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> But the wages of Americans with American parents has risen, not fallen. Wages for Americans with American parents in the lowest quintile of income have risen

> But the wages of Americans with American parents has risen, not fallen. Wages for Americans with American parents in the lowest quintile of income have risen the most - that seems like exactly the opposite of what your theory predicts! Are you certain that this applies to Americans that don't have a college education? That didn't graduate from high school? Those who would suffer most economically from uneducated immigrants? And one must average in those who are unemployed (eg, 0 wages). Don't look at averages, look at distributions.

yummyfajitas 10y ago
Are you certain that this applies to Americans that don't have a college education? No, I am not certain that Americans with American parents in the bottom 20% didn't get an education. Some of them probably did (about half the population has at least some college) and had their place at the bottom of the ladder filled by an immigrant. Don't look at averages, look at distributions. It helps if you actually follow the link provided and look at the exact figure being cited. Then you'd see it's a histogram of a distribution!
- davidf18 10y ago
  One of the documents is 38 pages and the other is 20 pages. Were there are emotions such as immigration and especially illegal immigration, it is important to provide the data and answer the exact question which I could not see the proper distribution. “The facts support the application of Ricardo’s theory to immigration. Skilled immigrants lower the wages of skilled natives, and unskilled immigrants lower the wages of unskilled natives. … In contrast, in the United States, which takes in a far higher percentage of low-skilled immigrants than the U.K. does, it is unskilled wages that have stayed low: the income of unskilled workers has barely kept pace with inflation for the last forty years.” -- Tim Harford: The Undercover Economist (2nd ed) p. 30 https://www.amazon.com/dp/0199926514/ https://www.amazon.com/dp/0199926514/ Financial Times columnist Harford has a BS & MS Economics Oxford The question is: For people whose parents were born in the US without a high school education and also without a college education, and including those who have no income because they can't get a job is there wage growth or a decrease? It is economists that state that immigrants who are uneducated displace those citizens who are working class.
  - yummyfajitas 10y ago
    You may be right that the particular slice of people you single out has also had a decrease in wage growth. Do you have any evidence of this? Or are you simply assuming that all unknown facts support your position? In any case, the specific stats Harford cites are cross sectional. This means the averages include immigrants and fall victim to the exact same Simpson's Paradox issue that I discuss above. To show that immigrants have reduced anyone's wages, you need longitudinal data. And your question is also malformed, because you don't specify whether you are discussing the children (who may be educated) of uneducated American parents, or the uneducated children of American parents (who may or may not have been uneducated).
    - davidf18 10y ago
      My intent to is to ask about the children of people born in America. The parents lacked a high school or college education and the children lacked a high school or college education. Average wages don't work unless it also takes into account people in this category who are want jobs but are unable to get them. In order to successfully complete college, one needs an IQ of 110 which is of course above average of 100. Others are being left out not because they don't work hard, but because of biology/opportunity. If one reads Harford's book, which I found out from the Freakonomics people, they'll get a better idea that the intent is that low educated immigrants compete with low educated American citizens for jobs and drive down wages and that highly educated immigrants (think H1-B visas) compete with highly educated American citizens. The problem is not immigration, but the percentage of the population should have remained at 5% of the population and not at nearly 14% (which does not include 11 million immigrants here illegally). By comparison, in 1990 about 1 million of 60 million Brits (1.5%) and now it is 3.3 million or about 5%. The legal immigrant levels in the US today are 3 times that of the level the Brits voted for BrExit.

yummyfajitas 10y ago

Are you certain that this applies to Americans that don't have a college education? No, I am not certain that Americans with American parents in the bottom 20% didn't get an education. Some of them probably did (about half the population has at least some college) and had their place at the bottom of the ladder filled by an immigrant. Don't look at averages, look at distributions. It helps if you actually follow the link provided and look at the exact figure being cited. Then you'd see it's a histogram of a distribution!

davidf18 10y ago
One of the documents is 38 pages and the other is 20 pages. Were there are emotions such as immigration and especially illegal immigration, it is important to provide the data and answer the exact question which I could not see the proper distribution. “The facts support the application of Ricardo’s theory to immigration. Skilled immigrants lower the wages of skilled natives, and unskilled immigrants lower the wages of unskilled natives. … In contrast, in the United States, which takes in a far higher percentage of low-skilled immigrants than the U.K. does, it is unskilled wages that have stayed low: the income of unskilled workers has barely kept pace with inflation for the last forty years.” -- Tim Harford: The Undercover Economist (2nd ed) p. 30 https://www.amazon.com/dp/0199926514/ https://www.amazon.com/dp/0199926514/ Financial Times columnist Harford has a BS & MS Economics Oxford The question is: For people whose parents were born in the US without a high school education and also without a college education, and including those who have no income because they can't get a job is there wage growth or a decrease? It is economists that state that immigrants who are uneducated displace those citizens who are working class.
- yummyfajitas 10y ago
  You may be right that the particular slice of people you single out has also had a decrease in wage growth. Do you have any evidence of this? Or are you simply assuming that all unknown facts support your position? In any case, the specific stats Harford cites are cross sectional. This means the averages include immigrants and fall victim to the exact same Simpson's Paradox issue that I discuss above. To show that immigrants have reduced anyone's wages, you need longitudinal data. And your question is also malformed, because you don't specify whether you are discussing the children (who may be educated) of uneducated American parents, or the uneducated children of American parents (who may or may not have been uneducated).
  - davidf18 10y ago
    My intent to is to ask about the children of people born in America. The parents lacked a high school or college education and the children lacked a high school or college education. Average wages don't work unless it also takes into account people in this category who are want jobs but are unable to get them. In order to successfully complete college, one needs an IQ of 110 which is of course above average of 100. Others are being left out not because they don't work hard, but because of biology/opportunity. If one reads Harford's book, which I found out from the Freakonomics people, they'll get a better idea that the intent is that low educated immigrants compete with low educated American citizens for jobs and drive down wages and that highly educated immigrants (think H1-B visas) compete with highly educated American citizens. The problem is not immigration, but the percentage of the population should have remained at 5% of the population and not at nearly 14% (which does not include 11 million immigrants here illegally). By comparison, in 1990 about 1 million of 60 million Brits (1.5%) and now it is 3.3 million or about 5%. The legal immigrant levels in the US today are 3 times that of the level the Brits voted for BrExit.