alt Hacker News> The current system seems to generate a collection of second-class citizens
Poor choice of words. Illegals are not citizens. That's the whole point.
> have no recourse if they're exploited
The recourse is to go back. In the era when you could just immigrate to the US just by getting on a boat (before the Immigration Act of 1924), about 1/3 of immigrants went back to their home country if they did not make it in the US.
See:
> From 1908 to 1932, 12 million individuals migrated to the United States. Over the same period, four million returned to their source country.
-- https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00144... (you have to pirate it to view the full thing)
But now, the expectation of leftists is that the government is somehow supposed to help the failed immigrants.
Replies
There are very few Leftists in the USA, and even fewer in government. Who are you talking about?
Most people in the US are immigrants, including white people. Very few white people have a lineage to the revolution. Most came from Europe following WWII or, perhaps, before. This most likely includes you.
The idea that the US is composed of true Americans that have been here since the beginning is an outright Republican fantasy. A delusion to make white immigrants feel better about themselves. But it's just not true.
This has always been a country composed of immigrants, and it's always something we've been proud of. We have long been the melting pot. To think otherwise is anti-American, and you do not belong here.
There are no leftists in power in the US government outside of maybe a very small handful. We have not had a leftist president or majority ever, unless you just group neo-liberal democrats into that bucket, which would just be wrong...
Even if true (and it's not), what even is your point? Do you not think people that work and pay taxes should get any benefits? Do you think it's ok that people are exploited if they're immigrants?
It's not like undocumented immigrants even get welfare or other social programs, but they do have to pay taxes. Interesting enough, they even commit 50% less crime than citizens.
To think these people can't be exploited and that it's trivial to return to their home countries shows a lack of critical thinking.
For example, many of these people flee countries that have dire situations directly caused by US interventions over the past decades including most of Central and South America.
The list of countries that have had their democratically elected leaders overthrown or were otherwise destabilized by the US and its corporate elite is long and well documented.