Globalist garbage.
A world of free movement would be $78T richer
111–120 of 402 posts
Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer
#112Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, I have considered that. It doesn't appear to be true. If it was, cases like Rahman's would not have happened. After moving from Bangladesh as a young person, and becoming surrounded by political stability and economic opportunity, he would have adopted western values and become an ordinary politician. So would the people in Tower Hamlets, which has a very large Bangladeshi immigrant population. In fact what happ…
Having interacted with immigrants from many different places, I find for a vast majority of them, the environment does in fact determine their culture. Are there a few for whom it doesn't? Sure. In the same way there are criminals even among people who grow up in such an environment.
Yes, immigrants obviously can and do adapt to their host culture and it happens often, perhaps most of the time (I don't know of stats on that).
But what causes this, and what's the "absorption rate"? With no migration controls at all, could such absorption be overwhelmed and cease working?
Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer
#113A world of free movement will not have a single welfare state. Even after decades, and generations, immigrants from certain regions have absolutely abysmal rates of employment in more developed countries they have settled in. How would an even larger scale of immigration flip the trend we can already witness, a complete 180 degrees? Many seem completely content on living on benefits alone, or fully unable to find emp…
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Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer
#114This an interesting article because it reframes current immigration discussions from humanitarian issues to economic ones. I'd like to see more modelling on wage depression to see why this wouldn't have a widespread negative impact. Additionally this seems like a weird point: >Unskilled migrants care for babies or the elderly, thus freeing the native-born to do more lucrative work. If lucrative work were available, w…
Once there was a time in Europe when every fief couldn't be more happy to get more subjects for free, and the usual travel restriction was on leaving your place, not moving to a new one. It was the first world war that changed everything. Things like migration control, passports, visas, formal institute of citizenship, all traces to the time when the imaginary no. 1 boogyman was not Ben Laden and "angry Arab guys," b…
This sounds like the kind of interesting perspective one picks up from a good book or podcast series. Do you have one to recommend on this subject?
Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer
#115One thing open borders would completely destroy would be the social safety net of many countries. Let’s say there is completely open borders between Sweden and the United States. Sweden has high taxes and an significant social safety net. The United States has low taxes and a non-existent safety net. Over time, people who pay a lot of taxes migrate from Sweden to the United States. People from the United States who a…
>People from the United States who are unable to work for whatever reason, migrate to Sweden. I think you're overestimating the number of Americans who would have the means to do so, despite not having an income.
They would get the "means" in their destination country through welfare. That's the entire point.
Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer
#116Earlier quoted context omitted.
I guess you’d be surprised by reality buddy, because that’s exactly how my nanny did it when I grew up...she took care of her two kids and me at the same time...it’s like people who have three kids, totally possible and being done everywhere.
Sure, but we're not talking about an additional place here or there. When people say childcare they tend to mean professional daycare, no? That's very much people bottlenecked. But if immigrants are more fertile than the locals, which they usually are at least for a while, then if the Economist was right about immigrants being well employed in construction jobs and hairdressers such, you'd expect an sudden influx to…
> When people say childcare they tend to mean professional daycare, no?
Negative. As a child, of a poor family, my childcare was some combination of aunts, cousins, and family friends.
As a parent, while in the military, we often used professional childcare in the form of a daycare. Now, as an engineering, our nanny watches our children along with her own children.
So, personally, childcare has rarely referred to professional childcare.
Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer
#117This an interesting article because it reframes current immigration discussions from humanitarian issues to economic ones. I'd like to see more modelling on wage depression to see why this wouldn't have a widespread negative impact. Additionally this seems like a weird point: >Unskilled migrants care for babies or the elderly, thus freeing the native-born to do more lucrative work. If lucrative work were available, w…
Have you tried getting adequate and affordable child care? Fortunately our kids don't need it any more. It hugely restricts available options. Either from hours available, lengthy waiting lists or simply finding that after paying childcare work is no longer making economic sense.
Proper child care means a high level of interaction with well-educated people who speak crisply perfect English.
For the child, this is a time when they are developing language and cultural habits that will have a lifelong impact, ultimately impacting the quality of their employment and spouse. Immigrants will not provide that. It's hard enough finding non-immigrants who can provide it.
Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer
#118This article seems symptomatic of a general decline in the quality of The Economist. I used to be a subscriber but there was a noticeable sharp drop some time ago, I think when Micklethwaite stepped down as editor, and things seem to have got worse since. Shoddy thinking, bizarre arguments and extremist conclusions seem more common than they used to be. Firstly, the core thesis of the argument is that merely by movin…
>Firstly, the core thesis of the argument is that merely by moving to a richer country, people become automatically more productive:
>> Workers become far more productive when they move from a poor country to a rich one. Suddenly, they can join a labour market with ample capital, efficient firms and a predictable legal system. Those who used to scrape a living from the soil with a wooden hoe start driving tractors. Those who once made mud bricks by hand start working with cranes and mechanical diggers
>This can only be described as some sort of fantasy. People who have spent their lives making mud bricks by hand don't suddenly become qualified crane operators by mere virtue of migrating to a developed country. They need the same training any native born person would, but they also need to learn the local language and customs too.
Um, what? Of course they do. Capital is a complement to labor. Moving to a high-capital country means the fruits of your labor are multiplied because you can take advantage of that capital to increase your productivity.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_intensity
>Indeed, a common effect of mass immigration is that mechanical diggers and cranes are less used, because why buy expensive automated machinery when labour is nearly free?
Labor is sometimes a substitute for capital, and we can observe this substitution at the margin as you describe. However, overall, capital is a complement to labor once scale effects are taken into account — as overall output increases after a right-shift in labor, demand for capital increases as well. This is the same effect behind why Luddism is wrong.
http://www.wwnorton.com/college/econ/labor-economics/supplem...
>A clear counterpoint is the state of Germany. Over 1 million migrants from Africa and the ME let in with no border controls worth talking about. Did they all immediately become high earning crane operators. No. Aydan Özoğuz, commissioner for immigration, refugees and integration, told the Financial Times that only a quarter to a third of the newcomers would enter the labour market over the next five years, and “for many others we will need up to 10”.
Refugees in Germany face significant regulatory obstacles to participating in the labor force.
http://www.dw.com/en/when-refugees-want-to-work-in-germany/a...
>This problem is not theoretical or simply scaremongering. The sad tale of Lutfur Rahman is a warning sign of what can go wrong when large numbers of people settle in the west from parts of the world where western values are not well established - they don't simply change overnight and instead western political systems start to look like third world countries too:
An immigrant from a third world country was corrupt, therefore corruption is endemic to all immigrant populations because they don't know any better? Not touching this one.
Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer
#119This article seems symptomatic of a general decline in the quality of The Economist. I used to be a subscriber but there was a noticeable sharp drop some time ago, I think when Micklethwaite stepped down as editor, and things seem to have got worse since. Shoddy thinking, bizarre arguments and extremist conclusions seem more common than they used to be. Firstly, the core thesis of the argument is that merely by movin…
Have you ever considered that what you consider "western values" are in fact values that emerge in a society that lives in conditions where there is political stability and economic opportunity? That people's "culture" is affected by the environment around them as a general pattern?
I've considered this but don't see any good evidence to believe it.
Have you ever considered that it isn't true? And I don't mean that snarkily, I mean it as a literal question.
Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer
#120Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, I have considered that. It doesn't appear to be true. If it was, cases like Rahman's would not have happened. After moving from Bangladesh as a young person, and becoming surrounded by political stability and economic opportunity, he would have adopted western values and become an ordinary politician. So would the people in Tower Hamlets, which has a very large Bangladeshi immigrant population. In fact what happ…
Having interacted with immigrants from many different places, I find for a vast majority of them, the environment does in fact determine their culture. Are there a few for whom it doesn't? Sure. In the same way there are criminals even among people who grow up in such an environment.
> I find for a vast majority of them, the environment does in fact determine their culture.
I presume you actually mean "affects" their culture (who could disagree with that), not "determines" (I for one disagree with this).