For this column, let’s not look through a moral lens. But rather, let’s be completely selfish, and examine how Donald Trump’s deportation policy would hurt American citizens.

Let’s not even consider the damage to the lives of around 11 million of our neighbors that are undocumented immigrants, all of whom Trump has promised to deport if he is elected. Trump told a crowd in Iowa in September: “We will carry out the largest domestic deportation operation in American history.” He told Time Magazine that he would deport “15 to 20 million undocumented immigrants.” His program includes round-ups by police and the National Guard, massive detention camps, and charter flights and bus trips that would cost taxpayers a projected $300 billion over 20 years.

However, I said we’d look at this situation selfishly. And of course, ripping the American Dream away from those huddled masses yearning to breathe free is terrible, but it is not the primary effect on you and me.

The nation’s undocumented immigrants grow and harvest the food we eat. Half of all farmworkers are undocumented. In a 2022 study by Pierre Merel, an agricultural and economics expert at UC Davis, it shows that even a 50% decrease in farm laborers would lead to a 21% increase in the price of hand-picked crops, and many farms would be out of business. Twenty-five percent of workers of processed meat, fish, and poultry likely lack legal status. Milk prices would also double. We would be more reliant on imports and the deportations could easily create a food shortage.

Who cares for the sick, young children, and elderly in our community? Undocumented immigrants account for 350,000 health care workers, and 142,000 are child care workers, personal care and home health aides. Another 160,000 are cleaners and housekeepers. Who is going to care for you, your children, and your elderly parents when these workers are deported?

Who is going to build the housing that your family and friends need? One in five undocumented workers, 1.4 million people, are employed in construction. That is 10% of the industry’s workers, and it’s higher in certain specialties, such as where they make up 32% of roofers. The industry already faces a shortage of 500,000 workers, and Trump’s deportation plan would bring the construction of new housing to a screeching halt. As Greg Casar, Texas representative to Congress, so clearly states, “the economy would collapse.”

In addition, unauthorized workers pay $13 billion into Social Security even though they are not eligible for benefits. Undocumented households in 2022 paid $35.1 billion in taxes, which the country loses if we deport these families.

During the COVID-19 pandemic more than 5 million, or about 3 in 4, undocumented immigrants in the workforce were “essential workers.” As many as 340,000 DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) recipients were also part of the pandemic response.

If the plan Trump has promised is implemented, we will almost immediately lose much of our health care workers, farmers, meat, poultry and dairy workers, child care providers, and almost all those who care for our elderly. This plan would have catastrophic and immediate effects on our daily lives, while having no demonstrated benefits.

Along with his other policies, it is not designed to help you or me. For the catastrophe this will unleash on our country, no one should be voting for Trump.

Paul Jablon lives in Greenfield.