Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Svalbard is as close as you can get to a place with open borders

thenation.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

241–250 of 270 posts

Re: Svalbard is as close as you can get to a place with open borders

#241

Post by incompatible »

semi-extrinsic wrote: post #12
jiveturkey wrote: post #5

> Svalbard’s geopolitics provide an imperfect but alternative vision of how places can be governed, whom they can accommodate, and how communities can form. Hardly. It's a rugged community of 2300 people. That's not a model for alternative government. > "This is not a cradle to grave society,” one of Askholt’s colleagues told me.

> this is not a cradle to grave society Specifically: if you are pregnant approaching 7-8 months, if you become seriously ill, or if you are old enough to need care, you are flown off to the mainland. You're literally not allowed to be born or die there.

I'm curious about how that works for people with no visa or right to residence or healthcare in Norway.

Re: Svalbard is as close as you can get to a place with open borders

#242

Post by mturmon »

HillaryBriss wrote: post #194
coldtea wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And LA's poor millions are free to crowd right into to Beverly Hills and just start grabbing up some of that wealth. Yeah, not really free. They can't pay rent in Beverly Hills, they can't afford to shop at Beverly Hills shops, they can't even be walking around looking poor without harassment (especially if also black/latino), they don't have access to closed communities, and so on...

> they can't even be walking around looking poor without harassment (especially if also black/latino) I don't quite know where you're getting that. I mean, it's not like the city has enacted some kind of Jim Crow regime. Beverly Hills residents were among Barack Obama's most generous donors. You think they would stand for that kind of evil in their own city? Beverly Hills is represented by Democrats at the state and…

Bev Hills has fought tooth and claw to ensure a subway would not go through their city, and it was generally reported that the fear was that poorer people would be more easily able to go there. They (shamefully) got their Democratic congressman, Henry Waxman, to pass a bill forbidding Federal funding for any subway to the area: https://la.curbed.com/2012/4/13/10379720/eighties-subwaystal...

Some of this opposition continues to this day. Here’s the latest dispatch: https://www.lamag.com/driver/beverly-hills-finally-loses-cra...

Re: Svalbard is as close as you can get to a place with open borders

#243

Post by snowwrestler »

cpp4life wrote: post #187
snowwrestler wrote: post #35

I think the degree to which open borders are a reality within the U.S. is under-appreciated. As a reminder, U.S. states are sovereign entities with their own criminal laws, tax regimes, educational systems, property and contract rights, civil rights, economic growth, industries, natural resources, etc. In some cases their laws are pre-empted by U.S. federal law, but there remains quite a bit of diversity. Despite thi…

MD to WV is nothing like the difference between Mexico or Guatemala to the US.

True but public sentiment on this is not a matter of degree; it's not like Americans go around saying "open borders between U.S. states is only a little bit bad, in proportion to relative economic differences."

In my experience it's most often taken for granted, or seen as contributing to American cultural and economic strength--a good thing.

Re: Svalbard is as close as you can get to a place with open borders

#244

Post by semi-extrinsic »

incompatible wrote: post #241
semi-extrinsic wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> this is not a cradle to grave society Specifically: if you are pregnant approaching 7-8 months, if you become seriously ill, or if you are old enough to need care, you are flown off to the mainland. You're literally not allowed to be born or die there.

I'm curious about how that works for people with no visa or right to residence or healthcare in Norway.

They will probably never get there in the first place - there's actually passport control at the airport before you leave the mainland.

Re: Svalbard is as close as you can get to a place with open borders

#245

Post by incompatible »

semi-extrinsic wrote: post #244
incompatible wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious about how that works for people with no visa or right to residence or healthcare in Norway.

They will probably never get there in the first place - there's actually passport control at the airport before you leave the mainland.

You could get there with a tourist visa and stay? After the visa has expired, I guess they'd let you back into Norway mainland before potentially kicking you out again, perhaps with a large medical bill.

Edit: The article mentions for example "significant Thai and Filipino population"; I assume not all would have a right of residence in Norway.

Re: Svalbard is as close as you can get to a place with open borders

#246

Post by CapricornNoble »

HillaryBriss wrote: post #194
coldtea wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And LA's poor millions are free to crowd right into to Beverly Hills and just start grabbing up some of that wealth. Yeah, not really free. They can't pay rent in Beverly Hills, they can't afford to shop at Beverly Hills shops, they can't even be walking around looking poor without harassment (especially if also black/latino), they don't have access to closed communities, and so on...

> they can't even be walking around looking poor without harassment (especially if also black/latino) I don't quite know where you're getting that. I mean, it's not like the city has enacted some kind of Jim Crow regime. Beverly Hills residents were among Barack Obama's most generous donors. You think they would stand for that kind of evil in their own city? Beverly Hills is represented by Democrats at the state and…

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/beverly-hills-back-on-the_b_5...

Anecdote: my friend from Trinidad who has an affinity for Caucasian women told me a story of harassment in Beverly Hills. He and a lady friend were in the woman's Mercedes and the police pulled them over and kept asking the woman if she was "under duress".

Re: Svalbard is as close as you can get to a place with open borders

#247

Post by incompatible »

schoen wrote: post #88
univalent wrote: post #72

I took the ferry from Dublin to Wales while on vacation. We collected all our passports once the ferry docked and we went to our car preparing for the immigration officers, police etc. There was no one. Literally. We only saw sheep for the first 10 miles or so after driving off the boat.

That's due to the CTA ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Travel_Area ).

Another place where border checks will presumably be implemented if/when Brexit takes effect.

Re: Svalbard is as close as you can get to a place with open borders

#248

Post by luckylion »

leereeves wrote: post #232
luckylion wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pay a bit of money in China and you'll have a visa in no time. That's doesn't work with, say, Switzerland, at least not with a similar amount of money.

Most countries (including Switzerland) have some form of investor's visa which is basically an official way to pay for a visa.

Which is a very different thing and will set you back ~1m, not a few hundred.

Re: Svalbard is as close as you can get to a place with open borders

#249

Post by testaccount13 »

rayiner wrote: post #224
kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "second poorest" is likely a misquote. The Hasidic community of Kiryas Joel has a notably high official poverty rate due to the lifestyle of the people living there. This is one village in one county. The entire state in aggregate is not anywhere near the poorest even with NYC removed.

New York has the second lowest purchasing-power adjusted median income. On the Census Bureau’s supplemental poverty measure (which accounts for cost of living), New York is the third poorest, with 17.9% of people living in poverty (versus 14.8% for West Virginia): https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publicatio... .

CA does very poorly by that measure. Both of these states have large rural populations (which bring down the median income), as well as large urban centers (which bring up the cost of living).

Re: Svalbard is as close as you can get to a place with open borders

#250

Post by prawn »

TremendousJudge wrote: post #144
rconti wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Argentina strikes me as a strong combination of "desirable" and "open". Virtually anyone can become a citizen, and it's a prosperous enough country, currency decline notwithstanding.

For people in the US and Europe, South America is more remote than Svalbard

For those in the US, it might be 1-2 affordable flights and in the same timezone? Someone elsewhere in these comments suggested Svalbard would be 40 hours and $1200+.
Post reply on HN