Milton Friedman’s America Reviewing the video from Milton Friedman has given quite an insight on how he feels about what America was, what America has become, and what America should be. He focuses his ideas around legal and illegal immigrants and how the laws affect America when dealing with them as a working class. In some sense, the comments that he made were a bit insulting, while on the other hand, the comments were a bit amusing at best. These views are view that I would expect a comedian to address in stand-up than what I would expect a public speaker to verbalize to bluntly. He starts be addressing how immigrants today differ from the immigrants from a few decades ago. He states that in the 40’s the immigrants were welcomed because they came to America looking to work and were willing to take the jobs that no other American wanted. These jobs included agriculture and other labor intensive jobs. He then continued by saying that illegal immigrants were the ones that would take on these jobs, but as states began to legalize immigration, it made possible the ability for immigrants to come to America and become civilian who are able to stay at home and receive a check legally. He is against this because he feels that now immigrants are coming to America legally to get a free check instead of coming to America illegally to earn a living. I don’t believe he is saying to drive immigrant out by making immigration illegal. However, he is saying that illegal immigrants made America better by working the jobs that no one in America wanted, and at the same time, benefited by being paid under the table and being able to live in the country. He continues by expressing that the government should have no influence on how work is completed on the lowest level which is the same level Milton Friedman feels is the level that immigrants work. He uses the building of a pencil as an example, and says that the pencil is made by many different vendors. As the demand for pencils increase, the vendors are offered more money for the materials it takes to create the pencil. He explains that the vendors do not care about why the pencil has become higher in demand, but if the vendor can make more money, the vendor will provide more material. The idea that he makes with this example is that the vendors do not need to be motivated to get this done. In the same sense immigrants do not need to be motivated to work. He explains that legalizing immigration allows immigrants to come to the country with no incentive to work, which destroys this system he calls the “Price System.” The way that he sees it is that it is easier to hire someone on the side to change the light bulb than it is to wait for the government to send someone to change the light bulb. One of the ethical consideration that I felt was discussed in this video is the legalization of immigration, and the idea that making immigration illegal is good for American productivity. Never mind the fact that this is insulting to a certain minority group although I will address this later. Milton Friedman’s idea is that making immigration illegal is a good way to get illegal immigrants to work when they come into the country, it is a good way to pay people under the table for cheap labor, and it is ok to illegally employ immigrants. This is absolutely wrong for several reasons. First, if immigration is illegal, it is illegal to hire immigrants without the proper protocols to employ them. Second, if immigration was not illegal, it is illegal to limit a minority group to just one type of employment because they are immigrants. Third, hiring immigrants under the table takes jobs away from the unemployed. Legalizing immigration means that the immigrants get paid a fair amount, and it gives other an opportunity to work the same jobs. I think that not only are the question relevant, but the entire issue is relevant. Companies are asked to maintain a social responsibility to the community. This means that hiring immigrants means treating them equal. This is another good reason for immigrants to be legal. In addition, if hiring immigrants for lower pay is easier than hiring American citizen, where will that put the American citizens looking for jobs? What would that do to American families just trying to make it? Where is the social responsibility to the American society? Immigration should be legalized and immigrants should be provided with the same opportunities and limitations as any other American citizen to be able to live in America. There are two ways that this video would help me to do business. It allows me to look at the way others view business verses the way that businesses should be ran. Some people would like to take as many short-cuts as possible. These are the same type of business ideas that lead companies to outsource to other countries and disregard providing work to the community. I will also say that, as many negative things I found with this video, there were some positive things that I gained as well. The fact is a “price system,” that drives how people are employed, and that system can be applied to many situations. I also agree that government should not manage every level of employment, but as we learned earlier in the course, sometime it takes making laws for some people and organizations to stay ethical.