>Some of my buddies mowed lawns. That work has been taken by immigrants.
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>I see plenty of teenage boys mowing lawns and shoveling snow in my neck of the woods. Fortunately, in Akorn Ohio we do not tend to get many illegal immigrants
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>Some worked as helpers on construction sites. Almost no construction going on around here and the few sites use immigrants as helpers.
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>I suspect that the unions would get very upset if a construction company used non-union helpers.
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>We have 40-50 year old fathers and mothers trying to support their families by bagging groceries in the supermarkets here. That work was once done by school kids.
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>Most of the baggers that I see in my local grocery stores are either school kids or on social security.
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>There are no jobs for a lot complicated reasons - automation is a large factor
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>But automation also creates (skilled) jobs. You need people to manufacture, program, repair, sell and deliver the machines. True, these jobs require more training than it takes to bag groceries, but they also provide what you call a "living wage". If one does not like his or her situation, one should take steps to change it - like getting some training. When I was 29 years old, I left my first husband. My first thought was "Here I am almost 30 and I'm still tending bar. I sure as heck don't want to be doing this when I am 50!" So I went back to school and got my degree in Computer Science while tending bar at night. I did not sit around and complain about my situation while doing nothing about it.

And again, I'll ask - how much were you paying for rent/housing? food? car/transportation/gas?
I can remember when I could fill up the 26 gallon gas tank of my car and still get change from a 10 $ bill. Now, filling up the 13 gallon tank now runs 40 - 50 $. How many hours working at minimum wage does it take to fill up that tank? In Austin, you'll pay anywhere from $1.50/sq ft in rent (assuming it's an area you actually WANT to live in) and good luck finding a studio/1 bedroom when UT is in session. Milk is now $3/gallon around here.

A person making minimum wage probably takes home $250/wk. Rent is 2 weeks work, utilities another weeks work - which leaves about $250 for food/gas/sundries. For the month. On what money are they supposed to go to school? "Take out loans" you say? Ya still gotta be enrolled at least 'half-time' which, I'm guessing is 6-9 hours. And the Fed loans (the easiest) max out around 27,500.