6 ms·

“Strong population growth is a key contributor to economic prosperity” This is the main ingredient of any pyramid scheme.

by folli 8y ago

ekianjo 8y ago
This is especially laughable as a claim when you look at European countries with high immigration and at best very weak economic growth. How do they explain that?
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- sparkling 8y ago
  I cringe when i hear western european leaders talk about how their countries must accept immigration from third world countries to "save the economy" or "stabilize the social service systems". Even if these immigrants end up to be net tax payers after all the costs of feeding, housing, integrating these people... well, guess what, eventually they get old too and this circle starts over.
  - TeMPOraL 8y ago
    > well, guess what, eventually they get old too and this circle starts over. Our economies are built on the assumption of endless growth. Those immigrants better have children above the replacement rate.
  - geff82 8y ago
    Sorry to tell you that there is a big difference between regular immigrants and refugees. A regular Immigrant to Europe usually is a net win from day one because they have been educated for free in their country of origin, while the upfront cost of raising someone in your own country with your own taxes is quite high (Kindergarten, school, university...).
    - insertcredit 8y ago
      This is an oversimplification. A lot (most?) of the problematic immigrants in the EU come from developing countries and are not very well (if at all) educated. There are exceptions of course. In Germany where I live there has been a massive wave of immigrants coming from Greece. Having met quite a few, a lot of them have a university-level education and decided to immigrate in order to escape from a corrupt non-meritocratic state and make the most of their abilities. Greece is a member of the EU and culturally belongs in the west thus there are no cultural clashes or assimilation issues, which is why Germany is a net winner in this case. On the flipside, we also have a lot of immigrants from Africa / Egypt / Morocco / the Middle East that lack any sort of education and contribute to rising crime and cultural dilution. Islam makes it even worse, since it's very exclusive and does not allow for cultural assimilation to take place. Now, keep in mind that a lot of these immigrants also seek to game the state via rent-seeking and typically have a lot of children. The writing on the wall if the current policies continue is not hard to discern. For immigrants coming from outside the EU, I'm a firm supporter of Singapore's first-order eugenic criteria. Countries should adopt harsh immigration policies and accept people who probabilistically will turn out to be assets to society. Unfortunately, populism is experiencing a renaissance in Europe, and it's very easy for politicians to appeal to the brainwashed masses on "humanitarian" grounds to vote for policies that will lead to major clashes in the future. In some EU countries, implementing said liberal immigration policies has led to the rapid rise of nationalist parties so backlash is already happening (and in the worst possible way).
      - selimthegrim 8y ago
        > Islam makes it even worse, since it's very exclusive and does not allow for cultural assimilation to take place. I have seen some generalizations on HN but this is a howler - takes the cake.
  - Hasknewbie 8y ago
    >> "Even if these immigrants end up to be net tax payers after all the costs of feeding, housing, integrating these people" So, I don't know how immigration works on your planet, but here in the real world immigrants do not get free "feeding, housing" or free anything-else. In fact a key condition in even the most open/lenient countries is that you must show proof that you can provide for yourself. Any other way would simply not make any sense, and I am always in awe at the level of confabulation needed to believe these nativist fairy tales. Or maybe you're one of these people who mistake immigrants for refugees?
    - s9w 8y ago
      Immigrants and "refugees" are more or less interchangeable. They are both used similarly by politicians who call for immigration and mean refugees and open borders. And they certainly are used very loosely by the people themselves, who just need to mumble that they are Syrian to get all the goodies. But anyways - both do definitely not have to proof that they can provide for themselves. At least not in large parts of Europe.
      - lawlessone 8y ago
        >who just need to mumble that they are Syrian to get all the goodies. Maybe you should stay off the chans and Voat there buddy, maybe stop reading Brietbart.
        s9w 8y ago
        There is no reasonable process to verify refugee claims. There are countless cases of refugees having multiple "identities" by just going from center to center and get their money. Even Anis amri (Berlin terrorist) had 14 identities. edit: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-38516691 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-38516691
        lawlessone 8y ago
        >multiple identities apparently enabled him to claim large amounts in welfare benefits. Pretty sure you don't have to be a migrant to do that. Plenty of people doing it in my country are locals.
- Arnt 8y ago
  Which ones are that? It's an honest question. I can't think of any. But for all I know, immigration to some Andorra/Albania/whatever has been significantly higher than emigration every year for the past ten. I can't recall reading anything with data and I'd like to know.
  - wott 8y ago
    Andorra?? You know what Andorra is? Obviously not :-D
    - Arnt 8y ago
      I've been there.
      - wott 8y ago
        Wonderful. My family and I have been living for the last 80 years exactly 20 miles away from the Andorran border so I am 100% comfortable calling your statements a bunch of baloney, no matter what the mod may say, thank you. And thanks as well for flagging me, that's highly appreciated.
    - dang 8y ago
      Please don't post unsubstantive comments here.
      - wott 8y ago
        More substantive than the one I answered (OP named random small European countries without any idea of what they are), and intended to have people question the nonsense of that association of Andorra and Albania and thus the pretended knowledge of the poster by at least looking what Andorra is. Obviously nobody knew nor cares, and he could get away with spreading complete bullshit. I didn't think it could be so, I thought at least a few Europeans would be around, because everybody around knows that associating Andorra and Albania is like associating Monaco or Lichtenstein with Sierra Leone. Hence the sarcastic comment. So, I'll spend 45 minutes writing this since nobody can read Wikipedia for 5 seconds. Andorra is a principality, a tiny rich country located between France in Spain, uses Euro as currency, and has some traditional weird governance shared by the president of France and a Spanish archbishop. It is a tax haven which lives on tourism (semi-luxury, I'd say, most expensive ski resorts in the Pyrenees, if it did not change), duty free stores, and more or less shady banking. They speak Catalan, but also fluent French and/or Spanish for business reasons (and because they are so few and the country is so small). That is to say they are perfectly integrated with their French and Spanish neighbours. So, this is a country of significantly less than 100,000 inhabitants (no, no figure is missing) with a rather fixed structure of "who owns what", that ranks in wealth/inhabitant among Australia and Germany. You still think it makes any sense to talk about immigration/emigration from/to Andorra? On the other hand, Albania is an eastern country, which was already the poorest country of the Eastern block when it was still a thing; its wealth compares with Venezuela and Mongolia; it has more than 40 times as many inhabitants as Andorra and... a 'tradition' of massive emigration. For example, there is zero geographical, cultural, or historical connection between France and Albania, and yet they represent the most numerous asylum seekers in France; despite the fact that they have zero chance to be granted asylum, since their country is safe and they are not threatened by anyone, yet they keep on coming (same in Germany). There is also the Albanian mafia, spread all around the world. So, now I have lost 45 minutes explaining stuff of public knowledge on a buried thread none will read... Great.
- Leary 8y ago
  Correlation does not mean causation. People migrate to richer countries. Richer countries are higher on the technological frontier and therefore it's more difficult to increase their per capita productivity, and therefore have weak growth.
yoran 8y ago
I've always thought the opposite. If your GDP increases by 1% but so does your population, then you've effectively gained nothing in GDP per capita.
- adventured 8y ago
  Japan for example has been the poster child for the premise that you desperately need immigration and need to avoid population contraction. The better solution is to allow your population to contract and seek to boost the per capita output over time through augmentation with higher automation - robotics, AI, et al. The overall net economy size may stagnate or contract... so what, that's not the most important thing. The most important thing is the quality of life of each person. Less pressure on the environment, less pressure on housing, higher standard of living per capita. The primary argument I see in the developed world for needing endless overall population expansion, is that a lot of entitlement programs are shaky ponzi schemes that require ever larger numbers of new workers to pay for the last generation's benefits or the entire thing collapses in a shattered social contract. Sweden for example is dealing with that debate: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-06-26/now-even-swedes-are-questioning-the-welfare-state https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-06-26/now-even-...
- BartBoch 8y ago
  The 1% of the population you are talking about needs 20 years before adding to the economy. The results will be visible once they will enter the market.
- bodas 8y ago
  Well yes, but how suitable is GDP/capita as a measure? e.g. If you care for your own parents or children you have contributed nothing to GDP, but if you put them in a nursing home or daycare then you have. If you grow your own food and eat it, you have contributed nothing to GDP, but if you buy it, you have. If you clean your kitchen you have contributed nothing to GDP but if you hire a cleaner then you have. A country where your actions are judged on whether they improve improve GDP or GDP/capita would be a terrible place to live.
  - 8y ago
onion2k 8y ago
The difference is that in a pyramid scheme regardless of how many people enter at the bottom, people further up are putting in a fixed amount and then stop contributing. The money in the pyramid only flows upwards. In the case of population growth new people act as a multiplier for people already in the network - businesses are able to grow with new customers, provide new services, hire more people, pay them, and they buy things, so money flows both up and down the pyramid.

“Strong population growth is a key contributor to economic prosperity” This is the main ingredient of any pyramid scheme.

by folli 8y ago

“Strong population growth is a key contributor to economic prosperity” This is the main ingredient of any pyramid scheme.

ekianjo 8y ago

This is especially laughable as a claim when you look at European countries with high immigration and at best very weak economic growth. How do they explain that?

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
sparkling 8y ago
I cringe when i hear western european leaders talk about how their countries must accept immigration from third world countries to "save the economy" or "stabilize the social service systems". Even if these immigrants end up to be net tax payers after all the costs of feeding, housing, integrating these people... well, guess what, eventually they get old too and this circle starts over.
- TeMPOraL 8y ago
  > well, guess what, eventually they get old too and this circle starts over. Our economies are built on the assumption of endless growth. Those immigrants better have children above the replacement rate.
- geff82 8y ago
  Sorry to tell you that there is a big difference between regular immigrants and refugees. A regular Immigrant to Europe usually is a net win from day one because they have been educated for free in their country of origin, while the upfront cost of raising someone in your own country with your own taxes is quite high (Kindergarten, school, university...).
  - insertcredit 8y ago
    This is an oversimplification. A lot (most?) of the problematic immigrants in the EU come from developing countries and are not very well (if at all) educated. There are exceptions of course. In Germany where I live there has been a massive wave of immigrants coming from Greece. Having met quite a few, a lot of them have a university-level education and decided to immigrate in order to escape from a corrupt non-meritocratic state and make the most of their abilities. Greece is a member of the EU and culturally belongs in the west thus there are no cultural clashes or assimilation issues, which is why Germany is a net winner in this case. On the flipside, we also have a lot of immigrants from Africa / Egypt / Morocco / the Middle East that lack any sort of education and contribute to rising crime and cultural dilution. Islam makes it even worse, since it's very exclusive and does not allow for cultural assimilation to take place. Now, keep in mind that a lot of these immigrants also seek to game the state via rent-seeking and typically have a lot of children. The writing on the wall if the current policies continue is not hard to discern. For immigrants coming from outside the EU, I'm a firm supporter of Singapore's first-order eugenic criteria. Countries should adopt harsh immigration policies and accept people who probabilistically will turn out to be assets to society. Unfortunately, populism is experiencing a renaissance in Europe, and it's very easy for politicians to appeal to the brainwashed masses on "humanitarian" grounds to vote for policies that will lead to major clashes in the future. In some EU countries, implementing said liberal immigration policies has led to the rapid rise of nationalist parties so backlash is already happening (and in the worst possible way).
    - selimthegrim 8y ago
      > Islam makes it even worse, since it's very exclusive and does not allow for cultural assimilation to take place. I have seen some generalizations on HN but this is a howler - takes the cake.
- Hasknewbie 8y ago
  >> "Even if these immigrants end up to be net tax payers after all the costs of feeding, housing, integrating these people" So, I don't know how immigration works on your planet, but here in the real world immigrants do not get free "feeding, housing" or free anything-else. In fact a key condition in even the most open/lenient countries is that you must show proof that you can provide for yourself. Any other way would simply not make any sense, and I am always in awe at the level of confabulation needed to believe these nativist fairy tales. Or maybe you're one of these people who mistake immigrants for refugees?
  - s9w 8y ago
    Immigrants and "refugees" are more or less interchangeable. They are both used similarly by politicians who call for immigration and mean refugees and open borders. And they certainly are used very loosely by the people themselves, who just need to mumble that they are Syrian to get all the goodies. But anyways - both do definitely not have to proof that they can provide for themselves. At least not in large parts of Europe.
    - lawlessone 8y ago
      >who just need to mumble that they are Syrian to get all the goodies. Maybe you should stay off the chans and Voat there buddy, maybe stop reading Brietbart.
      - s9w 8y ago
        There is no reasonable process to verify refugee claims. There are countless cases of refugees having multiple "identities" by just going from center to center and get their money. Even Anis amri (Berlin terrorist) had 14 identities. edit: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-38516691 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-38516691
        lawlessone 8y ago
        >multiple identities apparently enabled him to claim large amounts in welfare benefits. Pretty sure you don't have to be a migrant to do that. Plenty of people doing it in my country are locals.
Arnt 8y ago
Which ones are that? It's an honest question. I can't think of any. But for all I know, immigration to some Andorra/Albania/whatever has been significantly higher than emigration every year for the past ten. I can't recall reading anything with data and I'd like to know.
- wott 8y ago
  Andorra?? You know what Andorra is? Obviously not :-D
  - Arnt 8y ago
    I've been there.
    - wott 8y ago
      Wonderful. My family and I have been living for the last 80 years exactly 20 miles away from the Andorran border so I am 100% comfortable calling your statements a bunch of baloney, no matter what the mod may say, thank you. And thanks as well for flagging me, that's highly appreciated.
  - dang 8y ago
    Please don't post unsubstantive comments here.
    - wott 8y ago
      More substantive than the one I answered (OP named random small European countries without any idea of what they are), and intended to have people question the nonsense of that association of Andorra and Albania and thus the pretended knowledge of the poster by at least looking what Andorra is. Obviously nobody knew nor cares, and he could get away with spreading complete bullshit. I didn't think it could be so, I thought at least a few Europeans would be around, because everybody around knows that associating Andorra and Albania is like associating Monaco or Lichtenstein with Sierra Leone. Hence the sarcastic comment. So, I'll spend 45 minutes writing this since nobody can read Wikipedia for 5 seconds. Andorra is a principality, a tiny rich country located between France in Spain, uses Euro as currency, and has some traditional weird governance shared by the president of France and a Spanish archbishop. It is a tax haven which lives on tourism (semi-luxury, I'd say, most expensive ski resorts in the Pyrenees, if it did not change), duty free stores, and more or less shady banking. They speak Catalan, but also fluent French and/or Spanish for business reasons (and because they are so few and the country is so small). That is to say they are perfectly integrated with their French and Spanish neighbours. So, this is a country of significantly less than 100,000 inhabitants (no, no figure is missing) with a rather fixed structure of "who owns what", that ranks in wealth/inhabitant among Australia and Germany. You still think it makes any sense to talk about immigration/emigration from/to Andorra? On the other hand, Albania is an eastern country, which was already the poorest country of the Eastern block when it was still a thing; its wealth compares with Venezuela and Mongolia; it has more than 40 times as many inhabitants as Andorra and... a 'tradition' of massive emigration. For example, there is zero geographical, cultural, or historical connection between France and Albania, and yet they represent the most numerous asylum seekers in France; despite the fact that they have zero chance to be granted asylum, since their country is safe and they are not threatened by anyone, yet they keep on coming (same in Germany). There is also the Albanian mafia, spread all around the world. So, now I have lost 45 minutes explaining stuff of public knowledge on a buried thread none will read... Great.
Leary 8y ago
Correlation does not mean causation. People migrate to richer countries. Richer countries are higher on the technological frontier and therefore it's more difficult to increase their per capita productivity, and therefore have weak growth.

yoran 8y ago

I've always thought the opposite. If your GDP increases by 1% but so does your population, then you've effectively gained nothing in GDP per capita.

adventured 8y ago
Japan for example has been the poster child for the premise that you desperately need immigration and need to avoid population contraction. The better solution is to allow your population to contract and seek to boost the per capita output over time through augmentation with higher automation - robotics, AI, et al. The overall net economy size may stagnate or contract... so what, that's not the most important thing. The most important thing is the quality of life of each person. Less pressure on the environment, less pressure on housing, higher standard of living per capita. The primary argument I see in the developed world for needing endless overall population expansion, is that a lot of entitlement programs are shaky ponzi schemes that require ever larger numbers of new workers to pay for the last generation's benefits or the entire thing collapses in a shattered social contract. Sweden for example is dealing with that debate: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-06-26/now-even-swedes-are-questioning-the-welfare-state https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-06-26/now-even-...
BartBoch 8y ago
The 1% of the population you are talking about needs 20 years before adding to the economy. The results will be visible once they will enter the market.
bodas 8y ago
Well yes, but how suitable is GDP/capita as a measure? e.g. If you care for your own parents or children you have contributed nothing to GDP, but if you put them in a nursing home or daycare then you have. If you grow your own food and eat it, you have contributed nothing to GDP, but if you buy it, you have. If you clean your kitchen you have contributed nothing to GDP but if you hire a cleaner then you have. A country where your actions are judged on whether they improve improve GDP or GDP/capita would be a terrible place to live.
- 8y ago

onion2k 8y ago

The difference is that in a pyramid scheme regardless of how many people enter at the bottom, people further up are putting in a fixed amount and then stop contributing. The money in the pyramid only flows upwards. In the case of population growth new people act as a multiplier for people already in the network - businesses are able to grow with new customers, provide new services, hire more people, pay them, and they buy things, so money flows both up and down the pyramid.