7 ms·

That is going to be explosive because there isn't a developed economy anywhere that can avoid major crises without maintaining or increasing immigration levels

• ChocolateGod 2y ago
  > coming decades as the effects of fertility rates really start to bite. I mean one solution is to promote policies that encourage people to have more children, but we "can't afford it", expecting we'll be able to afford the incoming social care crisis.
  • vidarh 2y ago
    Despite many countries trying, none has found a way that works.
• 15155 2y ago
  How about door 3: only allow immigration for skilled individuals capable of adding outsized value to our economy?
  • ben_w 2y ago
    As a person who can be described that way: why would I want to migrate to any country whose leaders were elected on a platform of hating migrants? "Oh but not like you, you're one of the good ones!" - imagine yourself being described that way, and ask if that's a crowd you care to spend your time living with.
    • anal_reactor 2y ago
      As another skilled immigrant, this is exactly what I want.
    • 15155 2y ago
      > why would I want to migrate to any country whose leaders were elected on a platform of hating migrants? "Hating migrants" != "want only the migrants that pull their own weight" Why would you personally want to immigrate to a place where you are immediately expected to foot the bill for everyone else?
      • ben_w 2y ago
        > "Hating migrants" != "want only the migrants that pull their own weight" "Oh but not like you, you're one of the good ones!" - imagine yourself being described that way, and ask if that's a crowd you care to spend your time living with. > Why would you personally want to immigrate to a place where you are immediately expected to foot the bill for everyone else? Because the only places that doesn't describe are those without a functioning government capable of collecting taxes. You want me to migrate to ${your country} to boost the economy? Well, that's only useful to you to the extent it means I'm supporting all the people in your country that can't migrate elsewhere for exactly the same reason.
        • 15155 2y ago
          > "Oh but not like you, you're one of the good ones!" I want to live with people who pull their weight and aren't an immediate financial burden on everyone else, yes. If this is "one of the good ones" vs "one of the bad," so be it. If one is immediately looking to burden everyone else, I can see why one wouldn't want to "spend [their] time living with" folks who don't want to give them free shit. > Because the only places that doesn't describe are those without a functioning government capable of collecting taxes. We're not talking about tax collection, we're talking about how taxes are spent. > You want me to migrate to ${your country} to boost the economy? I don't care why or if you immigrate, but if you do, you will not have a net-negative financial impact on the population. Yes: there are freeloaders amongst the population as-is - this itself isn't a valid reason to import millions more. We're already taking the cream of the crop - which is why H-1B and O-1s visas are a thing. People hiking across the Darién gap aren't magically going to become engineers and doctors.
          • 2y ago
    • deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    • itsoktocry 2y ago
      >why would I want to migrate to any country whose leaders were elected on a platform of hating migrants? Well, for one: cutting back on illegal immigrants and hating immigrants are not the same thing. Two: stay where you are? I don't get what your expectations are here. Plenty of skilled immigrants love the US. If it's not your cup of tea, that's fine.
      • ben_w 2y ago
        1. Illegal immigration is already illegal. Cutting back on it is tangential to every other statement about promoting, limiting, or targeting migration. 2. I'm responding to a comment that says "How about door 3: only allow immigration for skilled individuals capable of adding outsized value to our economy?" And in my capacity as such a person: that attitude makes me not interested in anything else on the table. Hypothetically to demonstrate the point: You could offer me your entire GDP, even after accounting for a business plan where I somehow specifically help you double it, as pay… and I'd turn you down. Remember that the current state of immigration in the USA is exactly what was being proposed to be changed: the previous desirability is specifically not going to remain.
  • deniscepko2 2y ago
    It works if your existing population is willing to do unskilled labour. Which in my country is not the case
    • arandomusername 2y ago
      cheap labour, not unskilled. So what you want is to import third world immigrants so you can pay your plumber cheaply instead of paying them appriopriately.
      • neeleshs 2y ago
        That's the ethos of commerce for thousands of years. Try to pay the least to get the best
    • 15155 2y ago
      I love this one because it's so basically obvious: the price for this work will increase or it simply won't happen and wasn't necessary anyway.
      • astrange 2y ago
        You can't get native Americans to do farm work for any amount of money, because they'd have to live in the middle of nowhere near the farm and that's no fun. (That is, you'd have to pay them so much they could buy the farm and then hire someone else to work it. But you're not going to do that.)
        • 15155 2y ago
          The market will take care of this: people will do the work or pay for it or they won't eat.
          • astrange 2y ago
            "They won't eat" is a perfectly possible outcome of this, and a bad one. That is called a recession.
  • bryanlarsen 2y ago
    Studies show you've got it backwards. If you let a nurse or programmer into the country, they're going to take a job that's otherwise filled by an American, depressing skilled wages. If you let in an unskilled laborer, they're going to take a job that nobody wants. They spend those wages, boosting the economy. In both cases, studies show that the number of jobs stays roughly the same; immigrants create about the same amount of jobs as they take. However skilled immigrants decrease average wages, and unskilled immigrants increase average wages. It's the outliers that really tip the balance, though. If one of those immigrants turns out to be Jensen Huang or his parents, that's how you make America great.
    • 15155 2y ago
      > Studies show you've got it backwards. If you let a nurse or programmer into the country, they're going to take a job that's otherwise filled by an American, depressing skilled wages. But at that same time they're contributing massive amounts to the tax base, furthering society. Maybe they even start a company, employing more programmers. They also spend their wages. > If you let in an unskilled laborer, they're going to take a job that nobody wants. The price for that work is artificially low because these folks don't have any legal protections of any kind. Guess what else happens commonly to unskilled, under-the-table labor? Injuries! Which I have to pay an outsized amount for in the form of Medicaid and ER fees. How much of their remaining income is remitted straight to their impoverished relatives back home? > If one of those immigrants turns out to be Jensen Huang or his parents Know how to easily filter out Jensen Huang from the crowd of people swimming across the Rio Grande? Marketable skills.
      • bryanlarsen 2y ago
        > How much of their remaining income is remitted straight to their impoverished relatives back home? The skilled labourers do far more of that than unskilled ones. > Guess what else happens commonly to unskilled, under-the-table labor? Injuries! Which I have to pay an outsized amount for in the form of Medicaid and ER fees. The vast majority of the cost of health care is old people, and it's expensive because it's labor intensive. The way to bring health care costs down is to increase the ratio of young people to old people. Which in 2024 means immigration. > Know how to easily filter out Jensen Huang from the crowd of people swimming across the Rio Grande? Marketable skills. Marketable skills like shopkeeper? That's what Jensen Huang's parents were.
• ben_w 2y ago
  While I'd like that to be an accurate description of why the Tory party lost, my understanding is that the migration topic was basically the only thing the Tories did that continued to resonate with voters, and what actually lost them was a continuing series of incompetent leaders, starting with Cameron (who didn't realise the mic was still hot immediately after resigning). Nobody (of any party) liked May, Johnson got away with pleasing lies until Partygate, Truss was a forgettable joke, and Sunak was basically Jim Hacker. IMO the only reason the Tories didn't lose sooner was that the Labour party was also stuck with Corbyn.
  • flir 2y ago
    They lost the anti-immigration vote to Reform. That shows, to me, that the voters that cared about that topic could see the difference between their rhetoric and their actions.
  • vidarh 2y ago
    Reform gutted the Tory party largely on anger over immigration the Tory party itself whipped up. Their incredibly incompetent string of PMs didn't help, but without Reform spoiling, they'd at least still have had a shot. Note how Labour didn't win this as much as the Tories lost it: Starmer got fewer votes than Corbyn. Starmer failed to attract more voters despite running against the most ridiculed government in modern British history. People didn't want Starmer, they wanted not-Tories, and on the right that meant voters fleeing to the anti immigrant Reform.
• arandomusername 2y ago
  What are those major crises? Decrease in housing prices?
  • dsign 2y ago
    Pensions and taxes. I guess that's medicare in USA?
    • arandomusername 2y ago
      Less Taxes: So we would have a smaller government? That's good. Government already gets so much money and waste it. Pensions: Maybe instead of relying on a pyramid scheme, people would need to manage their investments or have kids and raise them well so they take care of them later. Sounds like a win.
      • vidarh 2y ago
        Less tax revenue. Higher tax rates to try to compensate to prevent collapse. As for pensions, arguing about what should be is not going to help the growing proportion of your population that don't have enough or that will end up having to try to help their parents and grandparents avoid destitution. Even if people "managed their investments", with fewer and fewer working age people relative to the total population, if everyone reduced their spending to invest for their pensions, yields will drop as demand gets taken away for people to save instead of spend.
  • vidarh 2y ago
    Collapsing healthcare and pension systems, and massively rising taxes to account for a reclining tax base as the proportion of people working drops. Critical positions becoming harder and harder to fill, and industries fleeing to places they can hire labor.
• logicchains 2y ago
  Japan is way ahead of the west in falling birthrates, but in spite of very little immigration there hasn't been any major crisis, just gradually declining standards of living.
  • vidarh 2y ago
    "Just" a slow collapse of society in other words. How many places do you see people putting up with that without electing increasingly extreme politicians? And even Japan is nowhere near experiencing the worst of it - their population size is still near its peak.