Which is exactly why I always advocate for importing temporary labor from mexico. Letting the local tradespeople gain too much power is half the reason why building is so difficult in america.
See, throwing a lot of nonsequiters together does not make a convincing argument that you know anything about what you’re talking about!
Ditto for most of the kitchen labor in big cities. Anthony Bourdain wrote about it extensively in the book that made him famous.
Both are the reason the middle class was able to eke it out for so long. Now the hacks aren't working and the money printer kept going brrrrrrrrrrrr and the average person can't afford jack.
Rent is low in construction as it is not tied to a particular location; you store the machines and tools anywhere.
Increasing the supply of labor will just ensure that the providers of capital get to keep more of the profit.
Why is the US based tradesperson superior to the Mexican? Why must we address his prosperity more than theirs? To “protect” the Mexican from making cash?
And remember that when construction is expensive, people have to pay for it. Maybe if you already have saved enough for your house, that’s fine for you, but if not? It absolutely makes it harder for young people (not in tech) to afford homes. And on the national scale we have a massive backlog in housing and can expect it will take decades before housing gets better.
US labor is neither morally superior nor economically sounder for the US or world economy. It is the specific laborer himself who benefits.
A better question to ask is why is the value of the Mexican’s labor so much higher once they step foot into the United States for the same exact work and exact same skill level.
Another question you can ask is why can’t I as an American move to Norway and partake in their healthcare system and sovereign wealth fund? Or why can’t I move to Switzerland and work as a barista?
Once you can answer the second question, you have your answer to the first.
The concept of the US style planned development (fraccionamiento, very loosely the MX counterpart) where basic service infrastructure is laid down first, and construction happens afterward, is very much the exception there, and most work is done ad hoc using whatever tooling happens to be available in the nearest small town.
Also Mexican construction is almost entirely cement and cinder block standards due to relatively little native timber, and those things are all hauled around the site manually with occasional wheelbarrow assistance. None of this tilt up, balloon frame stick built business we have here.
Bottom line being that the typical Mexican construction laborer is going to be much more well-rounded, flexible, and industrious then the typical American construction worker, and as such is worth far more to an American crew, where these traits stand out, than to a Mexican crew where they are the norm.
It would be good if Mexico could improve and avoid these problems. Until it does so, trapping the Mexican laborer in Mexico to earn his wage, when he could go elsewhere, is like making a farmer farm in the desert.
It is not a natural-resource ownership allocation problem like you allude to with Norway.
This is false in the general sense but also you can just ignore the natural resource ownership allocation problem and still use Norway as an example, or a different country (the Netherlands? New Zealand? Japan?).
The answer someone has to provide is why an everyday American barista can't wake up and move to Switzerland, Norway, etc.
> Trapping the American laborer in America to earn their wage, when they could go elsewhere, is like making a farmer farm in the desert.
We don’t need to be stuck in a rut of malaise like Japan. We could prosper instead.
Or are only construction jobs being opened up like that?
If you were a roofer would you rather make 20K in Mexico us 50K in the US?
I don't know, but I doubt it is clear cut answer.
The insane US health care costs alone would eat up much of that if you're unlucky. I'd guess a young healthy single guy should take the 50K in the US but as soon as there is a family to support, 20K in Mexico may go farther.
The other possibility might be that it's not that simple.
When I was playing around with startup ideas, not employed by any large corporation, your so-called free healthcare was costing me well over $3K/month in the US (not including out of pocket expenses, of course).
Why is the US based computer scientist superior to the mexican? Why must we address his prosperity more than theirs? To "protect" the programmer from making cash?
And remember, development is expensive, people have to pay for it. Maybe if you already have enough saved for your application, that's fine for you, but if not? It absolutely makes it harder for young people to create businesses. And on the national scale we can use more mexican app developers.
US developers are neither morally superior nor economically sounder for the US or world economy. It is the specific laborer themselves who benefits.
PS Your argument is that the country you live in shouldn't value the citizens of that country over some other country's citizens - its basically the end of the social contract and of society in general. Its a bad idea but I guess if it saves you $15/h on a construction worker its now moral in your eyes?
Absolute drivel.
Also yes, I assume most of American buildings in the next 20-30 years will be built by foreign contractors using foreign labor.