Slate analyses illegal immigration
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Enough of that BS below. Let's get a real topic going again. In this article[^] Stephen Landsburg of Slate magazine[^] analyses the economic cost of illegal immigration. He concludes with the following few paragraphs: Accounting for all that, it turns out that the immigrant's $7 gain is worth about five times the American's $3 loss. In other words, to justify keeping the immigrant out, you'd have to say he's worth less than one-fifth of an American citizen. By contrast, there was a time when the U.S. Constitution counted a black slave as three-fifths of a full-fledged citizen. Alabama Gov. Bob Riley has recently apologized for the ravages of slavery. How long till politicians apologize for the ravages of our restrictive immigration policies? Agree? Disagree? Other input? The math is here[^].
Looked at another way, 10 million immigrants gaining $7 per hour contribute $140,000,000,000 to the annual GDP and 100 million American's losing $3 per hour costs $600,000,000,000 annually. So the net economic loss due to immigrants is 460 billion dollars.
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Enough of that BS below. Let's get a real topic going again. In this article[^] Stephen Landsburg of Slate magazine[^] analyses the economic cost of illegal immigration. He concludes with the following few paragraphs: Accounting for all that, it turns out that the immigrant's $7 gain is worth about five times the American's $3 loss. In other words, to justify keeping the immigrant out, you'd have to say he's worth less than one-fifth of an American citizen. By contrast, there was a time when the U.S. Constitution counted a black slave as three-fifths of a full-fledged citizen. Alabama Gov. Bob Riley has recently apologized for the ravages of slavery. How long till politicians apologize for the ravages of our restrictive immigration policies? Agree? Disagree? Other input? The math is here[^].
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Christian Graus wrote:
If it's economically beneficial, then it should be made easier for people to immigrate.
Beneficial, yes, but who gets the benefit? The whole "fifths of a Citizen" angle, with its slavery connotations is a great troll, but in one sense, a US Citizen is worth more than an uneducated immigrant from a dirt-poor 3rd-world country: we've spent more on them. I'd be willing to bet that the cost of raising a child to the working age is much higher here than in such a place. That's money flowing to schools, farmers, manufacturers, shops... And if we have to pay their way through a university education because there's no unskilled labor that pays well enough for them to pay their own way... well, that's an even more expensive worker. At some point, we have to actually employ them to get a return on our investment, right***? IMHO, either we agree that the natives are worth more than the immigrants, or we should drop the whole idea of income taxes and a minimum wage, open the borders, and let things work themselves out... _*actually, i could argue "no" - but quite a few folks disagree. Plus, my reasoning largely involves a drastic change to the demographics of this country, and a whole lot of people aren't too excited about that one...**_
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Troll or no troll he's trying to assign some kind of "value" to an illegal immigrant to counter the position that illegal immigrants are devastating the economy of the U.S. I think he makes an interesting argument in terms of the numbers. The legality of somebody entering the U.S. is another matter as is the cultural impact. But from an economic standpoint, as he argues, it's pretty hard to reject it (illegal immigration) just based on the economics.
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asxzdf213 wrote:
Why would the U.S.A want a constitution that was written when slavery was legal?
Why not? What's your point, troll? If you aren't going to contribute anything useful, then piss off.
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asxzdf213 wrote:
Why would the U.S.A want a constitution that was written when slavery was legal?
Why not? What's your point, troll? If you aren't going to contribute anything useful, then piss off.
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Looked at another way, 10 million immigrants gaining $7 per hour contribute $140,000,000,000 to the annual GDP and 100 million American's losing $3 per hour costs $600,000,000,000 annually. So the net economic loss due to immigrants is 460 billion dollars.
Ed, I'm not sure I see where the loss comes in. All the wages are earned in the U.S. so, unless they send every dollar back to Mexico, that money stays in the U.S. and the immigrants contribute to the GDP.
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Ed, I'm not sure I see where the loss comes in. All the wages are earned in the U.S. so, unless they send every dollar back to Mexico, that money stays in the U.S. and the immigrants contribute to the GDP.
American workers lose $3 per hour. Multiply that by 100 million workers working 2000 hours per year. Immigrant workers gain $7 per hour. Multiply that by 10 milliion immigrants working 2000 hours per year. The wage depression suffered by the American workers netted against the wage gain by the immigrants results in an overall loss of $460 billion annually to the economy.
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Let's see - you joined CP yesterday. You claim you don't understand English yet your knowledge of English colloquialisms and vulgarity is superb.... Hmmmmmmmm.
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Troll or no troll he's trying to assign some kind of "value" to an illegal immigrant to counter the position that illegal immigrants are devastating the economy of the U.S. I think he makes an interesting argument in terms of the numbers. The legality of somebody entering the U.S. is another matter as is the cultural impact. But from an economic standpoint, as he argues, it's pretty hard to reject it (illegal immigration) just based on the economics.
73Zeppelin wrote:
Troll or no troll he's trying to assign some kind of "value" to an illegal immigrant to counter the position that illegal immigrants are devastating the economy of the U.S. I think he makes an interesting argument in terms of the numbers.
I thought the argument right along was that we need massive numbers of low-wage immigrants in order to avoid devastating the economy. That our current economy actually depends on them. The down side being at the individual level, it's hard to make a living doing things that cheaper immigrants can do. The arguments that i've heard against seem to be far more of a "damage to individuals / culture" thing. I really don't think i've heard anyone argue that we must sacrifice our cheap labor for the good of the GDP... Then again, some people will argue just about anything. ;)
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American workers lose $3 per hour. Multiply that by 100 million workers working 2000 hours per year. Immigrant workers gain $7 per hour. Multiply that by 10 milliion immigrants working 2000 hours per year. The wage depression suffered by the American workers netted against the wage gain by the immigrants results in an overall loss of $460 billion annually to the economy.
Yes, but GDP is a measure of the market value of all goods and services produced within a given country. Wages aren't included in the GDP measure. Are you saying that economic consumption is reduced which thereby reduces the GDP from a fall in production, then? Because then I'd agree.
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Let's see - you joined CP yesterday. You claim you don't understand English yet your knowledge of English colloquialisms and vulgarity is superb.... Hmmmmmmmm.
You are rude because I joined yesterday? :( I use urbandictionary.com to understand curse and dirty words.
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Because its the same constitution which made slavery illegal, moron.
Pardon Libby!
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73Zeppelin wrote:
Troll or no troll he's trying to assign some kind of "value" to an illegal immigrant to counter the position that illegal immigrants are devastating the economy of the U.S. I think he makes an interesting argument in terms of the numbers.
I thought the argument right along was that we need massive numbers of low-wage immigrants in order to avoid devastating the economy. That our current economy actually depends on them. The down side being at the individual level, it's hard to make a living doing things that cheaper immigrants can do. The arguments that i've heard against seem to be far more of a "damage to individuals / culture" thing. I really don't think i've heard anyone argue that we must sacrifice our cheap labor for the good of the GDP... Then again, some people will argue just about anything. ;)
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How near to the knife edge is the current American economy. I ask this because if the bill gets a second reading, as suggested by your President [^], and a Z-visa is introduced thus giving some illegals some degree of legal status, will the cost to the economy caused by inevitable higher wages push the economy "over-the-cliff-edge" into some recession that could have worldwide implications. The degree of threat needs to be made known.
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Enough of that BS below. Let's get a real topic going again. In this article[^] Stephen Landsburg of Slate magazine[^] analyses the economic cost of illegal immigration. He concludes with the following few paragraphs: Accounting for all that, it turns out that the immigrant's $7 gain is worth about five times the American's $3 loss. In other words, to justify keeping the immigrant out, you'd have to say he's worth less than one-fifth of an American citizen. By contrast, there was a time when the U.S. Constitution counted a black slave as three-fifths of a full-fledged citizen. Alabama Gov. Bob Riley has recently apologized for the ravages of slavery. How long till politicians apologize for the ravages of our restrictive immigration policies? Agree? Disagree? Other input? The math is here[^].
But how is that possible? By that economic logic, we would be better off with no middle class at all. The more uneducated, poverty stricken, desease ridden ner-do-wells we import the better off we would all be. If all the middle class guit their jobs and started picking tomatoes we would improve our ecnomy? Its rediculous and cannot possibly be valid.
Pardon Libby!
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Because its the same constitution which made slavery illegal, moron.
Pardon Libby!
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How near to the knife edge is the current American economy. I ask this because if the bill gets a second reading, as suggested by your President [^], and a Z-visa is introduced thus giving some illegals some degree of legal status, will the cost to the economy caused by inevitable higher wages push the economy "over-the-cliff-edge" into some recession that could have worldwide implications. The degree of threat needs to be made known.
Richard A. Abbott wrote:
The degree of threat needs to be made known.
Yeah, let's ask for an exact cost in lives and dollars of Global Warming while we're at it. :rolleyes: There's just too much rhetoric; if there even exists a way of making such a prediction, we'd never know it from all the bogus predictions anyway...
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Richard A. Abbott wrote:
The degree of threat needs to be made known.
Yeah, let's ask for an exact cost in lives and dollars of Global Warming while we're at it. :rolleyes: There's just too much rhetoric; if there even exists a way of making such a prediction, we'd never know it from all the bogus predictions anyway...
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Sorry Shog, I was trying to get some understanding of how deep seated the problem was. As if the prices at the factory gates increase too dramatically, this has inflationary tendencies that must be addressed by your country's finance minister, and a spiralling out-of-control interest rates will cause wholesale suffering not just in the USA but worldwide, after all, the USA economy is a powerhouse for good and for ill.
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Sorry Shog, I was trying to get some understanding of how deep seated the problem was. As if the prices at the factory gates increase too dramatically, this has inflationary tendencies that must be addressed by your country's finance minister, and a spiralling out-of-control interest rates will cause wholesale suffering not just in the USA but worldwide, after all, the USA economy is a powerhouse for good and for ill.
Right, but my point is that - in spite of the doomsday predictions - pure legislation may have little or no effect. I mean, take meat packing, an industry just filled with illegals. Packing plants are located in rural areas, where it's cheap and easy to ship in both the animals and the labor. The cost of living is low, the cost of processing is low, the cost of meat is low. Incredibly low. I don't believe for a minute that these companies are going to look at the brand-new legal workers and tell their current workforce to take a hike - they'll pay the absolute minimum amount possible; arguments like "shortage of legal workers" and "jobs citizens don't want" are convenient excuses, but don't actually need to be true. The bigger danger would come from enforcing existing laws - which is why there's no bill likely to pass that would cause that to happen. And if one did - if suddenly it became an incredibly expensive risk to hire illegal workers - that would likely only accelerate the trend towards moving the jobs out of the country entirely - why bring cheap southern workers in when you can pay them even lower wages to grow and pack the meat? As for inflation... well, i'm no where close to qualified to comment on that. But my gut feeling is, when holding onto the money you earn isn't considered wise or even safe... we're already spiraling. Now if you'll excuse me, i need to go and sell some stuff so i can pay bills... :rolleyes:
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Enough of that BS below. Let's get a real topic going again. In this article[^] Stephen Landsburg of Slate magazine[^] analyses the economic cost of illegal immigration. He concludes with the following few paragraphs: Accounting for all that, it turns out that the immigrant's $7 gain is worth about five times the American's $3 loss. In other words, to justify keeping the immigrant out, you'd have to say he's worth less than one-fifth of an American citizen. By contrast, there was a time when the U.S. Constitution counted a black slave as three-fifths of a full-fledged citizen. Alabama Gov. Bob Riley has recently apologized for the ravages of slavery. How long till politicians apologize for the ravages of our restrictive immigration policies? Agree? Disagree? Other input? The math is here[^].
Mike The NYT - my leftist brochure. Calling an illegal alien an “undocumented immigrant” is like calling a drug dealer an “unlicensed pharmacist”. God doesn't believe in atheists, therefore they don't exist.
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Yes, but GDP is a measure of the market value of all goods and services produced within a given country. Wages aren't included in the GDP measure. Are you saying that economic consumption is reduced which thereby reduces the GDP from a fall in production, then? Because then I'd agree.
Because the discussion relates to wages, I prefer the GDP income[^] method instead of the GDP expenditure method. GDP(I) = Wages + Interest + Rent + Profit + Proprietors' Income + Other Adjustments vs. GDP(E) = Personal Consumption + Investment + Government Consumption + Net Exports