Is Immigration a Net Benefit or Drain?

[J842P]

Another view:


Perpetual Growth, endless growth, ad infinitum, forever, till the end of time.

''Economists are master illusionists who rely on a set of fictions, fantasies and forecasts that emanate from a core magical mantra of Perpetual Growth that goes untested year after year.

And yet it’s used to manipulate the public into a set of policies and decisions that are leading the American and the world economy down a path of unsustainable globalization and GDP growth assumptions that will self-destruct the planet.
Denial? We’re all addicted to the Myth of Perpetual Growth

Yes, economists are addicted to this ideology. Trapped deep in their denial, can’t see the problem, or admit it, or if they do, they are unable to stop themselves, see past their own myopic world view. They’re mercenaries working for capitalists who pay their salaries, and expect them to support the capitalist’s bizarre Myth of Perpetual Growth.

Worse, the public also bought into the myth. Yes, you believe everything you learned in college about economic theories, all the textbooks, everything you read in the daily press, the government reports, all those Wall Street analysts’ predictions relying on studies prepared by economists with credentials.


But driving the economists’ growth myth is population growth. It’s the independent variable in their equation. Population growth drives all other derivative projections, forecasts and predictions. All GDP growth, income growth, wealth growth, production growth, everything. These unscientific growth assumptions fit into the overall left-brain, logical, mind-set of western leaders, all the corporate CEOs, Wall Street bankers and government leaders who run America and the world.

But just because a large group collectively believes in something doesn’t make it true. Perpetual growth is still a myth no matter how many economists, CEOs, bankers and politicians believe it. It’s still an illusion trapped in the brains of all these irrational, biased and uncritical folks.
No-win scenario: Damned if we grow? Damned it we don’t grow?

Capitalism itself is at a crossroads. Growth is capitalism’s sacred cow but it’s “grow or die” theory doesn’t work anymore. With us since 1776, it’s being challenged by a “new god of reality” that’s flashing warnings of an emerging new reality from critics, contrarians and eco-economists. This war is pitting old and new economists:

Grow OR Die. Traditional economists (pro-capitalism): We’re told we need 3% GDP growth to support the next batch of 100 million Americans. We believe it on faith. Drill Baby Drill. Buy stuff. Get new jobs to fuel growth. We’re out of control. Exploding growth fuels demands as the rest of the world adds 2.9 billion new humans, all chasing their “American dream.”

Grow AND Die. New eco-economists (environmentalists): They see Big Oil’s destruction of our coastal economies, the rape of West Virginia’s coal mountains, the unintended consequences of uncontrolled carbon emissions and they ask: “When will economists, politicians and corporate leaders stop pretending Earth’s resources are infinitely renewable?”

Yes, our world is at a crossroads, facing a dilemma, confronting the ultimate no-win scenario, because the “Myth of Perpetual Growth” is essential to support the global population explosion. But all this “Growth” is also killing our world, wasting our planet’s non-renewable natural resources. “Eternal Growth” is suicidal, will eventually destroy Earth. We’re damned if we grow. Damned if we don’t.''


http://www.marketwatch.com/story/myth-of-perpetual-growth-is-killing-america-2012-06-12

I wonder which economists he is talking about in particular. Most "traditional" economists are Keynesian, Monetarist, or some mix or derivation. Very few of those are pro-capitalism, but pro-Keynesianism.

All of those are pro-capitalism, dude.

 

[rousseau]

I wonder which economists he is talking about in particular. Most "traditional" economists are Keynesian, Monetarist, or some mix or derivation. Very few of those are pro-capitalism, but pro-Keynesianism.

Just listen to the news, read the papers, watch TV......practically all of the economists and political leaders you see and hear happen to chant the mantra of Perpetual Growth. I can't recall hearing an alternative proposal on mainstream media channels for a long time. Occasionally you may come across people like Brian Czech or Herman Daly being interviewed, but these dissenting voices tend presented as eccentrics (not taken seriously). Yet, as you say, classical economists did talk about the end to growth and the need for a new economy, but this is rare amongst our current crop of neoclassical thinkers.

Yes. Scaling society backward isn't a politically viable option, even if it's the best one.

Really hard for a politician to stand at a podium and say something like: 'we're going to make your life worse in the short-term, but it will be better for humanity in the long-run'. People always want more for themselves, regardless of consequences, and that's ultimately going to be our downfall.

 

[LordKiran]

Just listen to the news, read the papers, watch TV......practically all of the economists and political leaders you see and hear happen to chant the mantra of Perpetual Growth. I can't recall hearing an alternative proposal on mainstream media channels for a long time. Occasionally you may come across people like Brian Czech or Herman Daly being interviewed, but these dissenting voices tend presented as eccentrics (not taken seriously). Yet, as you say, classical economists did talk about the end to growth and the need for a new economy, but this is rare amongst our current crop of neoclassical thinkers.

Yes. Scaling society backward isn't a politically viable option, even if it's the best one.

Really hard for a politician to stand at a podium and say something like: 'we're going to make your life worse in the short-term, but it will be better for humanity in the long-run'. People always want more for themselves, regardless of consequences, and that's ultimately going to be our downfall.

People have a tendency to bet everything on black (Miraculously saving ourselves with technology) and then hope for the best. Funny thing, a lot of the time this actually works out pretty well for us.

 

[rousseau]

Yes. Scaling society backward isn't a politically viable option, even if it's the best one.

Really hard for a politician to stand at a podium and say something like: 'we're going to make your life worse in the short-term, but it will be better for humanity in the long-run'. People always want more for themselves, regardless of consequences, and that's ultimately going to be our downfall.

People have a tendency to bet everything on black (Miraculously saving ourselves with technology) and then hope for the best. Funny thing, a lot of the time this actually works out pretty well for us.

Problem being industrialization and global warming have no historical precedent. Don't discount the possibility that things could get really weird, really fast in the next couple hundred years.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

I wonder which economists he is talking about in particular. Most "traditional" economists are Keynesian, Monetarist, or some mix or derivation. Very few of those are pro-capitalism, but pro-Keynesianism.

All of those are pro-capitalism, dude.

If that is true, then the definition of "capitalism" is "economic system" which means that capitalism includes socialism and communism.

Well, that's a bit extreme, but you get the point.

It is more accurate to say a person with cancer is the same as a person without cancer. While all of those systems need a capitalist structure on which to grow like mildew, the capitalist structure does not need those systems. Cancer needs a living host, a living host does not need cancer. That's why I differentiate between Keynesian, Monetarist, Supply Side, Demand Side, Corporatist, and Welfarist on the one side and Capitalism on the other side.

It is this basic confusion between a body with cancer and a body without cancer that causes many who actually do advocate for capitalism to prefix it with the redundant term "free market". "Free market capitalism" is redundant, and not Keynesian.

 

[J842P]

All of those are pro-capitalism, dude.

If that is true, then the definition of "capitalism" is "economic system" which means that capitalism includes socialism and communism.

Well, that's a bit extreme, but you get the point.

It is more accurate to say a person with cancer is the same as a person without cancer. While all of those systems need a capitalist structure on which to grow like mildew, the capitalist structure does not need those systems. Cancer needs a living host, a living host does not need cancer. That's why I differentiate between Keynesian, Monetarist, Supply Side, Demand Side, Corporatist, and Welfarist on the one side and Capitalism on the other side.

It is this basic confusion between a body with cancer and a body without cancer that causes many who actually do advocate for capitalism to prefix it with the redundant term "free market". "Free market capitalism" is redundant, and not Keynesian.

Capitalism is any system where the means of production are held by private individuals, and where goods and services are traded by private individuals for profit in free markets. All those systems you describe can easily fall under that categorization.

You just insist on a strict definition because you are an ideologue.

Just consider your analogy - cancer vs a body. Get a grip, man.

It's like in the programming world, where programming paradigms are pretty similar to ideologies. Scala isn't "really a functional language" because it allows for state-change, and the only functional languages are "purely functional languages" like Haskell. "Purely functional is redundant".

Yea, OK buddy.

 

[DBT]

Do you consider the Keynesian Paul Krugman to be a classical economist?

I live in Australia. I haven't heard enough about Paul Krugman to comment.

 

[DBT]

Just listen to the news, read the papers, watch TV......practically all of the economists and political leaders you see and hear happen to chant the mantra of Perpetual Growth. I can't recall hearing an alternative proposal on mainstream media channels for a long time. Occasionally you may come across people like Brian Czech or Herman Daly being interviewed, but these dissenting voices tend presented as eccentrics (not taken seriously). Yet, as you say, classical economists did talk about the end to growth and the need for a new economy, but this is rare amongst our current crop of neoclassical thinkers.

Yes. Scaling society backward isn't a politically viable option, even if it's the best one.

Really hard for a politician to stand at a podium and say something like: 'we're going to make your life worse in the short-term, but it will be better for humanity in the long-run'. People always want more for themselves, regardless of consequences, and that's ultimately going to be our downfall.

My thoughts exactly. Nor does a steady state economy necessarily mean that everyone is worse off, the very rich would not be so rich, but the living standards of ordinary workers should be reasonable and secure. Development and improvements in efficiency doesn't stop, research and scientific discover being practically limitless, etc. The issues would be fairer wealth distribution and curtailing the mind set of more, ever more people, ever more high rise, more shops, roads, houses, more suburbs and so on, is better. It is not. Not in a finite world with a finite ecosystem.

 

[ronburgundy]

Some take jobs, some leech. I see no incompatibility in the two positions.

The positions are not about "some", they are about "immigrants" in general and their general net impact. Some non-immigrants also leech, so no one cares whether "some" immigrants leech. The argument only has relevance for immigration policy if the the leeching is greater than the working and paying taxes. If working immigrants, especially illegals, more than pay the tax bill for the leeching immigrants then the fact that some leech is a moot point.

 

[ronburgundy]

The very statement of "They are stealing our jobs." rests on the assumption that the native born people "own" those jobs, which is just the kind of unearned sense of entitlement that the people who utter such a statement accuse the left of.

Ironically, the only way native borns have a right to those jobs is if one accepts the liberal notion that tax-supported government is what lays the infrastructure and economic foundation for all business to even exist in order hire anyone or be able to turn a profit. People and their parents and grandparents before them paid to create the physical, political, scientific, and legal foundations that make those jobs possible, thus they have a right of first refusal to them above any immigrant or foreign worker.

 

[J842P]

Some take jobs, some leech. I see no incompatibility in the two positions.

The positions are not about "some", they are about "immigrants" in general and their general net impact. Some non-immigrants also leech, so no one cares whether "some" immigrants leech. The argument only has relevance for immigration policy if the the leeching is greater than the working and paying taxes. If working immigrants, especially illegals, more than pay the tax bill for the leeching immigrants then the fact that some leech is a moot point.

This I find to be the fundamental difference between "conservatives" and "liberals" in the US. Take for example welfare policy. Conservatives are willing to slash and burn welfare programs even if it means hurting a lot of people they might even agree deserve some help because they cannot stand the thought of freeloaders.

So yeah, Fox News can find some surfer bro' abusing food stamps, so they are willing to cut aid that helps millions of children and elderly have something basic to eat, just so they can sleep at night knowing that they've eliminated every last cheat.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

If that is true, then the definition of "capitalism" is "economic system" which means that capitalism includes socialism and communism.

Well, that's a bit extreme, but you get the point.

It is more accurate to say a person with cancer is the same as a person without cancer. While all of those systems need a capitalist structure on which to grow like mildew, the capitalist structure does not need those systems. Cancer needs a living host, a living host does not need cancer. That's why I differentiate between Keynesian, Monetarist, Supply Side, Demand Side, Corporatist, and Welfarist on the one side and Capitalism on the other side.

It is this basic confusion between a body with cancer and a body without cancer that causes many who actually do advocate for capitalism to prefix it with the redundant term "free market". "Free market capitalism" is redundant, and not Keynesian.

Capitalism is any system where the means of production are held by private individuals, and where goods and services are traded by private individuals for profit in free markets. All those systems you describe can easily fall under that categorization.

You just insist on a strict definition because you are an ideologue.

Just consider your analogy - cancer vs a body. Get a grip, man.

Yea, OK buddy.

With a loose enough definition of "free market" you become correct. Would you prefer Free Market Communism, Free Market Socialism, Free Market Keynesianism, Free Market Monetarism, or Free Market Capitalism?

 

[Treedbear]

I had a conversation today with a conservative friend who at first complained that immigrants "steal our jobs", and later claimed that immigrants "are lazy and drain out social support system". These two claims contradict one another.

My own sense is that in general immigrants are more productive and have a stronger work ethic than natural born citizens, and I welcome them with open arms not just on a compassionate and equal rights footing, but on an economic footing as well. I would even argue that refugees, having seen what they have seen, are likely to be more motivated and be more productive citizens than the self-entitled people who are born here.

My only qualm would be some of the cultural baggage that immigrants bring with them. Some of that sentiment is no doubt my own anti-religious bias, but I think there are some valid concerns there as well. We didn't have any honour killings where I live until immigration really picked up here for example.


Thoughts?

Why has the USA been so incredibly restrictive on immigrants, and especially on refugees? Your Statue of Liberty may need to be forfeited, yes?

I assume this has nothing to do with illegal immigration and undocumented workers. That's a different issue. And I can't speak for other countries but here in the USA our greatest strength has always been the diversity that comes with immigration. I think that's why we tend to be so inventive. And I agree that the great majority of immigrants are ambitious, and that is a good thing as long as legitimate opportunities are available. But some countries have established cultural heritage and customs that might get diluted by too much immigration. I enjoy watching travel shows about places like China or Japan for instance where the population is fairly homogeneous. They have a common history and established social etiquette which promotes understanding and the expression of concern for each other. By contrast I think we in the US feel more isolated from our neighbors. Over time the culture adapts, but when immigration is too rapid or unregulated the resulting loss of trust can be dangerous. That seems to be what we're going through now. This can only interfere with any efforts to promote sensible immigration policies.

 

[J842P]

Capitalism is any system where the means of production are held by private individuals, and where goods and services are traded by private individuals for profit in free markets. All those systems you describe can easily fall under that categorization.

You just insist on a strict definition because you are an ideologue.

Just consider your analogy - cancer vs a body. Get a grip, man.

Yea, OK buddy.

With a loose enough definition of "free market" you become correct. Would you prefer Free Market Communism, Free Market Socialism, Free Market Keynesianism, Free Market Monetarism, or Free Market Capitalism?

Nonsense. Again, you are confusing being an ideologue with being reasonable/correct. It is a feature of human reasoning that we deal easily with fuzzy and hybrid categories. If you had the ability to step back from your ideology, this wouldn't be controversial at all.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

With a loose enough definition of "free market" you become correct. Would you prefer Free Market Communism, Free Market Socialism, Free Market Keynesianism, Free Market Monetarism, or Free Market Capitalism?

Nonsense. Again, you are confusing being an ideologue with being reasonable/correct. It is a feature of human reasoning that we deal easily with fuzzy and hybrid categories. If you had the ability to step back from your ideology, this wouldn't be controversial at all.

Then help me out here, and tell me what is the name of my particular economic ideology that differentiates it from Keynesianism and Monetarism? Note, I'm asking for the name (as in what an Economist would use to describe it) and not your opinion of it (such as saying "it is stupid").

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Some take jobs, some leech. I see no incompatibility in the two positions.

The positions are not about "some", they are about "immigrants" in general and their general net impact. Some non-immigrants also leech, so no one cares whether "some" immigrants leech. The argument only has relevance for immigration policy if the the leeching is greater than the working and paying taxes. If working immigrants, especially illegals, more than pay the tax bill for the leeching immigrants then the fact that some leech is a moot point.

The point is claims are only in conflict if all immigrants are uniform.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

This I find to be the fundamental difference between "conservatives" and "liberals" in the US. Take for example welfare policy. Conservatives are willing to slash and burn welfare programs even if it means hurting a lot of people they might even agree deserve some help because they cannot stand the thought of freeloaders.

So yeah, Fox News can find some surfer bro' abusing food stamps, so they are willing to cut aid that helps millions of children and elderly have something basic to eat, just so they can sleep at night knowing that they've eliminated every last cheat.

No. Conservatives use the abuse as an excuse to do what they want anyway.

And the liberals aren't blameless either--they do the opposite, deny the abuse is more than a drop in the bucket. The number of high end cell phones I see in the hands of food stamp users I see at the local Hispanic market says otherwise.

 

[J842P]

Nonsense. Again, you are confusing being an ideologue with being reasonable/correct. It is a feature of human reasoning that we deal easily with fuzzy and hybrid categories. If you had the ability to step back from your ideology, this wouldn't be controversial at all.

Then help me out here, and tell me what is the name of my particular economic ideology that differentiates it from Keynesianism and Monetarism? Note, I'm asking for the name (as in what an Economist would use to describe it) and not your opinion of it (such as saying "it is stupid").

I never said it is stupid.

But I would say you probably subscribe to some flavor of Anarcho-capitalism or "Laissez Faire" capitalism, if you wish to use an older term.

 

[Derec]

To get back on topic, here is what I had in mind with immigration sometimes being very bad for host societies.
Italy’s migrant purgatory

I had never met a Muslim called ‘Billy’ before, so I asked him to write down his name. He couldn’t write. He spoke poor Italian, no English and — oddly for a Senegalese — no French. He makes seven or eight euros a day at the car park, he said.

These economic migrants from Africa are usually uneducated and often even completely illiterate. And Italy and other EU countries already have high unemployment, especially for less skilled jobs. And these then mass migrants come in by the hundreds of thousands and depress wages for unskilled labor ridiculously low. Either that or they turn to crime.

Most migrants, lured across the Mediterranean by the fool’s promise of a better life, aim to leave Italy as soon as possible. They want to reach a country which has better job prospects and a decent welfare system.

So the Schrödinger Migrant, far from being a paradox, is a reality.

I think the NGOs (including MSF) who are acting as human smugglers for the last leg of the mass migration route should be shut down and their leaders prosecuted for human trafficking.
Madness in the Med: how charity rescue boats exacerbate the refugee crisis

What is causing growing Italian anger is the role of charities and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in the transport of migrants across the Mediterranean. The image the charities like to present is that of desperate people putting to sea in any vessel they can lay their hands on because whatever risks they run cannot exceed the dangers of staying in their homelands.
[..]
The reality could not be more different. The vast majority of migrants from Libya are young men paying the equivalent of €1,000 each to people smugglers in what they see as a calculated risk to reach a better life in Europe. The business model of the smugglers does not include transporting their customers all the way to Italy, but rather to take them 12 nautical miles to the boundary of Libya’s territorial waters, so they can then be ‘rescued’ and ferried the rest of the way to Europe. The people smugglers are quite open about what they are doing: what can only be described as a Libya-based migrant travel agency has set up a Facebook page offering ‘tickets’ to ‘passengers’ with ‘discounts for group bookings’ on ‘ferries’ — i.e., smuggler boats — complete with phone number. The journey, it says, lasts only ‘three or four hours’ before rescue by an NGO, Italian or EU vessel, which will complete the ferry service to Italy.
[..]
The operators of these vessels are legally obliged to assist those ‘in distress’ at sea if they are in a position to do so. What they are not allowed to do is to operate deliberate and unauthorised search-and-rescue missions within territorial waters, nor to pick people off a boat which is not ‘in distress’ on the pretext of ‘rescuing’ them. Moreover, if they do save people in distress, they are obliged under maritime law to take them to the nearest safe port, which is seldom in Italy.

But these boats are entering Libyan territorial waters. I asked an independent Dutch research institute, Gefira, for evidence. It used marine traffic websites (freely available to the public) which track ships in real time via satellite. It discovered that a dozen NGO vessels entered Libya’s waters, often many times. The Vos Hestia, for example, did so on the 5, 16, 22 and 23 May; the Aquarius on the 2, 5, 16 and 23 May and as recently as 9 July. The Phoenix was tracked there three times, most recently on 10 July.

The NGOs are now under investigation by Sicilian magistrates for possible collusion with people smugglers. Carmelo Zuccaro, the magistrate in charge, told the Turin daily La Stampa in April: ‘We have evidence that there are direct contacts between certain NGOs and people traffickers in Libya.’ He says phone calls have been made from Libya to certain NGOs, lamps have been lit to illuminate the route to these organisations’ boats, and some of these boats have suddenly turned off their locating transponders.

Disgusting!

 

[Valjean]

This I find to be the fundamental difference between "conservatives" and "liberals" in the US. Take for example welfare policy. Conservatives are willing to slash and burn welfare programs even if it means hurting a lot of people they might even agree deserve some help because they cannot stand the thought of freeloaders.

So yeah, Fox News can find some surfer bro' abusing food stamps, so they are willing to cut aid that helps millions of children and elderly have something basic to eat, just so they can sleep at night knowing that they've eliminated every last cheat.

The right, it seems to me, is incensed at the thought that someone might be cheating and not being punished for it. They're vindictive. They'll rage against undeserving poor or illegals receiving social benefits, even if these are economically negligible. They are quite ready to throw the baby out with the bath water.