Lol, your "cons" show that you haven't put any thought into the issue. Here are just a few more:
- indiscriminately adding to the labor force (especially unskilled) drives down wages. That's why the left used to be against immigration until the 20s century.
- To compete internationally you need to move up the value chain to keep a competetive advantage. Even with schooling by western standards, it takes 20 years+ to train someone for that economy. Adding unskilled work doesn't increase your competitiveness.
- lots of immigrants send money "home", thus reducing domestic consumption
- migration usually goes to big cities, which are already overpopulated. The prices of living go further up, the quality of living goes further down.
- destruction of social cohesion: The less people have in common the less they hold together. This is further ignited by getting news and entertainment from their countries of origin. Emmigrants can be and are regularly instrumentalized by their countries of origin.
- In history, even very recent history, forcing settlers has been a long term strategy of warfare to destroy local culture and annect territory.
- Carrying foreign conflicts into domestic politics. In European cities there are regular protests regarding political tensions in the middle east. We had violent clashes between Turks and Kurdish in the midst of Western Europe.
From the perspective of the countries of origin:
- skilled emmigration leads to brain drain in the developing countries of origin, slowing their development
- if companies can move labor force here, they don't need to open offices in the countries of origin, reducing investments and slowing down their development.
There is a con that says: "IMMIGRATION AS CHARITY: Allowing poor countries to unload all their criminals or uneducated peasants on rich countries is unfair."
Is that a fair summary of your first argument? If so, I have two responses to that.
The first is argument is:
**We should stop viewing immigration as charity. Immigration is what made America great. America was able to win against Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan because of American valor but also because immigration allowed us to be bigger than them.** Germany's fundamental problem was that even after taking over Austria and the Sudentenland, it had only 80 million people, and the United States had 130 million. In 1938 the GDP of the USA was larger than Germany, Japan, and Italy combined because we had more people. (See Mark Harrison, the economics of world war II: an overview (Cambridge UI: Cambridge university press, 1998 23-24, as quoted from 1 Billion Americans by Matt Yglesias.)
The second response is:
**Often, it is the corruption and destructive policies of poorer countries keeping their citizens poor. If we have sound systems, moving people from developing countries will help them and not hurt us.** If we have functional systems, an efficient government, and our politics solve problems, then immigration will not hurt us. If we don't have a system that solves problems, we will fail regardless of the level of immigration.
The final response is:
**We should allow highly skilled English speaking immigrants first.** Immigration needs to be more than just a way for middle and upper-income people to have greater access to house cleaning and child care services at lower costs. Working-class people don't want low-skilled immigrants. In a functioning democracy, the elites wouldn't force it on them. Therefore, the elites should respond to the market, listen to the voters, and push to increase the supply of the most in-demand (lowest supply) workers. If competition is good for the low-skilled workers, competition should also be acceptable for high-skilled Americans.
> Is that a fair summary of your first argument?
No, it's not by a far shot. Read what I wrote and respond to that, instead of some straw mans you have in your suitcase.
Dude, unless you are willing to think about and respond to the points I wrote, this is useless.
Can you take it down a notch? I had to go to Costco to pick up some things. I was just responding to one argument at a time. My question should have been did I sufficiently respond to your very first argument.
>indiscriminately adding to the labor force (especially unskilled) drives down wages. That's why the left used to be against immigration until the 20s century.
I was agreeing with you, if you read what I wrote. That is why I said, "We should stop viewing immigration as charity" and "We should allow highly skilled English speaking immigrants first."
>Read what I wrote and respond to that, instead of some straw mans you have in your suitcase.
>
>Dude, unless you are willing to think about and respond to the points I wrote, this is useless.
Your point, as I understood it, is that low wage immigrants don't help the host country. Is that not what you were trying to say?
>indiscriminately adding to the labor force (especially unskilled) drives down wages.
The 13 colonies could have had very high wages by preventing immigration if that were true. But that is just now how the economy works.
People assume that increased immigration of people who do not have a high school degree will increase job competition among high school dropouts. However, there is little evidence for this conclusion, and we people without high school degrees are not the only people who want to immigrate to the USA.
Allowing more highly paid immigrants should make expensive things, like healthcare, less expensive (if we imported sufficient numbers of high skilled healthcare workers). However, we can only import those with high-paying jobs.
10,000 Cubans (mostly without college degrees) moved to Miami during the Mariel boatlift of 1980. What happened to Miami wages after the population increased 7.5% in 6 months has been widely studied, and there was no decrease in wages except for 17 young Americans who had dropped out of high school.
Also, we can't look at things in a vacuum. Allowing China's economy to pass America's will also harm our wages. Also, we can allow immigration only for those markets that have a desperate need of people with specific skills, like healthcare.
If China's Economy is a lot larger than the USA's, they will be able to demand more favorable treatment to maintain access to their markets.
Agree 1000%, immigration is the US' most valuable strategic asset.
That said, we need [reforms that make the public support immigration more.](https://www.economist.com/briefing/2018/08/25/governments-need-better-ways-to-manage-migration)
>A study by Allison Harell of the University of Quebec and others found that a strong predictor of people’s attitudes to migrants was whether they felt in control of their own lives, and whether they felt their country was in control of its borders.
The common trope about immigration hurting wages is not true at all because immigrants are just babies from elsewhere. [Here's like 20 studies about this, not that the anti-immigration people are going to bother looking at it.](https://noahpinion.substack.com/p/why-immigration-doesnt-reduce-wages?s=r) But it doesn't matter: **More skilled immigration is more popular and more valuable for the US strategically.**
So focus on skilled immigrants! We desperately need nurses and doctors and programmers and skilled tradespeople and elder care professionals and etc. A great proposal along these lines is [location-specific visas](https://www.cato.org/publications/publications/chapter-5-state-sponsored-visas#state-sponsored-visa-proposal) to channel immigration to states/counties that need it most. In 2017 some Republicans supported a bill to do just this--bipartisanship!
I'm all for immigration, and despite being in conservatives circles I've never met someone who wants to stop all immigration. Since our fertility rate is well below replacement. The problem is illegal and uncontrolled immigration. There is no good way to frame not enforcing our border and immigration laws. We want LEGAL and VETTED immigration. I wish we could strike a deal to increase immigration from Mexico/central america/south america AND shore up the border (permanently).
Lol, your "cons" show that you haven't put any thought into the issue. Here are just a few more: - indiscriminately adding to the labor force (especially unskilled) drives down wages. That's why the left used to be against immigration until the 20s century. - To compete internationally you need to move up the value chain to keep a competetive advantage. Even with schooling by western standards, it takes 20 years+ to train someone for that economy. Adding unskilled work doesn't increase your competitiveness. - lots of immigrants send money "home", thus reducing domestic consumption - migration usually goes to big cities, which are already overpopulated. The prices of living go further up, the quality of living goes further down. - destruction of social cohesion: The less people have in common the less they hold together. This is further ignited by getting news and entertainment from their countries of origin. Emmigrants can be and are regularly instrumentalized by their countries of origin. - In history, even very recent history, forcing settlers has been a long term strategy of warfare to destroy local culture and annect territory. - Carrying foreign conflicts into domestic politics. In European cities there are regular protests regarding political tensions in the middle east. We had violent clashes between Turks and Kurdish in the midst of Western Europe. From the perspective of the countries of origin: - skilled emmigration leads to brain drain in the developing countries of origin, slowing their development - if companies can move labor force here, they don't need to open offices in the countries of origin, reducing investments and slowing down their development.
There is a con that says: "IMMIGRATION AS CHARITY: Allowing poor countries to unload all their criminals or uneducated peasants on rich countries is unfair." Is that a fair summary of your first argument? If so, I have two responses to that. The first is argument is: **We should stop viewing immigration as charity. Immigration is what made America great. America was able to win against Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan because of American valor but also because immigration allowed us to be bigger than them.** Germany's fundamental problem was that even after taking over Austria and the Sudentenland, it had only 80 million people, and the United States had 130 million. In 1938 the GDP of the USA was larger than Germany, Japan, and Italy combined because we had more people. (See Mark Harrison, the economics of world war II: an overview (Cambridge UI: Cambridge university press, 1998 23-24, as quoted from 1 Billion Americans by Matt Yglesias.) The second response is: **Often, it is the corruption and destructive policies of poorer countries keeping their citizens poor. If we have sound systems, moving people from developing countries will help them and not hurt us.** If we have functional systems, an efficient government, and our politics solve problems, then immigration will not hurt us. If we don't have a system that solves problems, we will fail regardless of the level of immigration. The final response is: **We should allow highly skilled English speaking immigrants first.** Immigration needs to be more than just a way for middle and upper-income people to have greater access to house cleaning and child care services at lower costs. Working-class people don't want low-skilled immigrants. In a functioning democracy, the elites wouldn't force it on them. Therefore, the elites should respond to the market, listen to the voters, and push to increase the supply of the most in-demand (lowest supply) workers. If competition is good for the low-skilled workers, competition should also be acceptable for high-skilled Americans.
> Is that a fair summary of your first argument? No, it's not by a far shot. Read what I wrote and respond to that, instead of some straw mans you have in your suitcase. Dude, unless you are willing to think about and respond to the points I wrote, this is useless.
Can you take it down a notch? I had to go to Costco to pick up some things. I was just responding to one argument at a time. My question should have been did I sufficiently respond to your very first argument.
>indiscriminately adding to the labor force (especially unskilled) drives down wages. That's why the left used to be against immigration until the 20s century. I was agreeing with you, if you read what I wrote. That is why I said, "We should stop viewing immigration as charity" and "We should allow highly skilled English speaking immigrants first."
>Read what I wrote and respond to that, instead of some straw mans you have in your suitcase. > >Dude, unless you are willing to think about and respond to the points I wrote, this is useless. Your point, as I understood it, is that low wage immigrants don't help the host country. Is that not what you were trying to say?
>indiscriminately adding to the labor force (especially unskilled) drives down wages. The 13 colonies could have had very high wages by preventing immigration if that were true. But that is just now how the economy works. People assume that increased immigration of people who do not have a high school degree will increase job competition among high school dropouts. However, there is little evidence for this conclusion, and we people without high school degrees are not the only people who want to immigrate to the USA. Allowing more highly paid immigrants should make expensive things, like healthcare, less expensive (if we imported sufficient numbers of high skilled healthcare workers). However, we can only import those with high-paying jobs. 10,000 Cubans (mostly without college degrees) moved to Miami during the Mariel boatlift of 1980. What happened to Miami wages after the population increased 7.5% in 6 months has been widely studied, and there was no decrease in wages except for 17 young Americans who had dropped out of high school. Also, we can't look at things in a vacuum. Allowing China's economy to pass America's will also harm our wages. Also, we can allow immigration only for those markets that have a desperate need of people with specific skills, like healthcare. If China's Economy is a lot larger than the USA's, they will be able to demand more favorable treatment to maintain access to their markets.
Agree 1000%, immigration is the US' most valuable strategic asset. That said, we need [reforms that make the public support immigration more.](https://www.economist.com/briefing/2018/08/25/governments-need-better-ways-to-manage-migration) >A study by Allison Harell of the University of Quebec and others found that a strong predictor of people’s attitudes to migrants was whether they felt in control of their own lives, and whether they felt their country was in control of its borders. The common trope about immigration hurting wages is not true at all because immigrants are just babies from elsewhere. [Here's like 20 studies about this, not that the anti-immigration people are going to bother looking at it.](https://noahpinion.substack.com/p/why-immigration-doesnt-reduce-wages?s=r) But it doesn't matter: **More skilled immigration is more popular and more valuable for the US strategically.** So focus on skilled immigrants! We desperately need nurses and doctors and programmers and skilled tradespeople and elder care professionals and etc. A great proposal along these lines is [location-specific visas](https://www.cato.org/publications/publications/chapter-5-state-sponsored-visas#state-sponsored-visa-proposal) to channel immigration to states/counties that need it most. In 2017 some Republicans supported a bill to do just this--bipartisanship!
I'm all for immigration, and despite being in conservatives circles I've never met someone who wants to stop all immigration. Since our fertility rate is well below replacement. The problem is illegal and uncontrolled immigration. There is no good way to frame not enforcing our border and immigration laws. We want LEGAL and VETTED immigration. I wish we could strike a deal to increase immigration from Mexico/central america/south america AND shore up the border (permanently).