111–120 of 147 posts
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I imagine the migrants would get paid by other migrants to build the hypothetical cities. That is the way literally every US city happened after all — well, migrants or their descendants.
Then why aren't the migrants doing that in the places they live now?
And the country itself
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Not to mention the social welfare systems would collapse.
Milton friedman spoke 40 years ago of how people in america changed their views on immigration. In the 1800's and early 1900's, immigration was open and considered nowadays to be one of the great processes that got america to be what it is. Bring me the poor and the sick and all that. 60 years later, turns out immigrants are lazy welfarers. As MF says, the moment you put welfare, suddenly you end up wanting to restri…
That is incorrect. Before the Hart-Celler act in 1965, immigration was restricted to European countries with a quota system based on national origin. We even had health checks and required residency of up to 14 years before citizenship was granted (changed to 5 years with the Naturalization Law of 1802). Up until the 1960's, America was about 90% white, so 1800's to early 1900's immigration law has very little to do with "what it is" today.
In a world where low skilled workers get replaced by automation more and more, where even local citizens are having troubles finding or keeping a job, where the most common source of income for non-educated people is freaking driving professionally, sure, let's let in 160m+ folks escaping poverty and running from countries with no education, oppressive regimes and weird religions. Surely it'll turn out just fine. Surely they all will find decent jobs real quick, learn the language, integrate and bring huge benefits. Uh-huh.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I imagine the migrants would get paid by other migrants to build the hypothetical cities. That is the way literally every US city happened after all — well, migrants or their descendants.
Then why aren't the migrants doing that in the places they live now?
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Even if you restrict yourself to young males then immigrants have a disproportionate share in crime at least in Germany, actually immigrants in Germany commited ~40% of all crimes in 2015, with a rapid increase in the last few years. It is also pretty obvious on the street level: drugs for example are primarily sold by immigrant gangs, for example africans with turkish bosses.
Where are you getting this? >According to the Bundeskriminalamt, also known as the Federal Criminal Police Office or BKA, crimes by immigrants rose 79 percent in 2015. But at the same time, the number of refugees in the country rose more than fivefold — by 440 percent. In other words, the typical German was more likely to engage in crime than the average migrant. http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/201…
On page 6 the first table: 38,5% non-german, 19,6% immigrants. It contains a lot more stats that might be interesting to you. The BKA publishes those yearly. In 2016 the numbers were 40.5 % non-german, 21.5% (page 13): https://www.bka.de/SharedDocs/Downloads/DE/Publikationen/Pol...
Of course as the report points out there is a large number of unreported crimes and there is a probably politically motivated paragraph where they explain that the numbers are of course more complicated than that and that both germans and non-germans on average commit very few crimes (page 9).
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Is this the part you're referring to: "Unskilled migrants care for babies or the elderly, thus freeing the native-born to do more lucrative work." Sorry, no, I don't want migrants deeply afflicted with weird cultures left alone with my baby nor my mother.
> Is this the part you're referring to: > "Unskilled migrants care for babies or the elderly, thus freeing the native-born to do more lucrative work." No, it's this: > Gallup, a pollster, estimated in 2013 that 630m people—about 13% of the world’s population—would migrate permanently if they could, and even more would move temporarily. Some 138m would settle in the United States, 42m in Britain and 29m in Saudi Arabi…
So your retort to "if we ignore that a billion people would migrate in a few months in an attempt to escape poverty" is that it will be "less than a billion", then the article didn't exactly reassure. It's a quibble between basic numbers (population in the third world) vs hypothetical numbers (Gallup's rolodex), not a substantial discussion or disagreement.
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> you lose nothing Right, and if those unskilled immigrants don't all find jobs as nannies and nurses (since I won't be the only one keeping them from the most vulnerable), then I'll be taxed to pay for them anyway. That's not "nothing". If the cultures are very different, and they come in huge numbers that refuse to assimilate, then I suffer dilution of mine. That's not "nothing" either.
> then I'll be taxed to pay for them anyway. That's not "nothing". Taxed to pay them what. If you have a beef with welfare programs in the us, you should take it with the welfare programs. Foreigners never had a voice or a vote in terms of what qualified for such kinds of programs. > If the cultures are very different, and they come in huge numbers that refuse to assimilate, then I suffer dilution of mine. That's not…
Indeed - and they should not be a beneficiary either. Do you for a moment believe that "New Deal" / "Great Society" laws would ever have passed, if under the understanding that the whole population of the Earth would be entitled to receive it?
> This argument could be made verbatim ... that today are considered bigotry
That does not make the argument erroneous, only un-PC.
This is only a good idea if we ignore that a billion people would migrate in a few months in an attempt to escape poverty. The results would be catastrophic.
FTA: > If the worry is that future migrants might not pay their way, why not charge them more for visas, or make them pay extra taxes, or restrict their access to welfare benefits? Such levies could also be used to regulate the flow of migrants, thus avoiding big, sudden surges
> open borders
also FTA:
> why not charge them more for visas
Someone forgot what "open borders" means.
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You're special pleading for those fleeing from war-torn countries. Your original argument however is that everyone should be able to move freely. There were migrants coming in from Africa well before the Syria/Iraq crisis, though most of those never ended up in Germany, but rather in Greece or Italy. > The case for germany to still provide financial support is that is a huge long term benefit that is tax beneficial,…
> You're special pleading for those fleeing from war-torn countries I wasnt talking about refugees at all until you mentioned it and i tried to answer. If you wish we can remove them altogether from the general case of immigration policy. > If you want to make an utilitarian argument Im not making a utilitarian argument, I'm explaining that the tax-cost can be a very cost-effective tax investment for the state, so it…
The absolute gain is more important that the rate of return. If you only allow 1 single person to immigrate into a country, of course, that person will have the greatest return in taxes. He will not need any help of any kind and will bring lots of business. The second person you would allow would not be as great, but still will be positive. Any restriction or cutoff point would make it so the amount of absolute gains is reduced. Excepting a few cases like security or extreme refugees, all immigrants are net positive in their aggregate, because they need to work to survive and at least pay for themselves.
>If we don't educate them or don't give them the means to do so, they have zero opportunity here, as opposed to slightly above zero.
This is a thinking that comes from the economic class you are in. If they had zero opportunity in x country, they wouldnt go to x country. Sure some people will make the mistake of trying to escape into qatar or north korea to find themselves making a terrible mistake, but the vast majority of people that emigrate are making a conscious choice of worse to better. Education or not is part of the package a country can choose to give or not. Argentina gives free college education to foreigners, the U.S. doesn't for example. The U.S. still has a way more positive immigration flow.
> Which is exactly not my point. That is Trump's protectionism at work, not the idea that you pick the cherries from other countries (instead of letting them just flow in).
Any quota or restriction is meant to be protectionist. Trump didnt put the quotas. The quotas are there because it's politically favorable to say that you will protect the jobs of americans from being taken away by some foreigner. Doctor or farmer, its the same effect. Some people are restricted to the economical gain of a few. In economic terms, the aggregate is a loss. Again, thats the point of the article that tries to draw bounds on how much could be gained.
> We're talking about people at the very bottom of pay, how much lower are their wages supposed to drop? I suppose that you believe in the magic of an idealized market, but in the real world there's real people there defending their interests. The same kind of people that will gladly elect populists, by the way. If you want to call that oppression, fine. What difference does it make?
I think its important to remember that economics is not about money. Money is not value, goods and services are. If someone makes 10 forks, and then with an extra immigrant you make 19 forks, society is richer. Every person has an interest that noone else does his own job, to charge maximum value for it. But by going against that interest, everything you consume will be cheaper and better because more of that will be produced and hence consumed.
Private interests are always against many kinds of freedom. The fact that you are benefiting private interests with the addition of the power of the state is a tragedy. So lets not cheer in support for laws and policies that do just that!
Its interesting however that companies in general would love open immigration, it is trades and professions that would be against that (i.e. lawyers,doctors, accountants, etc).
It's important to call it oppression because it what it is: it's negative, it's the application of force to harm someone. If any person is in favor of such measures, I will call them on that, that they are advocating for harming other people, maybe to their own benefit.
> The beggars problem is going to become the mob of people that will ask for them to be locked up and deported, in case they become too much of a nuisance.
I dont know if you know San Francisco, but it has plenty of people in the street and they are not mobbing. But not only that, but you are looking at the problem as if it should be out of sight.
San Francisco could deport to another city/state all its homeless people, but it would only accomplish moving the problem and making it worse. If homeless people were forced by different immigration policies to live in NY, they would freeze to death for example. You are not making them a favor by restricting their movement.
So not only you have people that have little to no means to survive, but you are punishing them for it.
And regardless, the economic gains of free passage are so vast, it would produce a lot of riches and wealth that could work to improve the lives of the bottom as well.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
FTA: > If the worry is that future migrants might not pay their way, why not charge them more for visas, or make them pay extra taxes, or restrict their access to welfare benefits? Such levies could also be used to regulate the flow of migrants, thus avoiding big, sudden surges
FTA: > open borders also FTA: > why not charge them more for visas Someone forgot what "open borders" means.
> To clarify, “open borders” means that people are free to move to find work. It does not mean “no borders” or “the abolition of the nation-state”. On the contrary, the reason why migration is so attractive is that some countries are well-run and others, abysmally so.
You're using a different (and unspecified) definition of "open borders" than the authors of the article.