[Colonel Kangaroo]

President Bush does not know much about economics or what he really means is America faces a shortage of cheap labor, labor more cheap for the employer than the taxpayers. The market will find equilibrium.

[tommix2]

suggesting that failure to pass a guest-worker program could trigger a labor shortage in the United States. what he really means is America faces a shortage of cheap labor, And then we might have to hire young black Americans and they are so uppity, they don't know their place. Mexicans are so much harder workers than blacks and they don't cause trouble. (sarc)

[ChildOfThe60s]

Defending the indefensible.

Mr. Bush is missing something very fundamental. He is wrong, but for the sake of discussion let’s say he’s not.

“If” as he says, we will have real shortages of labor without hordes of ILLEGALS, then this indicates some fundamental flaws in our economic structure. Such flaws should be addressed directly, not papered over with cheap, unskilled, ILLEGAL labor. Ultimately setting our economy up for a harder fall later on when the reality of trying to sustain it with ILLEGALS no longer works.

For a so called Republican, he has no faith in the ability of the market to find the needed labor via the incentive of market regulated wages.

In addition, he doesn’t (publicly) take into account the hidden costs of cheap, unskilled, ILLEGAL labor. Which, IMO, is a deliberate omission.

[Barb4Bush]

If we are facing a labor shortage why don’t we increase the number of legal immigrants that can come into the country. If we need more people to fill the jobs I can’t see why we wouldn’t increase legal immigration and still enforce our laws and guard our borders.