4 ms·

Why would they talk about this? The solution is obvious, and the US has practiced the solution for a very long time now: immigration at a sufficient rate to mak

Why would they talk about this? The solution is obvious, and the US has practiced the solution for a very long time now: immigration at a sufficient rate to make up for the decline in population. This is really mostly a problem for Japan and Korea where they don't play sufficiently well with immigrants.

coldtea 4y ago
That's only a solution if you view populations as replaceable, that culture and shared history doesn't matter, and that nations are just arbitrary grouppings of people that can be changed at will. Which works for the US, because it's a country of immigrants from all over the place anyway, colonized quite recently in historical terms (there are nations and cultures with 10x and 20x the longevity and far more continuity). If you start with a country with shared history and a cohesive culture, people are not seen as equally replaceable.
- nwienert 4y ago
  Immigration is a fundamentally incomplete answer that is designed to placate people who don't want to think to deeply about the actual issues. What happens to the countries they are emigrating from? Especially if we do as politicians say and "only accept the best", what does that imply happens to the emigrating nation? Are those countries stable then? And are they also now or in the future experiencing population decline? If population growth is due to being poor, is the strategy to keep them poor?
- coeneedell 4y ago
  This argument seems to have an unsavory consequence. There’s nothing wrong with excluding and persecuting minority groups because they’re not part of the nation. With a country like China, where the now-majority Han culture colonized the minority Wu, Canton, Hokkien, and various small western cultures in the last 100(ish, it was going on before the PRC as well) years, and a narrative of national unity and shared history was fabricated by the government, can we defend anti-immigration policies on the same grounds?
  - berjin 4y ago
    The parent comment amounted to ethnically cleansing the Korean population. It might not involve guns and it might take a 3-4 generations but that is what happens when immigration doors are opened at the behest of corporation lobbied governments with no consideration for the local population.
  - tannhauser23 4y ago
    It's only 'unsavory' if you're ignorant of the history and reality of Korea. Korea is a small, culturally and racially homogenous nation that, within living memory, was colonized by a power that attempted to wipe out its ethnic identity. It has no native racial minority groups. The ethnic and cultural unity of the nation is a source of pride for Koreans. You can't expect a nation like this to import millions of immigrants from other cultures.
  - coldtea 4y ago
    >This argument seems to have an unsavory consequence. There’s nothing wrong with excluding and persecuting minority groups because they’re not part of the nation. Minority groups have been part of different nations for millenia. So saying "they're not part of the nation" is not a given. They're just not be part of the majority group of a nation. Some nations might not even have such a majority group, but be composed of two or more different groups of roughly equal size. Nations aren't monolithic things. But that doesn't meant they're "anything goes", either. Nor does "a nation of people is more than just replecable individuals" has "it's OK to exclude and persecute minority groups" as any kind of necessary consequence, anymore so than "this person doesn't belong to my family" means we can mistreat it. It does however mean that "just bring foreigners in huge numbers to increase the local population" is not exactly a great solution. It might even amount to ethnic cleansing, and this has happened in the past too. Historical immigration was often part of such power plays and land grabs (like against Aboriginals or Southern Africans), or "population engineering" (those in power bringing in populations to divide and conquer, and to replace and suppress local populations). In fact one of the common targets that was yielded against was exactly minority groups local to a nation or part of an empire.
johnwalkr 4y ago
What do you mean by "don't play sufficiently well with immigrants"? Japan is very easy to emigrate to if you have skills (for many visas defined as an undergrad degree). There is no requirement to hire locally first, the process is streamlined based on a points system it's only a several weeks to get a visa and as little as 1 year to get permanent residency. It's also easy to go to university there and stay, or emigrate as a low-level blue collar worker. There's a language barrier but for things like immigration, taxes, help in daily life, most cities offer support in 5+ languages. It is missing the lottery system of the US however.
- midoridensha 4y ago
  It's true that Japan has a very permissive immigration system for high-skill immigrants, because it wants more people like that to help the economy. Japan has a shortage of technical workers, particularly in IT. And I agree, it's done a really good job of providing support for foreigners, better than what I saw in America which is supposedly immigrant-friendly (but not really). However, if this shortage didn't exist and the economy was humming along just fine without any immigration, these lax immigration laws would not be there. Japan used to be very hard to immigrate to prior to this century.
berjin 4y ago
People aren't breeding because it takes much longer to complete an education and save up for a home. Immigration doesn't address this. Immigration at a large scale replaces the culture and race of the locals so what you're suggesting is that Korean people and Korean culture are worth nothing. Let's just make every place on earth a globalist culture with the same people, same language, same brands etc etc. No.
steele 4y ago
Kids in cages Master Policy

coldtea 4y ago

That's only a solution if you view populations as replaceable, that culture and shared history doesn't matter, and that nations are just arbitrary grouppings of people that can be changed at will. Which works for the US, because it's a country of immigrants from all over the place anyway, colonized quite recently in historical terms (there are nations and cultures with 10x and 20x the longevity and far more continuity). If you start with a country with shared history and a cohesive culture, people are not seen as equally replaceable.

nwienert 4y ago
Immigration is a fundamentally incomplete answer that is designed to placate people who don't want to think to deeply about the actual issues. What happens to the countries they are emigrating from? Especially if we do as politicians say and "only accept the best", what does that imply happens to the emigrating nation? Are those countries stable then? And are they also now or in the future experiencing population decline? If population growth is due to being poor, is the strategy to keep them poor?
coeneedell 4y ago
This argument seems to have an unsavory consequence. There’s nothing wrong with excluding and persecuting minority groups because they’re not part of the nation. With a country like China, where the now-majority Han culture colonized the minority Wu, Canton, Hokkien, and various small western cultures in the last 100(ish, it was going on before the PRC as well) years, and a narrative of national unity and shared history was fabricated by the government, can we defend anti-immigration policies on the same grounds?
- berjin 4y ago
  The parent comment amounted to ethnically cleansing the Korean population. It might not involve guns and it might take a 3-4 generations but that is what happens when immigration doors are opened at the behest of corporation lobbied governments with no consideration for the local population.
- tannhauser23 4y ago
  It's only 'unsavory' if you're ignorant of the history and reality of Korea. Korea is a small, culturally and racially homogenous nation that, within living memory, was colonized by a power that attempted to wipe out its ethnic identity. It has no native racial minority groups. The ethnic and cultural unity of the nation is a source of pride for Koreans. You can't expect a nation like this to import millions of immigrants from other cultures.
- coldtea 4y ago
  >This argument seems to have an unsavory consequence. There’s nothing wrong with excluding and persecuting minority groups because they’re not part of the nation. Minority groups have been part of different nations for millenia. So saying "they're not part of the nation" is not a given. They're just not be part of the majority group of a nation. Some nations might not even have such a majority group, but be composed of two or more different groups of roughly equal size. Nations aren't monolithic things. But that doesn't meant they're "anything goes", either. Nor does "a nation of people is more than just replecable individuals" has "it's OK to exclude and persecute minority groups" as any kind of necessary consequence, anymore so than "this person doesn't belong to my family" means we can mistreat it. It does however mean that "just bring foreigners in huge numbers to increase the local population" is not exactly a great solution. It might even amount to ethnic cleansing, and this has happened in the past too. Historical immigration was often part of such power plays and land grabs (like against Aboriginals or Southern Africans), or "population engineering" (those in power bringing in populations to divide and conquer, and to replace and suppress local populations). In fact one of the common targets that was yielded against was exactly minority groups local to a nation or part of an empire.

johnwalkr 4y ago

What do you mean by "don't play sufficiently well with immigrants"? Japan is very easy to emigrate to if you have skills (for many visas defined as an undergrad degree). There is no requirement to hire locally first, the process is streamlined based on a points system it's only a several weeks to get a visa and as little as 1 year to get permanent residency. It's also easy to go to university there and stay, or emigrate as a low-level blue collar worker. There's a language barrier but for things like immigration, taxes, help in daily life, most cities offer support in 5+ languages. It is missing the lottery system of the US however.

midoridensha 4y ago
It's true that Japan has a very permissive immigration system for high-skill immigrants, because it wants more people like that to help the economy. Japan has a shortage of technical workers, particularly in IT. And I agree, it's done a really good job of providing support for foreigners, better than what I saw in America which is supposedly immigrant-friendly (but not really). However, if this shortage didn't exist and the economy was humming along just fine without any immigration, these lax immigration laws would not be there. Japan used to be very hard to immigrate to prior to this century.

berjin 4y ago

People aren't breeding because it takes much longer to complete an education and save up for a home. Immigration doesn't address this. Immigration at a large scale replaces the culture and race of the locals so what you're suggesting is that Korean people and Korean culture are worth nothing. Let's just make every place on earth a globalist culture with the same people, same language, same brands etc etc. No.

steele 4y ago

Kids in cages Master Policy