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A world of free movement would be $78T richer

economist.com

191–200 of 402 posts

Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer

#191
post #64
post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 2. Adding value Don’t you think that a PhD in their thirties would add more value if they instead focused on their studies subject?

No. It's not exponential. Caring for her own children, she would instill her values as they grow. Her children would most likely get a love of knowledge and a determination to accomplish long-term tasks. Since she can produce many children, the number of people with these values experiences exponential growth from generation to generation. If she instead outsources love to an immigrant from the third world, that othe…

[deleted]

Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer

#192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think all you have to do is look at modern American income disparity in the United States over the last 50 or so years and you have your answer. Sure, the poorest did become moderately better off financially in terms of wages. Yet did there quality of life increase? I would argue that the size of the pie is irrelevant past the point of what is required for basic survival. What truely matters is the relative size of…

> Yet did there quality of life increase? You seriously think poor people's quality of life hasn't increased in the last 50 years? Go drive around "working poor" neighborhoods right after Christmas and see how many huge flat-screen TV boxes are curbside waiting for "big trash day" (small hint: a lot) or see how many people don't have smartphones. I would argue that Wallyworld did more to bring up the standard of livi…

>Go drive around "working poor" neighborhoods right after Christmas and see how many huge flat-screen TV boxes are curbside waiting for "big trash day" (small hint: a lot) or see how many people don't have smartphones.

Perhaps the hedonistic acquisition of inessential physical goods is not necessarily commensurate with a higher standard of living?

While there has been progress in the past 50 years, there has certainly also been much regress. When measuring the advancement of a civilization, it seems something other than the pervasiveness of bigger, cheaper screens for reruns of Baywatch (et al.) should be the yardstick.

Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer

#193

>If the worry is that immigrants will outvote the locals and impose an uncongenial government on them, one solution would be not to let immigrants vote—for five years, ten years or even a lifetime. This is actually an interesting idea worth thinking about more. If the concern for those on the right is that more immigrants to the US would cause a permanent electoral Blue Wall by flipping Texas in a couple election cyc…

> we'd be creating tiers of citizens

Other than violating many Constitutions you mean? It's bad enough to have invisible castes as is, now enshrining it into law would be a regression.

Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer

#194

>If the worry is that immigrants will outvote the locals and impose an uncongenial government on them, one solution would be not to let immigrants vote—for five years, ten years or even a lifetime. This is actually an interesting idea worth thinking about more. If the concern for those on the right is that more immigrants to the US would cause a permanent electoral Blue Wall by flipping Texas in a couple election cyc…

It’s already like that. An Indian H1B will never get a green card but their US born kids will be citizens.

Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer

#195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

^^^^^^ I would also like to ask to whom would the majority of that increase in wealth go? I would argue it wouldn't be to the people doing the moving. It would be to the people driving them to move.

The increase in wealth from someone moving from a poor to a rich country is massive, and far more than the marginal benefit to an employer from hiring them rather than a slightly more expensive alternative person.

Wealth to who?

An immigrant will capture a much smaller share of the value they generate, otherwise why use them, than a native born citizen.

This means that while theoretically 'wealth' is increasing it is increasing in such a way that those who are in the position to pay wages keep more of them and those in the position to receive them get much less.

In short then what's the point of an average in a power law distribution which by definition does not have a defined average?

Or to put it even more dumbly would you rather live in a world of 100 units of wealth distributed between the 5 quintiles as [80.0, 16.0, 3.2, 0.64, 0.128] or one of 20 units distributed as [6,5,4,3,2]. For 2/3rds of the people in the world the second would be better.

Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer

#196

>If the worry is that immigrants will outvote the locals and impose an uncongenial government on them, one solution would be not to let immigrants vote—for five years, ten years or even a lifetime. This is actually an interesting idea worth thinking about more. If the concern for those on the right is that more immigrants to the US would cause a permanent electoral Blue Wall by flipping Texas in a couple election cyc…

> we'd be creating tiers of citizens Other than violating many Constitutions you mean? It's bad enough to have invisible castes as is, now enshrining it into law would be a regression.

The law already differentiates between “citizens” and “permanent residents”, so even if it is a regression, it had been codified a while ago.

Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer

#197
post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yet did there quality of life increase? You seriously think poor people's quality of life hasn't increased in the last 50 years? Go drive around "working poor" neighborhoods right after Christmas and see how many huge flat-screen TV boxes are curbside waiting for "big trash day" (small hint: a lot) or see how many people don't have smartphones. I would argue that Wallyworld did more to bring up the standard of livi…

> Wallyworld did more to bring up the standard of living The quality of food Walmart sells is abysmal. The pressure Walmart put on food manufactures to drop prices played a significant role in the malnutrition and obesity in the us. TVs and smart phones are a very small part of Quality of Life. Having fulfilling work, good health, and a clean environment are more important aspects that Walmart worsen.

> The pressure Walmart put on food manufactures to drop prices played a significant role in the malnutrition and obesity in the us.

Making food less expensive is bad? Never really understood that argument but maybe it's just me...

There are studies on the percentage of income a family spends on food today vs. some time in the past (with "time" depending on whatever study you look at) and it has steadily declined. Less money spent on food == more money to spend on some other necessary thing to live a quality life.

Also, I'd put more blame on the USDA[0] for "obesity in the us" than Wallyworld selling people what they want to buy. People grow up believing in the Food Pyramid and end up becoming overweight through a "well balanced diet" dreamed up through regulatory capture.

[0]https://www.huffingtonpost.com/jonathan-bailor/obesity-epide... -- note: #1 result on the google for "food pyramid obesity" is the huffpo so it has to be true...

Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer

#198

>If the worry is that immigrants will outvote the locals and impose an uncongenial government on them, one solution would be not to let immigrants vote—for five years, ten years or even a lifetime. This is actually an interesting idea worth thinking about more. If the concern for those on the right is that more immigrants to the US would cause a permanent electoral Blue Wall by flipping Texas in a couple election cyc…

Ask Germany how trying to import a class of non-citizen workers worked out for them.

Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer

#199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

^^^^^^ I would also like to ask to whom would the majority of that increase in wealth go? I would argue it wouldn't be to the people doing the moving. It would be to the people driving them to move.

The increase in wealth from someone moving from a poor to a rich country is massive, and far more than the marginal benefit to an employer from hiring them rather than a slightly more expensive alternative person.

Actually, in the proper context, it isn't. In fact, it's pitiful compared to the increase in wealth resulting from focusing on turning the poor country into a rich one. THAT'S the biggest economic story of the last several decades; and to first order, immigration is only relevant to the extent that it facilitates more rapid development of China/India/Rwanda/etc. The US electorate is still more annoyed by predominantly Mexican/Central American illegal immigration than the combination of reverse-mercantilist trade policy, foreign student education and practical training, outsourcing, and tech transfer that the US has deployed to facilitate the development of China, India, and many countries before and after them. The total positive impact of the latter is easily >20x as large as the former, higher-cost policy.

You don't get to discount China/India/etc.'s growth as "inevitable catch-up growth" on one side of the equation, yet fully count it on the other side.

As a consequence, I support reverse-mercantilist trade policy, foreign student education and practical training, outsourcing, and tech transfer, especially for countries like India which both have a lot to gain and are strategically highly aligned with the US (I acknowledge that China is now a more complicated case), to the extent that Americans can continue to bear these things. (Canadians and Australians seem to be fine with continuing these practices indefinitely, while also letting a pretty high number of skilled nonwhite foreigners from poor countries settle permanently.) And I violently oppose the grossly inefficient mass-low-skill-immigration policy that threatens to turn Americans, Germans, and others against the overall project while accomplishing so little.

Re: A world of free movement would be $78T richer

#200

Open borders will, at first, cause downward pressure on wages, as the labor pool of workers able and willing to perform work for a lower price grows. The magnitude would be more pronounced than with what we've been currently able to observe with controlled borders, because the article proposes a scenario where welfare and public assistance would readily apply to newcomers too. In fact, there would be a growth in the…

If this was true, then US being the biggest immigrant-friendly country in the world, would do so in a heartbeat. But neither the government nor corporations are advocating this. America currently has the biggest economy in the world, an average of $58,000 income, a low 3.9% unemployment rate while enjoying GDP growth rate of close to 5% in Q2, as well as close to 220,000 new jobs every month, and growth in wage increases. In some areas (like silicon valley), employees are offered 200k-300k salaries. It got to here by having a strong republic/democracy and rules and laws, support technologies in public and private sectors, limit immigration to skill-based, and recently choosing to lower corporate tax rate and reduce corporation regulations.
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