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This may be the best article on immigration I have read in a long time. Maybe I'm completely misunderstanding, but why don't we use immigration as a knob just l

This may be the best article on immigration I have read in a long time. Maybe I'm completely misunderstanding, but why don't we use immigration as a knob just like we use interest rates or any other government tool. Too few jobs? Lower the quota. Too many unfilled jobs? Raise the quota. It seems really simple to me.

0verD0ses 10y ago
It's not quite as simple as that. Immigration can in some cases actually create more jobs in the economy, but in other cases doesn't have this effect, so its hard to pinpoint the optimal amount of immigration for economic growth.
- norikki 10y ago
  I would love to see the study that can find a case where immigration creates more jobs than it consumes.
  - jack9 10y ago
    In the farm industry, chicken processing industry, etc. In the 80s, there were buses dedicated to shipping in immigrants to do the manual labor.
  - goodcanadian 10y ago
    Immigration, almost trivially, increases the size of the economy: more mouths to feed, more people to house, more demand for creature comforts. So, immigration increases jobs. Whether it creates more jobs than it consumes is a bit trickier. My money is on, "yes," but I suppose it will always depend on the details. I would also like to see a study; I'm sure someone must have done one.
    - norikki 10y ago
      The question is really: do you care that there is more wealth overall, or do you care that you personally are better off. Most sane people have no urgent desire to start cramming more people into their neighborhoods. What people want are higher standards of living, not the same or worse standards of living split among more people, even if the overall economy is 'bigger'. Many third world population booms are decimating quality-of-life, especially in places like Nigeria, India, and Brazil. The only people who benefit from a bigger overall population and economy at the expense of individuals being better off, are the people at the very top. They want a bigger pie because then their companies have bigger markets to sell their goods. If it comes at the cost of increasing the population so that everyone else is individually poorer, they don't care. You can't become a billionaire in a country of only 100,000 people. There aren't enough people from whom wealth can be concentrated.
      - goodcanadian 10y ago
        Yes, I read the article, and he does seem to imply that is the case with immigrants at the bottom level of skills. However, he also suggests that the total picture is much more complicated . . . it all depends on the details. My money is still on it being a net gain, overall.
  - schoen 10y ago
    Immigration is a form of population growth, so the question is in part what happens when a population gets larger. The new members of the population are increasing the supply of labor and also increasing the demand for goods and services. Overall, that means more economic activity and more total employment. (As the original article points out, that doesn't necessarily mean more employment of people who were in the population before.) You can envision a scenario where this doesn't happen because the new workers earn so little that the new demand they create is tiny, and their employers don't spend their savings on things that ultimately create more employment. (Like if 100 people showed up and started doing work for $0.01 apiece that the previous employees did for $1,000 apiece, and the employer decided to spend the whole $99,999 savings on some good that has very little labor input and that somehow also fails to have a significant multiplier effect that generates employment. In that case, while there has been an increase in total economic activity, there hasn't actually been an increase in employment.) This latter scenario seems pretty unrealistic to me, but I don't know exactly how to describe the conditions under which it would or wouldn't occur.
    - norikki 10y ago
      I agree, the numbers you picked seem extremely unrealistic. However, the scenario you envision is exactly what the Harvard economist who wrote the article has discovered in the USA by looking at employment statistics. There are plenty of ways corporate executives can spend their labor cost savings that do not produce nearly as much labor demand for Americans as was lost to immigrants. Most notably, they can take their assets overseas where no American worker will see a penny of it.
      - schoen 10y ago
        I thought I understood the article author to be saying that employment will typically increase overall as a result of immigration -- but not necessarily total employment among the non-immigrants.
caseysoftware 10y ago
I think one of the differences is that there's the "knob" and then there's the illegal immigration and both have an impact now and well into the future. "Too few jobs" today doesn't mean it will be the same next year or ten years from now. An interest rate change tomorrow will have an immediate impact and shift longer patterns but can be undone or furthered at a later time.. and 10 years from now, it will be lost in the noise.
coldtea 10y ago
>but why don't we use immigration as a knob just like we use interest rates or any other government tool. Too few jobs? Lower the quota. Too many unfilled jobs? Raise the quota. It seems really simple to me. That's exactly what nations do for legal immigration. But for illegal immigration there's no knob. (Well, no pleasant and easily controllable knob).
henrybaxter 10y ago
I believe the author is arguing that, regardless of where you turn the knob (except off), you'll end up with a redistribution of wealth that helps some and hinders others. Put another way: any amount of immigration with current policies will mean more money for immigrants and employers of immigrants, and less money for native workers they are displacing/competing with.
tpeo 10y ago
I'd just like to point out that interest rates are really unlike any other policy instrument. Compare them with other policy instruments (regulations, taxes, social programs, public works) and you'll see that they're more easily changed and create much less hassle among voters. Plus, they have a much more obvious impact in people's pockets and welfare, at least from the viewpoint of the voters.

0verD0ses 10y ago

It's not quite as simple as that. Immigration can in some cases actually create more jobs in the economy, but in other cases doesn't have this effect, so its hard to pinpoint the optimal amount of immigration for economic growth.

norikki 10y ago
I would love to see the study that can find a case where immigration creates more jobs than it consumes.
- jack9 10y ago
  In the farm industry, chicken processing industry, etc. In the 80s, there were buses dedicated to shipping in immigrants to do the manual labor.
- goodcanadian 10y ago
  Immigration, almost trivially, increases the size of the economy: more mouths to feed, more people to house, more demand for creature comforts. So, immigration increases jobs. Whether it creates more jobs than it consumes is a bit trickier. My money is on, "yes," but I suppose it will always depend on the details. I would also like to see a study; I'm sure someone must have done one.
  - norikki 10y ago
    The question is really: do you care that there is more wealth overall, or do you care that you personally are better off. Most sane people have no urgent desire to start cramming more people into their neighborhoods. What people want are higher standards of living, not the same or worse standards of living split among more people, even if the overall economy is 'bigger'. Many third world population booms are decimating quality-of-life, especially in places like Nigeria, India, and Brazil. The only people who benefit from a bigger overall population and economy at the expense of individuals being better off, are the people at the very top. They want a bigger pie because then their companies have bigger markets to sell their goods. If it comes at the cost of increasing the population so that everyone else is individually poorer, they don't care. You can't become a billionaire in a country of only 100,000 people. There aren't enough people from whom wealth can be concentrated.
    - goodcanadian 10y ago
      Yes, I read the article, and he does seem to imply that is the case with immigrants at the bottom level of skills. However, he also suggests that the total picture is much more complicated . . . it all depends on the details. My money is still on it being a net gain, overall.
- schoen 10y ago
  Immigration is a form of population growth, so the question is in part what happens when a population gets larger. The new members of the population are increasing the supply of labor and also increasing the demand for goods and services. Overall, that means more economic activity and more total employment. (As the original article points out, that doesn't necessarily mean more employment of people who were in the population before.) You can envision a scenario where this doesn't happen because the new workers earn so little that the new demand they create is tiny, and their employers don't spend their savings on things that ultimately create more employment. (Like if 100 people showed up and started doing work for $0.01 apiece that the previous employees did for $1,000 apiece, and the employer decided to spend the whole $99,999 savings on some good that has very little labor input and that somehow also fails to have a significant multiplier effect that generates employment. In that case, while there has been an increase in total economic activity, there hasn't actually been an increase in employment.) This latter scenario seems pretty unrealistic to me, but I don't know exactly how to describe the conditions under which it would or wouldn't occur.
  - norikki 10y ago
    I agree, the numbers you picked seem extremely unrealistic. However, the scenario you envision is exactly what the Harvard economist who wrote the article has discovered in the USA by looking at employment statistics. There are plenty of ways corporate executives can spend their labor cost savings that do not produce nearly as much labor demand for Americans as was lost to immigrants. Most notably, they can take their assets overseas where no American worker will see a penny of it.
    - schoen 10y ago
      I thought I understood the article author to be saying that employment will typically increase overall as a result of immigration -- but not necessarily total employment among the non-immigrants.

caseysoftware 10y ago

I think one of the differences is that there's the "knob" and then there's the illegal immigration and both have an impact now and well into the future. "Too few jobs" today doesn't mean it will be the same next year or ten years from now. An interest rate change tomorrow will have an immediate impact and shift longer patterns but can be undone or furthered at a later time.. and 10 years from now, it will be lost in the noise.

coldtea 10y ago

>but why don't we use immigration as a knob just like we use interest rates or any other government tool. Too few jobs? Lower the quota. Too many unfilled jobs? Raise the quota. It seems really simple to me. That's exactly what nations do for legal immigration. But for illegal immigration there's no knob. (Well, no pleasant and easily controllable knob).

henrybaxter 10y ago

I believe the author is arguing that, regardless of where you turn the knob (except off), you'll end up with a redistribution of wealth that helps some and hinders others. Put another way: any amount of immigration with current policies will mean more money for immigrants and employers of immigrants, and less money for native workers they are displacing/competing with.

tpeo 10y ago

I'd just like to point out that interest rates are really unlike any other policy instrument. Compare them with other policy instruments (regulations, taxes, social programs, public works) and you'll see that they're more easily changed and create much less hassle among voters. Plus, they have a much more obvious impact in people's pockets and welfare, at least from the viewpoint of the voters.