5 ms·

> The income of laborers and low-wage workers has been artificially suppressed due to uncontrolled immigration working at rates lower than minimum wage. Source

> The income of laborers and low-wage workers has been artificially suppressed due to uncontrolled immigration working at rates lower than minimum wage. Source?

dukeluke 10y ago
Logic. There are 11 million illegal immigrants in a country of about 300 million. Assuming around 7 million of those work & assuming 6 million of those work at or below minimum wage, that means that 2 percent of the population is probably underpaid. That doesn't sound like much until you consider that almost all of that 2 percent is working in some sort of manual labor, whether it's agriculture, construction or housework.
- denzil_correa 10y ago
  If the logic is so sound, it should not be difficult to prove. So, I'd wait until you prove it via data and get accepted by an independent fora. Until then, this is one of the many plausible theories.
  - newmanships 10y ago
    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_impact_of_illegal_immigrants_in_the_United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_impact_of_illegal_i... Tl;Dr - wages for lower class/lower educated minorities are hurt, but employers gain an advantage (lower labor costs). There's also a paper by professor in econ from Cornell about African Americans suffering the most from it, but my phone won't link to the PDF. Outside of academia you just have to go to your local home depot to see how much cheaper you can get someone to come work for you for the day, or go to any massage shop charging $25 / hour instead of $60+ while employing illegal immigrants.
    - denzil_correa 10y ago
      Thanks. > while employing illegal immigrants. It's important to note what the original claim of the parent comment was. It was not "illegal immigrants" but "uncontrolled immigration" which includes both legal AND illegal immigrants.
      - newmanships 10y ago
        In regards to legal immigrants there seems to be frequent discussions on HN about H1B visas and their effects. Here's an article talking about them. http://www.sciencemag.org/careers/2015/05/economists-h-1b-visas-suppress-wages http://www.sciencemag.org/careers/2015/05/economists-h-1b-vi... (the direct link to the study is in there as well) Edit: I should clarify - this isn't the only way to immigrate / cover all use cases, etc etc - just that in this & my first comment there does seem to be some wage suppression occurring in some forms related to various immigration.
        denzil_correa 10y ago
        The parent comment also claims it is "artificial suppression". In fact, even if the H1B effects are said to be true - it seems the issue is not legal immigration but HOW the H1B visas are granted and to whom. This is entirely different than the implication of the parent comment which seems to suggest to halt immigration.
        newmanships 10y ago
        Parent comment also is only referring to low-wage jobs so I suppose the entire H1B thing is irrelevant to the discussion. Not sure what you're looking for... you asked for a source - seems clear that yes, wages for some groups are "artificially suppressed" by "uncontrolled immigration". Is immigration uncontrolled? Yes immigration is not 100% controlled, hence illegal immigrants are a thing. I suppose you could argue that wages are suppressed "naturally" because of uncontrolled immigration if you want to argue about semantics in order to ignore the research that does show wages are suppressed.
        10y ago
bruceb 10y ago
George Jesus Borjas, Harvard Economics prof has thoughts on this: http://cis.org/Borjas http://cis.org/Borjas
- denzil_correa 10y ago
  I'm not really an expert in Economics. I tried to read through it but couldn't quite understand the main take away. What exactly is the relevant take away wrt this discussion?
  - shard972 10y ago
    The best empirical research that tries to examine what has actually happened in the U.S. labor market aligns well with economy theory: An increase in the number of workers leads to lower wages. This report focuses on the labor market impact of immigration.
    - denzil_correa 10y ago
      I get what the report focuses on. The report has to be contextualized with two important phrases used in the parent comment "uncontrolled immigration" AND "artificial suppression" of wages.
shard972 10y ago
It's just supply and demand isn't it? If you have a larger supply of workers due to laws around immigration being laxed, does it not stand to reason that the increased competition would lead to lower wages? Especially when an economy is not at full employment, like the the US.
- denzil_correa 10y ago
  There are two important points in the comment above : (1) Immigration is "uncontrolled" in the U.S. and (2) Wages are artificially suppressed. I'd like to see a source on both of those parts. Each and every word chosen in the comment above is critical to the claim being made (artificial and uncontrolled; in particular).
  - shard972 10y ago
    > (1) Immigration is "uncontrolled" in the U.S. If you are taking uncontrolled in it's most literal definition then you won't find a source, otherwise all you need to do is look at situation in the US with sanctuary cities. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanctuary_city https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanctuary_city As an Australian, I find the whole concept a bit baffling. That a city just decides "If you make it to this city, we will protect you from immigration laws". I don't see how you could describe an immigration system as "under control" if all the rules can be thrown out the window if you get to a "safe zone". I know this shooting has been referenced alot in the US and i think it's a good example of this, how can immigration be considered under control when a man can be deported 5 times and still get back in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Kathryn_Steinle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Kathryn_Steinle > (2) Wages are artificially suppressed. Well again, like all things in politics definitions are not always a constant. Artificial in this case could describe a host of valid definitions from Any government action on a free economy to overly burdensome regulations and mandates that force a market obviously in one direction. I'm sure some people would argue that taxation itself is wage suppression. So for this case, I would say when you take the fact the US's labor particpation rate still hasn't recovered to pre-GFC levels http://www.politifact.com/virginia/statements/2016/jun/13/dave-brat/dave-brat-us-labor-participation-rate-lowest-70s/ http://www.politifact.com/virginia/statements/2016/jun/13/da..., the laxing of immigration laws combined with stagnating wages http://www.epi.org/publication/charting-wage-stagnation/ http://www.epi.org/publication/charting-wage-stagnation/. I think you can definitely make an argument that wages have been suppressed by these policies.

> The income of laborers and low-wage workers has been artificially suppressed due to uncontrolled immigration working at rates lower than minimum wage. Source?

dukeluke 10y ago

Logic. There are 11 million illegal immigrants in a country of about 300 million. Assuming around 7 million of those work & assuming 6 million of those work at or below minimum wage, that means that 2 percent of the population is probably underpaid. That doesn't sound like much until you consider that almost all of that 2 percent is working in some sort of manual labor, whether it's agriculture, construction or housework.

denzil_correa 10y ago
If the logic is so sound, it should not be difficult to prove. So, I'd wait until you prove it via data and get accepted by an independent fora. Until then, this is one of the many plausible theories.
- newmanships 10y ago
  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_impact_of_illegal_immigrants_in_the_United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_impact_of_illegal_i... Tl;Dr - wages for lower class/lower educated minorities are hurt, but employers gain an advantage (lower labor costs). There's also a paper by professor in econ from Cornell about African Americans suffering the most from it, but my phone won't link to the PDF. Outside of academia you just have to go to your local home depot to see how much cheaper you can get someone to come work for you for the day, or go to any massage shop charging $25 / hour instead of $60+ while employing illegal immigrants.
  - denzil_correa 10y ago
    Thanks. > while employing illegal immigrants. It's important to note what the original claim of the parent comment was. It was not "illegal immigrants" but "uncontrolled immigration" which includes both legal AND illegal immigrants.
    - newmanships 10y ago
      In regards to legal immigrants there seems to be frequent discussions on HN about H1B visas and their effects. Here's an article talking about them. http://www.sciencemag.org/careers/2015/05/economists-h-1b-visas-suppress-wages http://www.sciencemag.org/careers/2015/05/economists-h-1b-vi... (the direct link to the study is in there as well) Edit: I should clarify - this isn't the only way to immigrate / cover all use cases, etc etc - just that in this & my first comment there does seem to be some wage suppression occurring in some forms related to various immigration.
      - denzil_correa 10y ago
        The parent comment also claims it is "artificial suppression". In fact, even if the H1B effects are said to be true - it seems the issue is not legal immigration but HOW the H1B visas are granted and to whom. This is entirely different than the implication of the parent comment which seems to suggest to halt immigration.
        newmanships 10y ago
        Parent comment also is only referring to low-wage jobs so I suppose the entire H1B thing is irrelevant to the discussion. Not sure what you're looking for... you asked for a source - seems clear that yes, wages for some groups are "artificially suppressed" by "uncontrolled immigration". Is immigration uncontrolled? Yes immigration is not 100% controlled, hence illegal immigrants are a thing. I suppose you could argue that wages are suppressed "naturally" because of uncontrolled immigration if you want to argue about semantics in order to ignore the research that does show wages are suppressed.
        10y ago

bruceb 10y ago

George Jesus Borjas, Harvard Economics prof has thoughts on this: http://cis.org/Borjas http://cis.org/Borjas

denzil_correa 10y ago
I'm not really an expert in Economics. I tried to read through it but couldn't quite understand the main take away. What exactly is the relevant take away wrt this discussion?
- shard972 10y ago
  The best empirical research that tries to examine what has actually happened in the U.S. labor market aligns well with economy theory: An increase in the number of workers leads to lower wages. This report focuses on the labor market impact of immigration.
  - denzil_correa 10y ago
    I get what the report focuses on. The report has to be contextualized with two important phrases used in the parent comment "uncontrolled immigration" AND "artificial suppression" of wages.

shard972 10y ago

It's just supply and demand isn't it? If you have a larger supply of workers due to laws around immigration being laxed, does it not stand to reason that the increased competition would lead to lower wages? Especially when an economy is not at full employment, like the the US.

denzil_correa 10y ago
There are two important points in the comment above : (1) Immigration is "uncontrolled" in the U.S. and (2) Wages are artificially suppressed. I'd like to see a source on both of those parts. Each and every word chosen in the comment above is critical to the claim being made (artificial and uncontrolled; in particular).
- shard972 10y ago
  > (1) Immigration is "uncontrolled" in the U.S. If you are taking uncontrolled in it's most literal definition then you won't find a source, otherwise all you need to do is look at situation in the US with sanctuary cities. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanctuary_city https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanctuary_city As an Australian, I find the whole concept a bit baffling. That a city just decides "If you make it to this city, we will protect you from immigration laws". I don't see how you could describe an immigration system as "under control" if all the rules can be thrown out the window if you get to a "safe zone". I know this shooting has been referenced alot in the US and i think it's a good example of this, how can immigration be considered under control when a man can be deported 5 times and still get back in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Kathryn_Steinle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Kathryn_Steinle > (2) Wages are artificially suppressed. Well again, like all things in politics definitions are not always a constant. Artificial in this case could describe a host of valid definitions from Any government action on a free economy to overly burdensome regulations and mandates that force a market obviously in one direction. I'm sure some people would argue that taxation itself is wage suppression. So for this case, I would say when you take the fact the US's labor particpation rate still hasn't recovered to pre-GFC levels http://www.politifact.com/virginia/statements/2016/jun/13/dave-brat/dave-brat-us-labor-participation-rate-lowest-70s/ http://www.politifact.com/virginia/statements/2016/jun/13/da..., the laxing of immigration laws combined with stagnating wages http://www.epi.org/publication/charting-wage-stagnation/ http://www.epi.org/publication/charting-wage-stagnation/. I think you can definitely make an argument that wages have been suppressed by these policies.