Sunday, June 19, 2011

Ch. 8 "Fifteen Years on the Bottom Rung"

After reading this article about the hardships of immigrants from other countries and making a decent living in the United States, I had mixed feelings about whether we should allow such a large influx of illegal immigrants from Mexico, much less grant them all legal status so that they can work and get better paying jobs. They are not supposed to be in this country anyway, so rewarding them for being able to cross the border and not be caught and deported doesn't make sense to me. The large numbers of Mexicans and illegal immigrants coming in are also the cause of the rising difficulty of finding a job and supporting oneself; if they were restricted or controlled, the people that did make it to the United States would have better chances of finding work and rising out of the lower classes.

Despite that, I couldn't help but feel sorry for Peralta who had been working hard for so many years and yet had not been able to achieve what his former employer, Zannikos, did in as much time. He cannot tell his family that it's actually much harder to achieve the American dream than is thought in Mexico, and he is expected to give them money when they need it. Despite what people think of America, nowadays, it's becoming a lot more difficult to move up and make a name for oneself and the influx of immigrants who think otherwise are just exacerbating the problem. If better policies are not drawn up and enforced in the next couple of years, this is a problem that will just continue to get bigger and start affecting more Americans as well.

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