunned at the extent to which my job sites are filled with non-Americans, possessing documents that I know to be fake. I can’t even look over to the side of a road and watch a mowing crew without knowing, with certainty, that every member is a non-citizen. Every single day. Today.
There is a two-sided, business, arguement to be had on this issue. For myself, professionally, I am greatly impressed by the difference between a crew, hired at random, that is “Latin.” This is not about the wage paid, but about the work ethic. If I come into a town and need help on a project, and I hire a local contractor, I know from experience, what to expect. If the contractor stages “Latins” on my job site, I will get the job done with minimal bitching, drinking, pot-smoking, and hassles.
If I get a crew of locals, probably hired off some Day Labor site, I will have nothing but trouble, all day, every day. I will have people so worthless that they run power cords through puddles, if you let them. I will have no time to do my own job, because I will spend most of my time just trying to keep me out of jail and my employees out of the hospital.
Every day, every job, I try to find good local contractors to put people on my job sites, but they cannot, for large-sized jobs. That’s a fact. You cannot hire guys out of a local tavern and run a complicated, safe, job site. I work all over the country and you cannot do it, because we have raised generations of people that believe playing grab-ass is part of their job description.
Now, during an awful recession, there are many good employees that are not employed. They need work. They should be the first hired. However, I, and many, have been stung too many times by crappy employees that are a complete negative, on a job site. So we need to think about this issue, as we just abandon 2 or 3 generations of worthless employees that cannot and will not ever be employable. There is no possibility that I would ever allow a worthless, lazy, drunken, loudmouth, on a job site of mine.
So, in my opinion, that’s what we need to do. We need to create a hireable group of small contractors that other people can count on to provide quality employees. Unions are the last place to go, as, in my experience, union employees can be the worst.
Today, this day, union employees are fighting for compensation for having breathed poor air at Ground Zero, which is a flat out lie. They are being compensated, even though this is a flat-out lie. There is no such thing as a first responder on the collapse of the Towers that was “forced” to do anything, or, more importantly, that didn’t already know better. A firefighter is required, by law, to be able to and know when to wear a respirator. They are not Allowed to wear a respirator, by law, until they know how and why to wear one. You have seen a firefighter wearing a respiraor, even in your own town, haven’t you? It’s a scam. There is no such thing as a First Responder that doesn’t know why, how, and doesn’t possess a repirator, a breathing filter, when responding to an emergency.
I have, personally, hauled my ass up ladders to dig through file boxes of medical records to dig up the history of “heroes” that sued our country for falling from the third step of a ladder. I proimse, that is true.
I have, personally, looked over the recrds of the people that are claiming great respiratory distress, because of the impacts from the collapse of the Towers. You know what? You are, mostly, being scammed by scam artists.
When I work in your town, any town, I hire gigantic companies, not small companies. Big companies have layers of lawyers that understand layers of lawyers. Small companies sre sometimes the best to work with, but their employees watch late-night TV Ads and sue and sue and sue.
I wouldn’t touch a small contractor, for business, if my life depended on it. I will only use big contractors, with multiple layers of lawyers. This is the real problem that you are facing. I work on a system in which clients care about the price for a job, but are more concerned about their ultimate liability. Ultimately, clients don’t care as much about their short term cost for a job, as they do their long term liability.
I can’t hire you, Mr. Small Local Businessman, because some employee of yours is going to find some lawyer to come back at my client, and a jury of Jerry Springer-watchers is going to award that former employee millions, even if they did everything against our spoken and written instructions.
No matter how hard we try, no matter what we do, a jury made up of people that won’t avoid jury-duty, those folks sitting at home and looking for a villain. will find against anybody, for anything.
Speaking for myself, we cannot afford to hire you, for any aspect of any project we do, because being sued is a given. You cannot afford the liability, so we have to assume it, to hire you.
Please, just re-think this, from this perspective. It will open your mind. Courtrooms are not filled with Juries of our Peers. Courtrooms are filled with people that either could not, or didn’t want to get out of jury duty.
Even if honest, law-abiding citizens wanted to be included on juries, the lawyers involved would never allow normal people to be seated on juries.
Your contracting busines will have to be built on a smalller, local, market. No calvary will be rushing in from the outside, to help.
I appreciate your opinion and perspective, but it’s well outside the Mom & Pop universe.
We’re not building skyscrapers and airports with 100-man crews. We’re doing remodeling and some new construction of residential homes, for the most part.
We’ve got a whole different set of work-related problems than you do.
Talk to me about who you hire to work on your home. That’s what we’re talking about here.
I hear that, I have a one man lumber wholesale company and refuse to quit.
Pray for America
It seems to me that they should have done a little background/reference check on the guy before they excepted his bid.
Not getting the contractor's license data from this "plumber" was a major flunk on the part of the general contractor. I can't believe he awarded the guy the contract without doing that one basic step.
I hope he ate the cost of having to re-do all that drain work.
Yeah I'm not sure how the guy got the bid either. The math doesn't add up (no pun intended).
I think the cost to re-do was 65,000 and I'm sure contractually he was stuck with it.
Yes. The trade wars have crossed the border, and are now being waged in neighborhoods all across the nation.
It's where the fight is today, and every contractor who hires illegals is an abject traitor to his nation, and his countrymen.
Seems to me, we need some sort of national Tea Party movement for the small American contractor.
If enough of us could band together and widely publicize what’s occurring to us, the American people would respond by backing us up with jobs.
Something approaching 80% of the people want the illegals out of the system, and out of our country. If they could be made aware of how badly we’re being crushed by illegal labor, it could start a nationwide movement to stop hiring illegals.
I don’t know. I’ve got a germ of an idea here.
What is a hard bid?
It’s where all the profit in the job is predicated on completing the job sooner than the schedule requires.
Shortening the job by a few months basically saves money on labor, management, and general services. This savings might be 2% profit at the most. A terrible way to make money.
“For myself, professionally, I am greatly impressed by the difference between a crew, hired at random, that is “Latin.” This is not about the wage paid, but about the work ethic. If I come into a town and need help on a project, and I hire a local contractor, I know from experience, what to expect. If the contractor stages “Latins” on my job site, I will get the job done with minimal bitching, drinking, pot-smoking, and hassles.
If I get a crew of locals, probably hired off some Day Labor site, I will have nothing but trouble, all day, every day. I will have people so worthless that they run power cords through puddles, if you let them. I will have no time to do my own job, because I will spend most of my time just trying to keep me out of jail and my employees out of the hospital.”
Although I’ve been complaining on this thread, what you’re saying here is true.
I see it everyday. I watch a particular company with a pretty good group of Mexican workers, and they do well (good leadership).
BUT, every time they bring in a new American backhoe operator he’s fat, dumb, and or lazy. It really is sad.
my husband too.
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