Whether illegal immigration is immoral is a question of no more interest to me than how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.
What matters to me is whether immigration -- legal or illegal, of a single individual or definable set of individuals -- is in the best interest of this country's current citizens.
The problem with immigration is not individual immigrants. One Afghani Pashtun can become a valuable member of the community. Ten thousand? Not so much.
why not? ... and that depends on the total size of the community, doesn't it? Ten thousand Afghani Pashtun can become valuable members of the 350 million Americans community.
Did you pay attention to the Afghan situation? Pashtun are some of the most clannish people on Earth. They don’t cooperate well with each other, let alone non-Pashtun. The only way is to get individuals alone and let Stockholm Syndrome do its thing.
"Pashtun are some of the most clannish people on Earth"
This is akin to saying that Americans are "obese geography ignorants incapable of speaking foreign languages". The fact that you can tell the (significant) differences between American individuals but fail to do so with Pashtuns, doesn't reflect any intrinsic characteristics of Pashtun people, only that you are acquitted with none of them.
Trust me, individual Pashtun are as different from each other as Americans. And, by the way, attributing collective characteristics to individuals is called "profiling" and it is intellectually and morally wrong. You may very well end up believing that black people are criminals or that New Yorkers are snobby.
I think you’re making a lot of assumptions, there. You assume that because your people on average behave in a certain way that everybody else does, too. Populations differ.
There is no such thing as "people on average". This is a useless "organic" conception of society.
Not at least when you talk about "behavior". There certainly is an average weight or height of a population but how do you work out the average clannish-ism of a population? There are only individuals and individual behavior.
This is one of the stranger posts on illegal immigration.
The libertarian-oriented who are against illegal immigration don't blame the illegal immigrants for the problem; we blame the government that allows and now is actively encouraging and facilitating illegal immigration.
If I were poor and in a poor country, and couldn't get into the U.S. legally, I would quite possibly try to enter illegally (modulo mostly only what I would owe to the cartel that got me in...).
The illegal immigrants seeking to "break the law" and come to the U.S. are NOT the fundamental problem on this issue.
The politicians not enforcing the law - and not following the law! - are the issue.
Am not against illegal immigration because of some legal argument, or even moral one - in their place i would likely do the same thing. Am against illegal immigration because it takes any ability to control the number and composition of immigrants out of the hands of the government, and by extension the people of the country that is being targeted. In other words, it's an invasion. Not nearly as bad as the huns but still an invasion. Bryan do you believe in the right of people to fight off invaders?
“… because it takes any ability to control the number and composition of immigrants out of the hands of the government”
Well, while I strongly agree with the rest of your statement, in fact the border czar Kamala Harris-Biden administration took the control out of the hands of Congress and the laws passed by Congress and signed by a previous president, and put it in the hands of their brazenly amoral Harris-Biden administration, for ideological and future political benefit reasons.
well obviously my comment above was exaggerated for effect, and am not saying am fearing immigrants to US will start using organized violence against me (whether it's 100% a won't or maybe a teeny little bit of a can't situation is debatable IMO but am going to avoid triggering you even more), however as a thought experiment imagine if instead of fighting back the ukrainians had just accepted to let in an unlimited number of russians and given them the right to vote after a few years without any requirement for proof of assimilation, would there be violence at all in that country right now? wouldn't the newcomers just have taken over all the institutions in a totally peaceful and democratic manner? are you ok with that kind of outcome then and should the original ukrainians be fine with that?
To say that illegal immigration is wrong because it breaks the law, is totally and utterly irrelevant in the immigration debate.
When it is really interesting this debate is "normative". It is all about what "ought" to be, which position makes intellectual and moral sense to hold about immigration. To say that today illegal immigration is, well, illegal, offers nothing of interest for the advancement of this normative debate.
The condemnation of illegal immigration, because it is illegal, is a totally different debate, very interesting, but different. It is, actually, like debating if illegally escaping the plantation before 1865 was bad because it broke the law, or debating if illegally marrying a black person before 1967 (!!) was bad because it broke the anti-miscegenation laws in place before that.
This second, different, debate is about whether or not obedience to the law should be "content-dependent". In this debate, two positions can be held:
a) No, the whole "rule of law" concept makes sense if you can not choose whether to comply or not with the law. This position forces you to explain why you would have opposed people escaping slavery or marrying people of a different race not so many years ago (spoiler alert: you would have been wrong).
b) Yes, obedience is content dependent. You are only obliged to follow the laws you agree to. This position certainly has the moral upper ground in the slavery and anti-miscegenation discussions, but it is not without problems. Basically means, from the political philosophy point of view, that all the laws that conform the "rule of law", should be approved by unanimity, since this is the only way of being sure that everybody agree with them at the time of their enactment.
So, saying that what is wrong with illegal immigrants is that they break the law, can only mean, within this framework, that you either a) think that obedience to the law should be content-independent or b) think that should be content-dependent but agree with the content of immigration laws actually in place.
I think that most of the time (all of the time?) is b) since most people that use the "illegal immigration is bad because it is illegal" tautology, break speeding laws frequently or broke alcohol laws when they were underage or ... . Some of them even think that assaulting Congress is the right thing to do if they believe that an election has been stolen. Even though it is manifestly illegal.
This article is confused about law, property, harm, and immigration.
The only sound reason not to “break” (ignore) state (or government) “laws” (mere political commands posing as genuine law) that flout liberty is personal prudence.
However, unlimited immigration does “harm” (initiate impositions on) the existing populace. All of the “public property” (state property) which immigrants would enter and occupy is rightfully owned by the existing populace, and should first be given to them by some more-or-less libertarian method (then they can invite who they like onto their own property). And it does not “harm” (initiate impositions on) would-be immigrants merely to decline to offer them a benefit: access to the roads, etc. that the populace should rightfully own.
Otherwise, one may as well say that having locks on one’s front door “harms” the people who want to enter one’s property and they do no “harm” to us by entering our rightful property without our permission.
"All of the “public property” (state property) which immigrants would enter and occupy is rightfully owned by the existing populace"
Following your theory, in the case of the US, the "existing populace" initiated its ownership of American public property by stealing such property from the original inhabitants of the land. According to you, they were the rightful owners or all "public property" in America. Should it be given back tho their heirs?
Insofar as the heirs of the original inhabitants have not already been restituted in various ways (I am no expert on the historical details in this matter) they are still entitled to any land they lost. However, one does not have a libertarian claim to the whole area that comprises the US just because one's ancestors originally lived in specific parts of it.
I see. Just curious, how your model of "public property" works with State or local property? When somebody from Texas enters public property that belongs to Florida's taxpayers, is he/she also entering and occupying lands rightfully owned by the existing populace of Florida? Can somebody from Tampa entering the lands rightfully owned by the existing populace of Miami?
How does it work with newborns? Do they have rights over the public property right from the moment they are born? or should they be considering trespassing on the public lands owned by the existing populace? should repeating fathers compensate childless ones for the abusive overoccupation of the lands rightfully owned by the childless?
I don't know, man. It all seems a matter of arbitrary legalities. This seems to move us back to square one as far as immigration is concerned.
>I see. Just curious, how your model of "public property" works with State or local property?
All state or local authority property also needs to be given to the relevant populace.
>When somebody from Texas enters public property that belongs to Florida's taxpayers, is he/she also entering and occupying lands rightfully owned by the existing populace of Florida?
Yes. Privatise those roads, etc., then he can only enter with a legitimate invitation.
>Can somebody from Tampa entering the lands rightfully owned by the existing populace of Miami?
Same answer.
>How does it work with newborns?
They are, in effect, invited into someone’s private property.
>Do they have rights over the public property right from the moment they are born?
Once they are full persons, at least. And only if that “public property” has not yet been privatised. What’s the hold up?
> or should they be considering trespassing on the public lands owned by the existing populace?
There won’t be any “public land” (in the state/government sense): that’s the whole point. All of it will be private in one way or another. To enter your street, I need to be invited. To use a road, I need to pay the toll.
>should repeating fathers compensate childless ones for the abusive overoccupation of the lands rightfully owned by the childless?
This doesn’t arise. Once all the state/government land is privatised, you can only occupy what you own unless invited elsewhere. However, some easements might need to be enforced by libertarian courts: you can’t imprison people in their houses just because you own the road directly in front of them (although most residents would collectively own their immediate road, or some holding company would do so contractually).
>I don't know, man. It all seems a matter of arbitrary legalities. This seems to move us back to square one as far as immigration is concerned.
I do know. There is nothing arbitrary about libertarian property. Problems solved. But for more Libertarianism 101 you could do a lot worse than start with David Friedman: www.daviddfriedman.com/Machinery%203rd%20Edn.pdf
What people vote for doesn't contain any epistemologically relevant information about a topic.
In a democracy, it only serves (through complex mechanisms that regulate the practicalities of majoritarian rule) the purpose of establishing what is legal and what is not. But legality can be foolish and unfair, and breaking existing laws is not necessarily morally wrong. It can even be something to be proud of (think of the people breaking the law by helping Jews to escape Nazi Germani). It is all content-dependent.
Very compelling moral arguments for open borders. I have yet to hear a solid argument as to why human capital should be treated differently than physical capital. Both should be able to cross borders easily. Ok with checking for bad guys to avoid crime (which is minimal), but labor should be mobile.
Milton Friedman’s basic argument that with a generous welfare state you can’t have open borders is rock-solid. Bad incentives, at some point unbearable costs to existing residents.
You might disagree with the argument because your values differ; fair enough. But it is a rock-solid argument that is simple to understand.
It’s not rock solid. Empirical evidence shows that immigrants contribute more to welfare state spending making them self fulfilling in terms of their welfare. Also, the question I posit is why is physical capital mobile but human capital not so much.
No, in fact, there is NO empirical evidence showing that allowing *unlimited* numbers of immigrants into a country with a very generous safety net contribute more to welfare than not. Even the research BC cites says as much about the lowest skilled immigrants not being net positive - and that includes illegal immigrants who only have access to a fraction of the safety net, and for understandable reasons of not wanting to be caught don’t use all of the safety net that is offered.
With unlimited legal immigration and a very generous safety net, it don’t compute.
One last time, you are free to disagree as to which policy you prefer, but the argument against that combination is rock solid.
And there are two answers to your question about physical vs human capital: 1) the welfare state. 2) the massive changes to culture (good norms and institutions) that have a high risk of resulting from unlimited immigration.
And I am one who *does* agree with you that absent the generous safety net and the risk to culture, there is an extremely strong argument for free trade in human labor just as in anything else. But those are two HUGE issues in real life.
Unskilled workers may not be a net benefit but is your argument to exclude ONLY them or is your argument against immigration in general? The evidence is clear: Immigrants add value and America would not be the powerhouse it is without them. Also on culture, what culture is the one you defend? White Christian values only? Should we take away women’s right to vote because it was not part of our culture? Cultural arguments are slippery slopes on which we cannot ever agree (and lead quickly to collectivist digressions). Safety nets are also subjective in their application, depth and breadth. You would have to be way more specific than your general statements against immigrants and their “poisoning” of your culture to entertain a meaningful discussion. The fact that you don’t like immigrants is hypocritical at best given than your probably come from a long list of immigrants yourself. Finally saying that welfare state is an argument against human capital equating physical capital is nonsensical or needs further clarification.
Ok, I am willing to respond to you despite your many false claims.
I am all for legal immigration. We are a nation of immigrants. Your statement that I don’t like immigrants is baseless. What I don’t like is illegal immigration.
As a matter of policy, I would enforce the existing laws against illegal immigration to reduce it to the trickle it once was, or at least the relatively small numbers it was in the 90s. After that, I would allow virtually unlimited high skill immigration, and a fairly large amount of low skill immigration. From all countries, but at least partly biased towards our hemisphere. But it should not be unlimited, it should be based on what we can reasonably absorb. I’m confident, however, that my views of how much legal immigration to allow (again, after radically reducing illegal immigration) would be more than what 80% of Americans would choose, perhaps even more than that.
Re: culture - which equals norms and institutions primarily, certainly in this context - I would suggest you search elsewhere on Substack for what this means. America was a wonderful melting pot in the 20th century (the first half of which, I’ll note, the safety net was minimal, at best), and I remain all for the American melting pot. It is one of our country’s greatest strengths.
The discussion above was specifically about whether truly open borders - LITERAL UNLIMITED MIGRATION - is compatible with a generous safety net. My claim and Milton Friedman’s is that it is not. I stand by that, and stand by the claim that you have no evidence that contradicts this. Incentives matter, and unlimited immigration would have particularly perverse incentives when combined with our generous safety net.
Then you asked why human capital is different from physical capital, and the answer is partly the same as I just stated, and partly that unlimited immigration - unless one is willing to entertain a permanently dual-class citizenship status - runs an enormous risk of changing institutions and norms of a good culture.
By which I ain’t referring to religion, or ethnicity - let alone ridiculous assertions of rolling back women’s right to vote - but on things like socialism, government power, equality of opportunity vs equality of outcomes, respect for the rule of law, etc., etc., etc.
If you prefer to cast aspersions and make assumptions about people’s beliefs, rather than take and address arguments at face value, I suggest you go to most of the other social media sites where that is rampant. I come to Substack precisely because I love that people here argue ideas rather than hurl cancel-culture ad hominem attacks.
I can't help but notice that there is a strong correlation between condemning illegal immigration and being a COVID NPI scofflaw. It's weird that those people are so adamant in one case, but not the other. If I didn't know any better I'd think that perhaps they were arguing in bad faith....
I would be fine with strict enforcement of speeding laws! If a law doesn't make sense, let's fix it or get rid of it instead of ignoring it while people become habituated to breaking the rules. While I am in favor of letting more people into the US to live and work, I disagree with arguing *for* illegal immigration. If we want to allow more immigration, let's legalize it instead of advocating for breaking laws.
Actually speeding is a particularly bad law to have strict enforcement. Because then people would push for higher speed limits, and so the variance in speeds driven would increase.
Other than on city streets with children present or a lot of pedestrians, there is unabashed goodness to the concept of what the technical speed limit is, combined with the norms of how much is acceptable to go over the limit.
I'll meet you halfway, however: laws like in Canada that make clear that if you go more than XX kilometers above the speed limit you will face a massive fine/penalty.
[BTW, I completely agree with your last 2 sentences specifically about immigration.]
"If a law doesn't make sense, let's fix it or get rid of it"
This doesn't work like this, does it? Mainly because the "subject" in this "make sense" part is missing. Makes sense to whom? Every single law makes sense to some individuals and not at all to others. There is not such a thing as a "collective being" to whom things make or doesn't make sense
Sorry, but due respect, all he’s claiming is a “we the people” thing. And however imperfectly, our legal system (and every European and now Asian variant thereof) has worked the same way.
Either way, you are surely not arguing that the brazen total disregard for current American immigration law by the border czar Kamala Harris-Biden administration is the proper way to go about things, are you?
Whether illegal immigration is immoral is a question of no more interest to me than how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.
What matters to me is whether immigration -- legal or illegal, of a single individual or definable set of individuals -- is in the best interest of this country's current citizens.
The problem with immigration is not individual immigrants. One Afghani Pashtun can become a valuable member of the community. Ten thousand? Not so much.
why not? ... and that depends on the total size of the community, doesn't it? Ten thousand Afghani Pashtun can become valuable members of the 350 million Americans community.
Did you pay attention to the Afghan situation? Pashtun are some of the most clannish people on Earth. They don’t cooperate well with each other, let alone non-Pashtun. The only way is to get individuals alone and let Stockholm Syndrome do its thing.
"Pashtun are some of the most clannish people on Earth"
This is akin to saying that Americans are "obese geography ignorants incapable of speaking foreign languages". The fact that you can tell the (significant) differences between American individuals but fail to do so with Pashtuns, doesn't reflect any intrinsic characteristics of Pashtun people, only that you are acquitted with none of them.
Trust me, individual Pashtun are as different from each other as Americans. And, by the way, attributing collective characteristics to individuals is called "profiling" and it is intellectually and morally wrong. You may very well end up believing that black people are criminals or that New Yorkers are snobby.
I think you’re making a lot of assumptions, there. You assume that because your people on average behave in a certain way that everybody else does, too. Populations differ.
There is no such thing as "people on average". This is a useless "organic" conception of society.
Not at least when you talk about "behavior". There certainly is an average weight or height of a population but how do you work out the average clannish-ism of a population? There are only individuals and individual behavior.
The Pashtun are famous for it since the time of Alexander the Great.
This is one of the stranger posts on illegal immigration.
The libertarian-oriented who are against illegal immigration don't blame the illegal immigrants for the problem; we blame the government that allows and now is actively encouraging and facilitating illegal immigration.
If I were poor and in a poor country, and couldn't get into the U.S. legally, I would quite possibly try to enter illegally (modulo mostly only what I would owe to the cartel that got me in...).
The illegal immigrants seeking to "break the law" and come to the U.S. are NOT the fundamental problem on this issue.
The politicians not enforcing the law - and not following the law! - are the issue.
Am not against illegal immigration because of some legal argument, or even moral one - in their place i would likely do the same thing. Am against illegal immigration because it takes any ability to control the number and composition of immigrants out of the hands of the government, and by extension the people of the country that is being targeted. In other words, it's an invasion. Not nearly as bad as the huns but still an invasion. Bryan do you believe in the right of people to fight off invaders?
“… because it takes any ability to control the number and composition of immigrants out of the hands of the government”
Well, while I strongly agree with the rest of your statement, in fact the border czar Kamala Harris-Biden administration took the control out of the hands of Congress and the laws passed by Congress and signed by a previous president, and put it in the hands of their brazenly amoral Harris-Biden administration, for ideological and future political benefit reasons.
Go to Ukraine for a while. You will learn pretty fast to differentiate an invader from an immigrant.
No need to do research before your departure. It would be pretty straightforward.
well obviously my comment above was exaggerated for effect, and am not saying am fearing immigrants to US will start using organized violence against me (whether it's 100% a won't or maybe a teeny little bit of a can't situation is debatable IMO but am going to avoid triggering you even more), however as a thought experiment imagine if instead of fighting back the ukrainians had just accepted to let in an unlimited number of russians and given them the right to vote after a few years without any requirement for proof of assimilation, would there be violence at all in that country right now? wouldn't the newcomers just have taken over all the institutions in a totally peaceful and democratic manner? are you ok with that kind of outcome then and should the original ukrainians be fine with that?
To say that illegal immigration is wrong because it breaks the law, is totally and utterly irrelevant in the immigration debate.
When it is really interesting this debate is "normative". It is all about what "ought" to be, which position makes intellectual and moral sense to hold about immigration. To say that today illegal immigration is, well, illegal, offers nothing of interest for the advancement of this normative debate.
The condemnation of illegal immigration, because it is illegal, is a totally different debate, very interesting, but different. It is, actually, like debating if illegally escaping the plantation before 1865 was bad because it broke the law, or debating if illegally marrying a black person before 1967 (!!) was bad because it broke the anti-miscegenation laws in place before that.
This second, different, debate is about whether or not obedience to the law should be "content-dependent". In this debate, two positions can be held:
a) No, the whole "rule of law" concept makes sense if you can not choose whether to comply or not with the law. This position forces you to explain why you would have opposed people escaping slavery or marrying people of a different race not so many years ago (spoiler alert: you would have been wrong).
b) Yes, obedience is content dependent. You are only obliged to follow the laws you agree to. This position certainly has the moral upper ground in the slavery and anti-miscegenation discussions, but it is not without problems. Basically means, from the political philosophy point of view, that all the laws that conform the "rule of law", should be approved by unanimity, since this is the only way of being sure that everybody agree with them at the time of their enactment.
So, saying that what is wrong with illegal immigrants is that they break the law, can only mean, within this framework, that you either a) think that obedience to the law should be content-independent or b) think that should be content-dependent but agree with the content of immigration laws actually in place.
I think that most of the time (all of the time?) is b) since most people that use the "illegal immigration is bad because it is illegal" tautology, break speeding laws frequently or broke alcohol laws when they were underage or ... . Some of them even think that assaulting Congress is the right thing to do if they believe that an election has been stolen. Even though it is manifestly illegal.
This article is confused about law, property, harm, and immigration.
The only sound reason not to “break” (ignore) state (or government) “laws” (mere political commands posing as genuine law) that flout liberty is personal prudence.
However, unlimited immigration does “harm” (initiate impositions on) the existing populace. All of the “public property” (state property) which immigrants would enter and occupy is rightfully owned by the existing populace, and should first be given to them by some more-or-less libertarian method (then they can invite who they like onto their own property). And it does not “harm” (initiate impositions on) would-be immigrants merely to decline to offer them a benefit: access to the roads, etc. that the populace should rightfully own.
Otherwise, one may as well say that having locks on one’s front door “harms” the people who want to enter one’s property and they do no “harm” to us by entering our rightful property without our permission.
https://jclester.substack.com/p/open-borders-today-stupid-or-sinister?utm_source=publication-search
https://jclester.substack.com/p/harm-principle-a-libertarian-viewpoint?utm_source=publication-search
https://jclester.substack.com/p/the-state-a-libertarian-viewpoint?utm_source=publication-search
"All of the “public property” (state property) which immigrants would enter and occupy is rightfully owned by the existing populace"
Following your theory, in the case of the US, the "existing populace" initiated its ownership of American public property by stealing such property from the original inhabitants of the land. According to you, they were the rightful owners or all "public property" in America. Should it be given back tho their heirs?
Insofar as the heirs of the original inhabitants have not already been restituted in various ways (I am no expert on the historical details in this matter) they are still entitled to any land they lost. However, one does not have a libertarian claim to the whole area that comprises the US just because one's ancestors originally lived in specific parts of it.
I see. Just curious, how your model of "public property" works with State or local property? When somebody from Texas enters public property that belongs to Florida's taxpayers, is he/she also entering and occupying lands rightfully owned by the existing populace of Florida? Can somebody from Tampa entering the lands rightfully owned by the existing populace of Miami?
How does it work with newborns? Do they have rights over the public property right from the moment they are born? or should they be considering trespassing on the public lands owned by the existing populace? should repeating fathers compensate childless ones for the abusive overoccupation of the lands rightfully owned by the childless?
I don't know, man. It all seems a matter of arbitrary legalities. This seems to move us back to square one as far as immigration is concerned.
>I see. Just curious, how your model of "public property" works with State or local property?
All state or local authority property also needs to be given to the relevant populace.
>When somebody from Texas enters public property that belongs to Florida's taxpayers, is he/she also entering and occupying lands rightfully owned by the existing populace of Florida?
Yes. Privatise those roads, etc., then he can only enter with a legitimate invitation.
>Can somebody from Tampa entering the lands rightfully owned by the existing populace of Miami?
Same answer.
>How does it work with newborns?
They are, in effect, invited into someone’s private property.
>Do they have rights over the public property right from the moment they are born?
Once they are full persons, at least. And only if that “public property” has not yet been privatised. What’s the hold up?
> or should they be considering trespassing on the public lands owned by the existing populace?
There won’t be any “public land” (in the state/government sense): that’s the whole point. All of it will be private in one way or another. To enter your street, I need to be invited. To use a road, I need to pay the toll.
>should repeating fathers compensate childless ones for the abusive overoccupation of the lands rightfully owned by the childless?
This doesn’t arise. Once all the state/government land is privatised, you can only occupy what you own unless invited elsewhere. However, some easements might need to be enforced by libertarian courts: you can’t imprison people in their houses just because you own the road directly in front of them (although most residents would collectively own their immediate road, or some holding company would do so contractually).
>I don't know, man. It all seems a matter of arbitrary legalities. This seems to move us back to square one as far as immigration is concerned.
I do know. There is nothing arbitrary about libertarian property. Problems solved. But for more Libertarianism 101 you could do a lot worse than start with David Friedman: www.daviddfriedman.com/Machinery%203rd%20Edn.pdf
This is a democracy, let's vote on this!
Actually, people did vote on this. But the brazen border czar Kamala Harris-Biden administration willfully flout the laws that were passed…
(P.S. we are actually a constitutional republic with democratically elected representatives 😏)
What people vote for doesn't contain any epistemologically relevant information about a topic.
In a democracy, it only serves (through complex mechanisms that regulate the practicalities of majoritarian rule) the purpose of establishing what is legal and what is not. But legality can be foolish and unfair, and breaking existing laws is not necessarily morally wrong. It can even be something to be proud of (think of the people breaking the law by helping Jews to escape Nazi Germani). It is all content-dependent.
Very compelling moral arguments for open borders. I have yet to hear a solid argument as to why human capital should be treated differently than physical capital. Both should be able to cross borders easily. Ok with checking for bad guys to avoid crime (which is minimal), but labor should be mobile.
Milton Friedman’s basic argument that with a generous welfare state you can’t have open borders is rock-solid. Bad incentives, at some point unbearable costs to existing residents.
You might disagree with the argument because your values differ; fair enough. But it is a rock-solid argument that is simple to understand.
It’s not rock solid. Empirical evidence shows that immigrants contribute more to welfare state spending making them self fulfilling in terms of their welfare. Also, the question I posit is why is physical capital mobile but human capital not so much.
No, in fact, there is NO empirical evidence showing that allowing *unlimited* numbers of immigrants into a country with a very generous safety net contribute more to welfare than not. Even the research BC cites says as much about the lowest skilled immigrants not being net positive - and that includes illegal immigrants who only have access to a fraction of the safety net, and for understandable reasons of not wanting to be caught don’t use all of the safety net that is offered.
With unlimited legal immigration and a very generous safety net, it don’t compute.
One last time, you are free to disagree as to which policy you prefer, but the argument against that combination is rock solid.
And there are two answers to your question about physical vs human capital: 1) the welfare state. 2) the massive changes to culture (good norms and institutions) that have a high risk of resulting from unlimited immigration.
And I am one who *does* agree with you that absent the generous safety net and the risk to culture, there is an extremely strong argument for free trade in human labor just as in anything else. But those are two HUGE issues in real life.
Unskilled workers may not be a net benefit but is your argument to exclude ONLY them or is your argument against immigration in general? The evidence is clear: Immigrants add value and America would not be the powerhouse it is without them. Also on culture, what culture is the one you defend? White Christian values only? Should we take away women’s right to vote because it was not part of our culture? Cultural arguments are slippery slopes on which we cannot ever agree (and lead quickly to collectivist digressions). Safety nets are also subjective in their application, depth and breadth. You would have to be way more specific than your general statements against immigrants and their “poisoning” of your culture to entertain a meaningful discussion. The fact that you don’t like immigrants is hypocritical at best given than your probably come from a long list of immigrants yourself. Finally saying that welfare state is an argument against human capital equating physical capital is nonsensical or needs further clarification.
Ok, I am willing to respond to you despite your many false claims.
I am all for legal immigration. We are a nation of immigrants. Your statement that I don’t like immigrants is baseless. What I don’t like is illegal immigration.
As a matter of policy, I would enforce the existing laws against illegal immigration to reduce it to the trickle it once was, or at least the relatively small numbers it was in the 90s. After that, I would allow virtually unlimited high skill immigration, and a fairly large amount of low skill immigration. From all countries, but at least partly biased towards our hemisphere. But it should not be unlimited, it should be based on what we can reasonably absorb. I’m confident, however, that my views of how much legal immigration to allow (again, after radically reducing illegal immigration) would be more than what 80% of Americans would choose, perhaps even more than that.
Re: culture - which equals norms and institutions primarily, certainly in this context - I would suggest you search elsewhere on Substack for what this means. America was a wonderful melting pot in the 20th century (the first half of which, I’ll note, the safety net was minimal, at best), and I remain all for the American melting pot. It is one of our country’s greatest strengths.
The discussion above was specifically about whether truly open borders - LITERAL UNLIMITED MIGRATION - is compatible with a generous safety net. My claim and Milton Friedman’s is that it is not. I stand by that, and stand by the claim that you have no evidence that contradicts this. Incentives matter, and unlimited immigration would have particularly perverse incentives when combined with our generous safety net.
Then you asked why human capital is different from physical capital, and the answer is partly the same as I just stated, and partly that unlimited immigration - unless one is willing to entertain a permanently dual-class citizenship status - runs an enormous risk of changing institutions and norms of a good culture.
By which I ain’t referring to religion, or ethnicity - let alone ridiculous assertions of rolling back women’s right to vote - but on things like socialism, government power, equality of opportunity vs equality of outcomes, respect for the rule of law, etc., etc., etc.
If you prefer to cast aspersions and make assumptions about people’s beliefs, rather than take and address arguments at face value, I suggest you go to most of the other social media sites where that is rampant. I come to Substack precisely because I love that people here argue ideas rather than hurl cancel-culture ad hominem attacks.
I can't help but notice that there is a strong correlation between condemning illegal immigration and being a COVID NPI scofflaw. It's weird that those people are so adamant in one case, but not the other. If I didn't know any better I'd think that perhaps they were arguing in bad faith....
I would be fine with strict enforcement of speeding laws! If a law doesn't make sense, let's fix it or get rid of it instead of ignoring it while people become habituated to breaking the rules. While I am in favor of letting more people into the US to live and work, I disagree with arguing *for* illegal immigration. If we want to allow more immigration, let's legalize it instead of advocating for breaking laws.
Actually speeding is a particularly bad law to have strict enforcement. Because then people would push for higher speed limits, and so the variance in speeds driven would increase.
Other than on city streets with children present or a lot of pedestrians, there is unabashed goodness to the concept of what the technical speed limit is, combined with the norms of how much is acceptable to go over the limit.
I'll meet you halfway, however: laws like in Canada that make clear that if you go more than XX kilometers above the speed limit you will face a massive fine/penalty.
[BTW, I completely agree with your last 2 sentences specifically about immigration.]
"If a law doesn't make sense, let's fix it or get rid of it"
This doesn't work like this, does it? Mainly because the "subject" in this "make sense" part is missing. Makes sense to whom? Every single law makes sense to some individuals and not at all to others. There is not such a thing as a "collective being" to whom things make or doesn't make sense
Sorry, but due respect, all he’s claiming is a “we the people” thing. And however imperfectly, our legal system (and every European and now Asian variant thereof) has worked the same way.
Either way, you are surely not arguing that the brazen total disregard for current American immigration law by the border czar Kamala Harris-Biden administration is the proper way to go about things, are you?
Thank you for this enlightening post