249 replies to this topic

[Futurist]

In response to demand for housing increasing, therefore housing cost goes up - surely though, as demand increases, market forces will dictate that supply increases?

Yeah, at least in some/many areas--after all, the U.S. still has a lot of available Lebensraum left even right now.

[caltrek]

[caltrek]

I am not sure how readable the image is above, so if you are having problems with the print size try this link:

 

 

http://reason.com/as...db5942ef5ad.jpg

 

 

 

 

 Further, employers can also higher seasonal temporary guest workers to fulfill any demand that teenagers can't fulfill. 

 

The charat above demonstrates that this is simply not true.Seasonla work visas are capped at 85,000 workers a year, compared to millions of undocumetned workers.  The nature of the agricultural industry in the U.S. is such that there are imply not enough willing teenagers in neighboring towns to even make much of a dent in the demand for workers. Moreover, although most agricultural laborers are probably not considered skilled for purposes of obtaining work permits, a significant ection of the are far more producitve in crrying out their task than are inexperienced teenagers. Teenagers that have an oppurtunity to gain the experience needed to obtain such skills need to also be highly athletic to take advantage of such opportunities. Most middle class parents would not be willing to submit their kids to such gruelling work conditions. 

[caltrek]

 

I hope that a Mormon President will be elected on the next round so that the prophecy of the White Horse will become true. God is angry with us, thats why American economy will stay sluggish in these years. I believe that a Mormon President will please God and USA economy will do much better. I pray everyday until this day will come. 

 

Ha. Hahahaha. He's a Mormon now. I guess a lot happened when I took a break.

You know, I hate to admit it, but the scary part is that a lot of Americans would probaly find his line of reasoning persuasive.  Perhaps Italian UFO would like to consider a craeer in American politics.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[tw88]

I am not sure how readable the image is above, so if you are having problems with the print size try this link:

 

 

http://reason.com/as...db5942ef5ad.jpg

 

 

 

 

 Further, employers can also higher seasonal temporary guest workers to fulfill any demand that teenagers can't fulfill. 

 

The charat above demonstrates that this is simply not true.Seasonla work visas are capped at 85,000 workers a year, compared to millions of undocumetned workers.  The nature of the agricultural industry in the U.S. is such that there are imply not enough willing teenagers in neighboring towns to even make much of a dent in the demand for workers. Moreover, although most agricultural laborers are probably not considered skilled for purposes of obtaining work permits, a significant ection of the are far more producitve in crrying out their task than are inexperienced teenagers. Teenagers that have an oppurtunity to gain the experience needed to obtain such skills need to also be highly athletic to take advantage of such opportunities. Most middle class parents would not be willing to submit their kids to such gruelling work conditions. 

 

 

no 85,000 cap is for SKILLED workers. There is no cap on the number of seasonal un-skilled H2A visas that can be given out. 

[Cosmic Cat]

Come to think of it; it did take me 11-12 years to become a Canadian citizen.

[caltrek]

 

 

I am not sure how readable the image is above, so if you are having problems with the print size try this link:

 

 

http://reason.com/as...db5942ef5ad.jpg

 

 

 

 

 Further, employers can also higher seasonal temporary guest workers to fulfill any demand that teenagers can't fulfill. 

 

The chart above demonstrates that this is simply not true.Seasonla work visas are capped at 85,000 workers a year, compared to millions of undocumetned workers.  The nature of the agricultural industry in the U.S. is such that there are imply not enough willing teenagers in neighboring towns to even make much of a dent in the demand for workers. Moreover, although most agricultural laborers are probably not considered skilled for purposes of obtaining work permits, a significant ection of the are far more producitve in crrying out their task than are inexperienced teenagers. Teenagers that have an oppurtunity to gain the experience needed to obtain such skills need to also be highly athletic to take advantage of such opportunities. Most middle class parents would not be willing to submit their kids to such gruelling work conditions. 

 

 

no 85,000 cap is for SKILLED workers. There is no cap on the number of seasonal un-skilled H2A visas that can be given out. 

 

 

Oooops!

 

My mistake.  H2A visas technically have no cap.  Still, it is a very problematic program:

 

 

 

CLINTON, N.C. — There was a time when Tracy Pope didn't have to worry about finding enough people to harvest the bell peppers, tobacco, squash and zucchini springing forth from his 500 acres of farmland.

 

Pope, a fourth-generation farmer, used to rely on family, neighbors, teens and a few hired hands to turn out for picking season. But locals increasingly find better work for the same pay outside the fields, so Pope does what many farmers do in America — he hires foreigners.

 

Unlike many farmers, he does it legally by going through a federal program that gives temporary work permits, known as H2A visas, to non-U.S. citizens to work on farms, ranches and vineyards across the country.

 

Yet the process is so bureaucratic that Pope, who uses his computer for little more than checking the weather, pays a firm specializing in the visas to handle the immense amount of paperwork and the considerable investment in time required to get them.

 

"I would eventually do something wrong, whether I knew it or not," Pope said of his attempts to comply with the regulatory process...

U.S. companies employ more than 1 million people to do the field work necessary to maintain the nation's food supply and make the United States an international food exporter. Half of those workers are illegal immigrants, according to the Department of Agriculture. Even though there are no limits to the number of H2A visas that can be granted each year, only 65,000 were issued last year.

 

One reason farmers avoid the program is that they prefer illegal immigrants who can be paid less and have no rights to complain, according to migrant worker advocates in Mexico. Others simply refuse to deal with the complexity of the system. Farmers must spend two-and-a-half months and hundreds of dollars getting approval from several state agencies and four federal agencies just to get one H2A worker on their land.

"It's really complicated," Pope said with a laugh, boasting that he doesn't even own a smart phone.

 

Foreign workers don't like the program either. It tethers them to the company that won the approval to hire them. If the workers feel they're being mistreated by the boss, they can't go down the road to find another job.

 

"You have to live with your eyes open and your mouth shut," said Blas Burboa, 27, a Mexican man who dropped out of the program after two years and is bouncing between jobs in Mexico.

 

 

 

Source:

 

http://www.usatoday....orkers/1946699/

[tw88]

Farmers must spend two-and-a-half months and hundreds of dollars getting approval from several state agencies and four federal agencies just to get one H2A worker on their land.

Hundreds of dollars? that's it? 2.5 months? That's more than enough time during the winter and growing season before harvest to get guest workers in. Perhaps if e-verify were mandated and there was increased penalties and enforcement of laws baring the hiring illegals,farmers would all of a sudden be able to find US citizens to work for them and be able to withstand the "grueling" process of legally bringing in guest workers. 

[caltrek]

 

 

Farmers must spend two-and-a-half months and hundreds of dollars getting approval from several state agencies and four federal agencies just to get one H2A worker on their land.

Hundreds of dollars? that's it? 2.5 months? That's more than enough time during the winter and growing season before harvest to get guest workers in. Perhaps if e-verify were mandated and there was increased penalties and enforcement of laws baring the hiring illegals,farmers would all of a sudden be able to find US citizens to work for them and be able to withstand the "grueling" process of legally bringing in guest workers. 

 

 

I do agree that we should look at the role employers play on the demand side of the undocumented worker equation.  Something I have learned in researching your allusion to e-verify:

 

http://staffingtalk....iring-illegals/

 

 

That's the framework  of a story Gregg Dourgarian posed when he sent me an email query about the subject, asking if I could do some research. Because anecdotally he says, he can confirm from visits with many staffing companies around the country, that e-verify actually serves as the perfect excuse for employers to get away with illegal hiring.

"Interestingly, I agree completely with the perspective of Leftists on this," Gregg told me. "They say Americans are being denied jobs in part because e-Verify makes it so easy for employers to use cheap illegals (see link). Where I disagree with them is whether any law can be effective for long in enforcing a market disequilibrium. Just like moonshine made it into the hands of the thirsty despite prohibition, cheap labor inside our borders will be sought out by employers despite e-Verify (or any other regulation)."

 

While approximately 26 million Americans are unemployed or underemployed, 7 million individuals work illegally in the United States.

 

One of the posters on the site in the link Gregg refers to claims "employers don't want a system that would correctly identify unauthorized workers." He also says that except for situations of identity fraud detectable by the Photo Screening Tool, if the counterfeit documents are of reasonable quality and contain information about actual work-authorized persons who resemble the worker providing the documentation, the Form I-9 process and the E-Verify system will incorrectly confirm the bearer as work authorized.

"Just like moonshine made it into the hands of the thirsty despite prohibition, cheap labor inside our borders will be sought out by employers despite e-Verify (or any other regulation)."

 

"One might conclude, therefore," says the poster, "that this system does not work, or one might conclude that the system is working EXACTLY as intended. At a time when millions of Americans are out of work, this Bush-era program is spending millions to put foreign nationals to work in our labor force, while at the same time yielding an unacceptably high rate of rejection of legal, foreign-born citizens. A system that enables a foreign national to work with illegally obtained 'breeder' documents while denying work to foreign-born U.S. citizens who have followed all the rules is simply unacceptable."

 

Arizona, home to as many as 460,000 undocumented immigrants, has been one of the centers of the national debate about illegal immigration for years. Employment, in turn, is one of the focal points of the immigration discussion because most border-crossers come to the U.S. looking for jobs.

 

“There is no way to completely, 100 percent, prevent workers who are not authorized to work in the United States from being on the payroll,” said attorney Christy Hubbard in a 2010 article in the Arizona Republic, while she was working at Lewis & Roca law firm in Phoenix. “The reason why is that people have documents that make them look like they are authorized to work.”

 

Most hiring staffers aren’t fake-ID experts, and so even companies with good intentions can unwittingly break the law, right along with employers who intentionally flout the law.

“There is no way to completely, 100 percent, prevent workers who are not authorized to work in the United States from being on the payroll.”

 

Even though neither the state government nor the feds can audit every single business for compliance, others are watching. There is a website called e-verifywatchdog.com that lists Arizona companies they claim are in non-compliance with the Arizona Employer Sanctions law that requires businesses to use e-Verify. Similarly, there is also a link to this list of hundreds of businesses they claim are in compliance.

 

We didn't find any staffing companies in the non-compliant list, and found plenty listed among the compliant companies...

 

Although the federal government doesn't require businesses to use E-Verify (except for certain companies that have government contracts), the Legal Arizona Workers Act, a state law implemented in 2008, does.

 

I did find a staffing and recruiting firm in Colorado, another state with lots of undocumented immigrants, who was promoting their decision to participate in the e-Verify program.

J. Kent Staffing signed the MOU with the Social Security Administration and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) last month, saying the company recognizes the importance of employing a legal workforce, particularly since many clients are holders of federal contracts.

With heightened awareness about Denver’s legal workforce, we have implemented the E-Verify program for the benefit of all J. Kent clients, for profit, non-profit, governmental contractors or entities in all our areas of Expertise. Although E-Verify Bill HR 2164 - The Legal Workforce Act* is requiring all employers to use the system phased-in over the next three years, we believe that E-Verify is a good, practical, business practice today. Conclusion: implementation at a later date serves no purpose. Therefore, effective February 17, 2012, all J. Kent staff members assigned to our Denver client companies are processed through E-Verify, a companion to Form I-9.

Participation in E-Verify is free and voluntary, and has been available for every business in the country since late 2004. More than 288,000 employers, large and small, across the United States use E-Verify to check the employment eligibility of their employees, with about 1,200 new businesses signing up each week according to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

 

We ran a shorter story in Staffing Talk last August asking whether in fact e-Verify "works." Here is what one reader left in the comments section of that story.

"Not only does it not work, but in many cases it is actually helping the illegals keep their jobs. In the construction trades many employers know that they are illegal but simply help them buy running new cards as the bring them until they find one that works. I have worked for an employer who started E-verify and had to get rid of 12 illegals. Within 2 months they were all back with new ss#. Not only were they back, but they were now in the system and set as a priority for work because the employer knew that if the were off of work too long they would need to be re-verified. In the construction trades alone millions of illegals are working while American citizens sit watching our government do nothing to help the problem.

 

Any suggestions? Are there are any Staffing Talk readers who have heard of using e-Verify as a cover for the deliberate hiring of illegals? Is the program a good one, or should it be dismantled and demolished? I'm looking forward to some spirited debate on this one.

"Not only does it not work, but in many cases it is actually helping the illegals keep their jobs."

 

As a side note, it is interesting how widely divergent are the estimates as to how many undocumented workers there really are in the U.S.

[tw88]

Job gains are going mostly to unskilled immigrants

http://www.zerohedge...may-jobs-report

[jamesgera]

Unless your a native then aren't all other Americans immigrants? The whole purpose of America was for moving people from poorer countries to a new land with a new chance.

Now a few hundred years later we see people hating those for doing what there ancestors did before them.

[tw88]

Unless you are in Africa then technically everyone is an immigrant using that logic. No one is hating on immigrants , but it stands to reason that if a glut of unskilled immigrants are depressing wages then the influx of such immigrants should be curved.

[Lunix688]

Unless your a native then aren't all other Americans immigrants? The whole purpose of America was for moving people from poorer countries to a new land with a new chance.

Now a few hundred years later we see people hating those for doing what there ancestors did before them.

 

While I myself detest the notion of immigration control (I much prefer allowing a free market when it comes to immigration, open borders) I do have to point out that from a lot of people's perspectives, they do not want unskilled laborers coming into America and actually depressing wages since they can do unskilled labor much cheaper then what an American probably would. Also, it's also a public services thing as most people do not want public schools to be flooded like they are in some areas with illegal immigrant children (because afterall, schools have limited capacity, and a massive influx is not the best for quality of education). Same with roads, hospitals, et cetera. 

 

Yes, you could say all Americans are immigrants - but immigration has changed significantly throughout the U.S's history, as have attitudes. 

 

Technically, the purpose of America was to proclaim a republic and escape being ruled by a monarch 1,000+ miles away. The U.S embraced immigration, but it wasn't really founded on the notion of immigration.

[jamesgera]

Unless you are in Africa then technically everyone is an immigrant using that logic. No one is hating on immigrants , but it stands to reason that if a glut of unskilled immigrants are depressing wages then the influx of such immigrants should be curved.

I wouldn't say you would be a foreigner if you are the first to claim the land

[tw88]

 

Unless you are in Africa then technically everyone is an immigrant using that logic. No one is hating on immigrants , but it stands to reason that if a glut of unskilled immigrants are depressing wages then the influx of such immigrants should be curved.

I wouldn't say you would be a foreigner if you are the first to claim the land

Should people with a higher proportion of Neanderthal and Devonian ancestry be able to have more of a say in immigration policies in Europe and Asia then people with less of such ancestry? Was the white apartheid in south Africa justified sense humans from African decimated the Neanderthals and white people are partially descended from Neanderthals? Should Inuits have less political freedom in Greenland than white people do there sense they killed off all the white settlers in Greenland during the middle ages? Should non white citizens in Europe have less of a say in immigration policy than white citizens? Maybe white people in Europe with higher proportions of Yamnaya and near east farmer ancestry should also have less say in immigration. Should negritos in south Asia be able to have more of a say in immigration in their countries sense northern Asians settled the land in south east Asia when negritos were there first? Should aboriginals from Tazmainia and other outlying islands have more of a say in immigration than aboriginals from mainland Australia sense they have a high proportion of Indian immigrant ancestry? Is a white person who is a citizen of a country in the Americas not considered an immigrant if he/she moves to Europe? Are people who move to Africa from other continents not considered immigrants there? Should people who live in areas that didn't have native American settlements at the time of Columbus have more influence on immigration policy than those who live in areas where there was native American settlements? What if someone is part native American and part something else, should their influence on immigration policy be intermediary between a full blooded native american and someone with no native american ancestry? What about Eskimos and Inuits? They arrived during a second wave of migration after after the initial wave of migration into America from bergenia, maybe Native Americans who can trace their ancestry back to the first wave of migrants from bergenia should have the most say in immigration. What about people from Easter island? They probably had contact with and may have interbred with natives in Chili. Perhaps Amerindians  in Chili with eastern island ancestry should also have less of a say in immigration than full blooded Amerindians.   Maybe registering to vote in countries that aren't racially homogeneous should require undergoing genetic testing in order to determine their genetic ancestry and use their ancestry to determine how much weight their vote will count for on a given ballot question regarding immigration? What if its found that, as some suspect, that there was a wave of migration from Europe into America during the last ice age? That would make things really complicated in determining who should have the most say in immigration policy!

[caltrek]

Job gains are going mostly to unskilled immigrants

http://www.zerohedge...may-jobs-report

 

From the cited article:

 

 

What is unknown is how many of these millions of "foreign-born" jobs have gone to illegal immigrant who are perfectly willing to work hard, and yet whose wage bargaining power is absolutely nil (after all they are happy just to have a job) thereby leading to depressed wages for native-born workers in comparable jobs, resulting in wage growth which over the past 8 years has been non-existant.

 

In the agricultural industry, this has been an issue over the years that has changed the alignment of those seeking to organize farm workers.  At one point leaders such as Cesar Chavez were quite hostile to immigrant laborers. Over the years the United Farm Worker's labor policy has shifted to being that of supporting immigration rights. More of an effort has been directed at solidarity within the ranks of the work force.  This is partly due to the fact that many native born or naturalized workers have relatives from other countries.  It is also due to an unwillingness to allow this to be used as  wedge to split workers into mutually hostile camps so that employers could capitalize on these divisions.  Employers in turn have also realized the need for some kind of immigration reform to be able to maintain their work force.

 

I find it ironic that some seem to be arguing that immigration should be curtailed because immigrants "are perfectly willing to work hard".   Is it better to let those jobs go unfilled?   Perhaps those jobs shouldbe filled by individuals not willing to work hard?

 

There may be those willing in the urbanized areas to do those jobs that would be left vacant, but that is simply not the case within the industrialized agricultural regions of California. Crops would start rotting in the fields, as they have in the past when immigration controls have been excessively successful.

 

One of the reasons why the bargaining power of undoumented workers is "absolutely nill" is precisley because of the laws that are hostile to their presence.  If they were in less fear of deportation, they would be in a better position to bargain for higher wages and better work conditions. Something that unions such as the UFW have come to recognize.

[tw88]

 

 

 

 

In the agricultural industry, this has been an issue over the years that has changed the alignment of those seeking to organize farm workers.  At one point leaders such as Cesar Chavez were quite hostile to immigrant laborers. Over the years the United Farm Worker's labor policy has shifted to being that of supporting immigration rights. More of an effort has been directed at solidarity within the ranks of the work force.  This is partly due to the fact that many native born or naturalized workers have relatives from other countries.  It is also due to an unwillingness to allow this to be used as  wedge to split workers into mutually hostile camps so that employers could capitalize on these divisions.  Employers in turn have also realized the need for some kind of immigration reform to be able to maintain their work force.

 

I find it ironic that some seem to be arguing that immigration should be curtailed because immigrants "are perfectly willing to work hard".   Is it better to let those jobs go unfilled?   Perhaps those jobs shouldbe filled by individuals not willing to work hard?

 

There may be those willing in the urbanized areas to do those jobs that would be left vacant, but that is simply not the case within the industrialized agricultural regions of California. Crops would start rotting in the fields, as they have in the past when immigration controls have been excessively successful.

 

One of the reasons why the bargaining power of undoumented workers is "absolutely nill" is precisley because of the laws that are hostile to their presence.  If they were in less fear of deportation, they would be in a better position to bargain for higher wages and better work conditions. Something that unions such as the UFW have come to recognize.

 

 

 

 

There is probably an equilibrium that should be met. Not enough labor to fulfill those jobs might cause those jobs to disappear or cause employers to look else where for people to fulfill those jobs (depending on the job).  Too many available applicants for a job, regardless of wither they are an illegal immigrant, legal resident, or citizens,  drives down the wages and probably also enables employers to exploit them more easily sense they can be more easily replaced if they are defiant. I believe its only people on temporary work visas that are bound to work for just one employer for the duration of their visa. I don't see any reason why illegal immigrants using a phony SSN working in agriculture couldn't go work for another nearby farmer  that was providing better pay and working conditions. However, if the supply of illegal immigrants willing to work for such jobs was vast enough, then such opportunities to jump farms for better pay and conditions would be unlikely to present it self sense there would be little competition among farmers to attract and keep labor. I think a good solution to poor working conditions and need for labor in the agricultural sector would be to shift more of the money for farm subsidies away from grains ,who's planting and harvesting is already highly automated, to fruits and vegetables, which often require manual harvesting, thus making labor less of a cost factor for such farmers.  I agree, that a significant shortage in labor would be bad. However, wages have been pretty stagnant, and most jobs being added to the economy are in the service and retail sector. A lot of these jobs aren't jobs that can be relocated the way that jobs in manufacturing plants can be. The location of a retail or service business is often an essential part of the business. It makes sense given the economic conditions, that we should try to curtail the number of unskilled immigrants, legal or otherwise, to bring the balance of applicants to jobs in better equilibrium. A slight to modest shortage in unskilled labor would probably be a good thing. 

[caltrek]

Trump Threatens Sanctuary Cities

 

https://nonprofitqua...ean-nonprofits/

 

Extract:

 

Across the nation yesterday, mayors of so-called “sanctuary cities” spoke out in defiance of another executive order by President Trump, this one threatening to cut federal funding to sanctuary jurisdictions. Trump also authorized the hiring of 10,000 new immigration officers as an indicator of increased enforcement activity.

 

All this action portends an impending collision between sanctuary cities and the new administration that promises to encompass issues of immigration and constitutional concerns around local vs. federal control. It comes accompanied by rhetoric about a broad-brush federal defunding that, if enacted, would affect many types of community services and supports. What is actually likely to happen from here?

 

...While there is no single definition of a sanctuary city, it generally means that the entity does not allow their police departments to collaborate with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, to detain and deport immigrants. Because of differences in definitional boundaries, there’s no single list of sanctuary cities. Some cities have been sanctuaries since the 1980s, and on top of that, a variety of counties, states, and even university campuses have declared themselves as sanctuaries. Still, as alarming as this might sound to communities and nonprofits that benefit from federal safety net and program funding, as with a number of Trump’s other declarations, there would be barriers to carrying out the defunding referred to in this order. “All federal grant money” would presumably include Medicaid money and monies allocated for various social programs, but CNN reports that not only are many federal disbursements under congressional rather than presidential control, but “the courts have held in the past that the federal government can only strip funding that is related to the policy involved—so it’s unlikely to hold up if the administration tried to take away highway funds, for example, according to experts.” Even so, for New York City to lose federal aid to local law enforcement, including $185 million in homeland security grants, would be significant.

 

Additionally, the courts have ruled, in alignment with the Constitution’s “anti-commandeering doctrine,” that funding decisions may not be used to coerce states into actions... This means that these declarations are likely headed straight to the courts, where they are likely to linger, much as Obama’s immigration orders did.

[caltrek]

ACLU Sues White House Over Immigration Ban

 

 

http://thehill.com/p...on-amid-refugee

 

Introduction:

 

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) on Saturday sued the Trump administration on behalf of two men who were detained at an airport while traveling back to the U.S. because of President Trump's immigration crackdown.

 

The suit was filed on behalf of Hameed Khalid Darweesh and Haider Sameer Abdulkhaleq, two men from Iraq who were  detained and threatened with deportation shortly after arriving at New York’s Kennedy International Airport on Friday, hours after Trump's executive order was signed.

 

“President Trump's war on equality is already taking a terrible human toll,” ACLU president Omar Jadwat said in a statement. “This ban cannot be allowed to continue.”

 

Darweesh worked as an interpreter, engineer and contractor for the U.S. government in Iraq from about 2003 to 2013, according to the complaint filed in the Eastern District of New York. His life was in danger in Iraq because of his ties to the U.S., the ACLU said.

 

Alshawi was traveling to Houston, Texas, to join his wife and child, who are both permanent legal residents of the U.S.

[caltrek]

Our Revolution Statement on Trump’s Executive Action on Immigration and Refugee Admissions

27th January, 2017

 

 

 

WASHINGTON -- James Zogby, Our Revolution Board Member and President of the Arab American Institute, on Wednesday released the following statement in response to the latest executive orders signed by President Trump: 

 

"The executive order issued today by President Trump is wrong on so many levels. 

 

"President Trump's order to ban the entry of individuals from Arab and Muslim-majority countries to the U.S.  is a misguided act that will deny millions of Americans the opportunity to be visited by their parents, siblings, and other family members.  

 

"Similarly, there is the President's decision to suspend our nation's refugee program. With one broad stoke, he has slammed the door on tens of thousands of innocents fleeing persecution and seeking refuge in our country. This heartless act is not based on security concerns, since those applying for refugee status already go through a rigorous vetting process. Rather, it is based on fear and prejudice and is a stain on our nation's honor.   

 

"The policies outlined are contrary to what we know to be true. Americans welcome immigrants and they welcome refugees.