Been dealing extensively with the trades for the renovation of my house. The roofing business is just an example but it is an easy one to observe due to the amount of people employed on any single job. I am wondering what percentage of the workers are “legal” versus “illegal”? I watched a 1500 sqf single story tile roof taken off, deck wood replaced as needed, maybe about 20% of the roof, and then the underlayment (not sure what they call it these days) attached. The whole thing was completed in 8 hours. There were about 12 people on the job. The company had 2 large commercial dump trucks to haul away the debris and the guys driving those trucks were also working on the roof. Safe to assume the drivers are “legal”? They had a supervisor who spoke english without an accent… Assuming he “has papers”?
Maybe they are all legal? Anybody have any idea? Maybe they are all illegal? That would be pretty brazen with what appeared to be a large and reputable roofing company… But maybe it’s not brazen, maybe its how things are done in this field? In my line of work following the “laws” is paramount and anything “illegal” is out of the question.
I have been blown away by the dominance of spanish speaking people in the exterior trade world here in south florida (roof, pool, excavation, landscape) On the interior trades its been a bit different. A large electrical company I hired appeared to have no one that could speak spanish despite working with 10 of their employees. Same thing with a large A/C company I hired to remove and replace ductwork.
TLDR ; What % of the trades are citizens / green card holders / on work visas?
At a minimum, the employer will have I9 documentation. Whether the documents are legit or forged is another question.
The problem with some occupations is finding people willing to do the work. This is especially true in residential work. In commercial, it’s slightly better but not by much.
And that’s one reason we need immigration reform. Our current approaches, IMHO, just kick the can down the road and don’t solve anything.
Been dealing extensively with the trades for the renovation of my house. The roofing business is just an example but it is an easy one to observe due to the amount of people employed on any single job. I am wondering what percentage of the workers are “legal” versus “illegal”? I watched a 1500 sqf single story tile roof taken off, deck wood replaced as needed, maybe about 20% of the roof, and then the underlayment (not sure what they call it these days) attached. The whole thing was completed in 8 hours. There were about 12 people on the job. The company had 2 large commercial dump trucks to haul away the debris and the guys driving those trucks were also working on the roof. Safe to assume the drivers are “legal”? They had a supervisor who spoke english without an accent… Assuming he “has papers”?
Maybe they are all legal? Anybody have any idea? Maybe they are all illegal? That would be pretty brazen with what appeared to be a large and reputable roofing company… But maybe it’s not brazen, maybe its how things are done in this field? In my line of work following the “laws” is paramount and anything “illegal” is out of the question.
I have been blown away by the dominance of spanish speaking people in the exterior trade world here in south florida (roof, pool, excavation, landscape) On the interior trades its been a bit different. A large electrical company I hired appeared to have no one that could speak spanish despite working with 10 of their employees. Same thing with a large A/C company I hired to remove and replace ductwork.
TLDR ; What % of the trades are citizens / green card holders / on work visas?
Check out this article about the immigrant child labor roofing business. It just came out. Sorry about the likely paywall but it’s an interesting/disturbing read
Ah great point never thought of forged documents. I have always wondered how people like “John Smith” pass background checks. There’s got to be millions and I am sure a bunch of them are in prison. Just as easy to get the fake i9 stuff if your name is Juan Gonzalez. There’s got to be millions that are legal.
moving on…
Absolutely on “nobody wants these jobs” Roofing looks tough as hell and not only that but bloody dangerous as well. Real “mans” work however the crew yesterday had a woman and she was very pleasant. What type of wage do you think these guys are getting? $30 per hour? Maybe more if the wage is the employers only expense?
Ah great point never thought of forged documents. I have always wondered how people like “John Smith” pass background checks. There’s got to be millions and I am sure a bunch of them are in prison. Just as easy to get the fake i9 stuff if your name is Juan Gonzalez. There’s got to be millions that are legal.
moving on…
Absolutely on “nobody wants these jobs” Roofing looks tough as hell and not only that but bloody dangerous as well. Real “mans” work however the crew yesterday had a woman and she was very pleasant. What type of wage do you think these guys are getting? $30 per hour? Maybe more if the wage is the employers only expense?
My first summer job, at 15 years old was for a roofer. I ripped off and carried bundles up the ladder. When the roof was all finished and I had all the shingles up there, then I was allowed to nail down some shingles. I was a HS football player and I looked at it as training. And I was making more money than I could spend. I was making $15…A Day!
I was able to read it. Disturbed and not surprised at the same time. I have definitely seen a few guys working and I thought “you are 18?†Possibly 17 or 16. Nothing younger for certain. Thank Goodness.
Our border situation has evolved on the same timeline as my home purchase and subsequent renovation. Unfortunately understanding it all too well.
I think residential is fairly cheap. I hope they’re making at least $20/hr if they’re lucky. And that’s underpaid in my opinion. But residential roofing pays by the square (100 sf of roof). The more you put down, the better you get paid.
Commercial pays better. On the low end, they’d be bring home $60k per year plus benefits.
A person-first suggestion- maybe “illegal workers†as a title instead of “illegals� You use illegal workers in your post.
People may be in a country, or working, illegally. But it isn’t illegal just to be a person.
People can call me on being “PC†but saying illegal workers is humanizing. “Illegals†is a cruel (even if untintentionally so which I believe is how you used it) way to refer to people who are just trying to exist.
My mom teaches English to non-native speakers, most of them immigrants - so this is a point of sensitivity to me
I was able to read it. Disturbed and not surprised at the same time. I have definitely seen a few guys working and I thought “you are 18?†Possibly 17 or 16. Nothing younger for certain. Thank Goodness.
Our border situation has evolved on the same timeline as my home purchase and subsequent renovation. Unfortunately understanding it all too well.
Article was disturbing. We will need a roof job in the next couple of years, and this will be at the front of my mind. I understand the dilemma of kids needing the work for their families, but sending them up without safety gear is just wrong. I have seen plenty of jobs around our area where the workers aren’t harnessed, and I cringe each time I see it. Doesn’t matter whether they are minors or adults, illegal or documented, they all deserve as much worksite protection as possible.
The sad thing is politicians don’t want to change things. The construction industry preys on these folks as workers, and they have significant lobbying influence.
TLDR ; What % of the trades are citizens / green card holders / on work visas?
We need to separate union trades from non-union trades. Union trades are 100% legal. Non-union trades - Who cares? Most of them are damn good at what they do, and they do it quickly and efficiently.
I wonder how people would deal with massive inflation if we got rid of all the illegal workers. In particular, food prices.
I heard a story that the recent increase in immigration was calculated to have an impact of reducing overall inflation by 1%.
I wonder how people would deal with massive inflation if we got rid of all the illegal workers. In particular, food prices.
Even if it happened with trump in office, half of them would find a way to blame Biden. I find it ironic that the majority of people complaining about inflation also want to deport everyone that isn’t here legally, and also support a guy who has talked about raising tariffs on everything imported into the US. The cost of food and construction work would skyrocket.
I recently had my quite large roof replaced including ice and water shield on the entire roof, and also had the vinyl siding on my dormers replaced with Hardie board. The crew that replaced my roof accomplished it in two days. For note, when it was replaced 4 years ago it took a crew 10 days. The recent crew was working from 7AM to dark (around 6:30) and took a short lunch break. At the end of each day, 8 of them walked around picking up debris from my yard.
The guys that replaced my dormer siding plus a little bit on the gables where there was a roof change had less than 450 square feet. They had a head start on the roofers and still spent 7 or 8 days - when they showed up. The quality of the work between the two was noticeable too.
The roofing crew was from South America and the siding guys were locals. He has a team that normally does his siding, but they’re on a big hurricane job and they couldn’t work this one for when we had the roof scheduled, so he hired the other crew.
I talked with my contractor about his roofing crew and he said that he’s been using them for a long time. He said that he makes sure that each one has green card and he doesn’t pay them under the table. He said that he’s hired locals in the past, but none of them have ever made it a year because they say the work is too hard.
So yeah. The people complaining about “illegals” will be upset when they have to pay more for veggies and fruit, and when it takes longer to get their roofs replaced only for the job to be poorly done.
These hard working people aren’t taking much work away from natural born citizens. Considering that we have a population-growth issue that is going to make it difficult to fund social security in the future, it seems like it would make sense to allow people in that want to work and have them contribute to our taxes. We can let it be known that those who don’t want to work, contribute and obey our laws will be deported immediately - and then back it up.
Maybe they are all legal? Anybody have any idea? Maybe they are all illegal?
It probably depends on the contractor. As I mentioned in my post above, my contractor requires all of his guys to have green cards/visas. He has been in business for 19 years. I’m sure that there are other contractors who don’t care.
I see a lot of “storm chasers” in my line of work. These are companies from out of town that come in whenever there is a hail storm, windstorm or hurricane. It wouldn’t surprise me if some of these guys hire anyone who can swing a hammer, but I’m sure some have crews that they use and just move them to wherever the work is.
On that note, when asked - I always suggest using someone who has lived in the community for a while. I want a contractor who has to worry about me making a scene if I see him at Home Depot or the restaurant after he did a bad job, not some guy who will be three states over and doesn’t care.
A person-first suggestion- maybe “illegal workers†as a title instead of “illegals� You use illegal workers in your post.
People may be in a country, or working, illegally. But it isn’t illegal just to be a person.
People can call me on being “PC†but saying illegal workers is humanizing. “Illegals†is a cruel (even if untintentionally so which I believe is how you used it) way to refer to people who are just trying to exist.
My mom teaches English to non-native speakers, most of them immigrants - so this is a point of sensitivity to me
Thanks for reading and considering
x2. Also speaking purely from a grammatical perspective there is no noun form of “illegal.” It is purely an adjective.
And to your other point, it always becomes harder to hate or speak condescendingly about a class of people when you actually know and interact with them. I’ve dealt a lot of with people with presumably illegal status having lived 30 years in a border city, and I’ve never had a negative interaction. I’m sure bad ones exist, I just never ran into one.
Absolutely on “nobody wants these jobs” Roofing looks tough as hell and not only that but bloody dangerous as well. Real “mans” work however the crew yesterday had a woman and she was very pleasant. What type of wage do you think these guys are getting? $30 per hour? Maybe more if the wage is the employers only expense?
If you work for Roofers Local 33 you make $51.28 per hour until 8/1 when you get a raise to $52.78/hr.
Apprentices make $25.02/hr for the first 2000 hours, $30.02/hr for the next 1000, $32.52 for the next 1000, $57.52 for the next 1000, $42.53 for the final 1000 hours of apprenticeship. That’s about 3 years if you actually work full time (apprentices don’t get much winter work)
Absolutely on “nobody wants these jobs” Roofing looks tough as hell and not only that but bloody dangerous as well. Real “mans” work however the crew yesterday had a woman and she was very pleasant. What type of wage do you think these guys are getting? $30 per hour? Maybe more if the wage is the employers only expense?
At some point I worked at a legal clinic that helped with workers rights. The amount of bosses that refuse to pay illegal immigrants after the work is completed is staggering.
I think residential is fairly cheap. I hope they’re making at least $20/hr if they’re lucky. And that’s underpaid in my opinion. **But residential roofing pays by the square (100 sf of roof). **The more you put down, the better you get paid.
Commercial pays better. On the low end, they’d be bring home $60k per year plus benefits.
This. Paying by the square motivates them to work harder/smarter.
It cost me about $35k to have my roof replaced. It took them two days and I think there was a crew of 8 guys. Assuming that half the money was for materials and the the contractor took a percentage, I would guess that these guys probably earned about 12-14k in two days. Assuming that some got paid more than others, some of them are probably making between 750-1000 a day on big jobs. And many of these guys work 7 days a week.
I tend to be the go to guy for refugee pts in our area. I get my wife to take care of the women because they often are not comfortable with male doctor esp when pregnant etc. I even got Syrian refugees that my Muslim colleagues would not take. Not aware of any of them being in Canada illegally. Those that are sponsored by local individuals or groups tend to do very well. It is a ton of work integrating them. One of my friend practically has a part time unpaid job helping them jump through all the gov’t hoops they need to get through to do things. He has mostly worked with people from Myanmar. My impression is those that are solely sponsored by gov’t struggle much more. The key seems to be to integrate them with local people.
When you get to know some of these guys, you find out several are sharing a place here and sending most money home to their families that are living quite well.
I can’t speak their language but I know cervasa.
Give them a bunch of Modello as a tip and they work even harder.
***I only do that when I’ve hired a contractor to work at my house and I do it as a thanks for the hard work.
In my day job, I rely on them being well compensated. I still take the approach I learned in Boy Scouts/Navy: I put them ahead of me.