At some point in our lives some of us may have come across the prospect of hiring a nanny or housekeeper who may not have had legal work authorization. It may have been in progress or simply never available.  At that time, the question would have been, should you or should you not hire this person.  Obviously by doing so, you would find yourself breaking the law.  Years and years ago when the immigration doors were wide open and people from every country flooded the United States, we were inundated with a labor force that would do anything for almost any amount of pay just to survive.  Although at that time, it still was not legal to hire someone of that status, almost everyone did and the legal system turned away the watchful eye.

Then when the immigration doors were shut, we continued to get the flood of people. Only this time, they were coming every which way and actually increased in numbers.  Now as we fast forward to the year 2007, everyone, both democrats and republications are completely perplexed as to what to do about this problem. There is no question that if you know anything about most immigrants who work here in this country, you can probably attest to the fact that they are extremely hard-working. They may not always do the job exactly how you like it, mostly as a result of poor training and education, but for the most part, they are very willing and intent on doing whatever it takes to survive and care for their families. It is of my opinion that we take into consideration the fact that those who have been here for many years and can prove that they have worked all those years should be allowed to remain here and receive a working status.  Certainly if one has children here, you couldn't possibly think that ripping illegal parents away from a legally born child would be in the best interest of anyone.  We are always going to need a labor force to work in the capacities where others who have been more fortunate would not venture.

Bottom line, is that we will always need housekeepers and nannies and that much of this labor force is usually an immigrant, and not always a legal one. So it is time to recognize our needs as a nation and to accept the mistakes we made in the past in allowing this situation to get out hand.  It is time to do something about it while keeping everyone's interest at mind.  It would be nice to fantasize about ridding ourselves of all this by simply rounding up everyone and sending them off.  We know that this isn't going to work. These people will simply return. Border control is still an issue.  A proper solution would be to give those who can prove that they are working and have been for a given period of time the opportunity to perhaps pay a penalty and buy themselves the right to remain here with a legal work status.  This way, they can be put on payroll and pay into the system as everyone else is forced to do.  The nation benefits by its labor force, the workers benefit by supporting themselves and their families, and the government benefits by receiving their tax dollars.