Earlier quoted context omitted.
> n the quarter century following the war, America’s economy grew at the fastest rate ever in the history of the country. This is exactly my point. Fastest ever growth. 1945-1970. > In the half century between 1870 and 1920, the number of Americans employed in manufacturing jumped almost 450%, climbing from 2.5 million to 11.2 million. This created a vacuum that encouraged immigration and, during the same period, 27.…
>This is exactly my point. Fastest ever growth. 1945-1970. They are talking about the Civil War. >This is simply population growth. Economic growth, as a metric that actually matters to quality of life, is defined as Real GDP per person. First, it's not just "simply" population growth. Try ferrying 27 million immigrants to current Southern Europe and see how the GDP fares. But more importantly, I just don't get the i…
https://www.quandl.com/data/MWORTH/0_5-United-States-Real-GD...
Here's nominal GDP: https://www.quandl.com/data/MWORTH/0_0-United-States-Nominal...
> They are talking about the Civil War.
My bad. I forget about these things since I'm not American.
> First, it's not just "simply" population growth. Try ferrying 27 million immigrants to current Southern Europe and see how the GDP fares.
A certain economic development model says growth is a function of technology, labour, and capital utilization. Assuming there's excess capital available, more population growth will always lead to economic growth. Whether or not you actually believe the model doesn't matter, economic growth has generally followed population growth, according to data.
> What you're essentially saying is that if a country has ten people earning $100 each, and then ten more people who were earning $2 in other countries now join the first ten (whose income is unaltered) but earn only $5, the quality of life has been reduced.
That's essentially what slavery was...
> To me this is simply nonsense unless one doesn't care about the quality of life of immigrants.
This is a different discussion altogether. We can see today, in places like Saudi Arabia, migrant workers come and are unable to attain anywhere close to a living standard the Saudis enjoy, is that the model we want?
Also, the US can't take in 6+ billion immigrants. Nice thought, but not possible.
And finally, I'm well aware of the plight of immigrants and those in 3rd world countries - my wife is an immigrant from a 3rd world country. However, when you factor in the cost of living, it's not always an upgrade (in my wife's case, she's done well so it is, but many of her family are in worse condition in Canada than back home)...