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By that logic we should restrict the number of children being born. But the growth of our country from a population of 50 million to 300 million did not result

By that logic we should restrict the number of children being born. But the growth of our country from a population of 50 million to 300 million did not result in a job loss of 250 million jobs. If anything, immigrants create many more jobs than they take. The deadweight to an economy is it's non-working population (retirees, children) so an influx of young, working families increases wages overall for natives.

programjames 2y ago
I mean, you've just invented eugenics. Restrict the number of children being born that would not help the economy out. The government did do this once upon a time, but there are tradeoffs like riots you have to take into account. The difference between immigrants and babies is the immigrants can't riot within the US, so the US has no need to cater to their desires. However, immigrants that create more jobs than they take, or raise wages and innovation do have a pretty easy time immigrating to the US (e.g. investor and o1/e1 visas).
toomuchtodo 2y ago
> By that logic we should restrict the number of children being born. I disagree with this assertion. Controlling immigration is reasonable and proper when a nation state has boundaries, citizens vs non citizens, and an economic system to balance. Forcing people who want children to not have children is neither reasonable nor proper. With that said, we are in luck: the fertility rate is rapidly declining in almost every country [1], so this is not a problem we face. The future faces a worker shortage as the world ages rapidly, but we still must solve for today. > But the growth of our country from a population of 50 million to 300 million did not result in a job loss of 250 million jobs. To look at "jobs" in a vacuum is myopic. Are they good jobs? Do people need two or three jobs to survive? If not, we do not have enough good jobs, just jobs. We should be measuring someone's resulting quality of life from their economic activity, not the job(s). As I mentioned previously, if you cannot find domestic labor to perform a job at a market rate living wage, then perhaps immigration should be considered. We are at full employment and workers are still struggling to make ends meet. This does not call for more immigration; this calls for mechanisms to more rapidly push wages up. Take construction jobs for example. At any time, there are about ~300k-400k construction jobs that are going unfilled due to lack of labor. Would those jobs be filled if domestic workers were trained and wages pushed up? Or would builders prefer to hire immigrants to do the work at wages on offer [2] [3]? The evidence shows the latter. There is a market clearing price for every job to be filled. TLDR Maximize economic success for citizen workers, and then turn the knob on immigration accordingly. [1] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=fertility+rate&sort=byDate&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu... [2] https://limos.engin.umich.edu/deitabase/2024/05/28/undocumented-construction-workers-us/ https://limos.engin.umich.edu/deitabase/2024/05/28/undocumen... [3] https://eyeonhousing.org/2024/03/states-and-construction-trades-most-reliant-on-immigrant-workers-2022/ https://eyeonhousing.org/2024/03/states-and-construction-tra...
- Kim_Bruning 2y ago
  Interesting how legitster's reductio ad absurdum argument got missed here. They're using the birth rate comparison not to actually advocate for birth restrictions, but to expose a flaw in the original economic reasoning. Legitser is pointing out that every person you add to the population is not just a supplier, but also a customer. They create demand for goods and services even as they help produce them. This makes job creation/job filling calculations a bit more complicated than straight linear/zero sum behavior. Some quick back of envelope maths suggests job growth might even outpace population growth. I suppose it would have to, else -as legitser points out- the economy would have imploded long ago. And... we haven't even gotten around to the actual figure that matters: Net migration - People Emigrate too!
  - toomuchtodo 2y ago
    Why do you focus on number of jobs vs poor economic outcomes current state across the economy for your median worker? Why do we care if immigration creates jobs from consumption if the jobs created (from said immigration) are going to be low quality, economically unfavorable (to the worker) jobs? “Think of the jobs!” arguments in this thread are optimizing for economic activity. I am arguing for workers to have better lives through better jobs, not more jobs. To understand this is to also better understand the shift to far right populism in the developed world as it relates to economic insecurity.
    - Kim_Bruning 2y ago
      I actually completely agree with you that people should have good and interesting jobs. I could use a lot of words, but... I just completely agree on that part. Now how this ends up in an immigration debate has me slightly mystified, I do have to admit. I'm treating the "if immigration creates [...] low quality [...] jobs" as one of a set of hypotheticals. Some others being that immigration creates high quality jobs, or indifferent jobs. So it seems we're in at least partial agreement (hopefully). Where would you like to take your argument from here?
      - 2y ago

programjames 2y ago

I mean, you've just invented eugenics. Restrict the number of children being born that would not help the economy out. The government did do this once upon a time, but there are tradeoffs like riots you have to take into account. The difference between immigrants and babies is the immigrants can't riot within the US, so the US has no need to cater to their desires. However, immigrants that create more jobs than they take, or raise wages and innovation do have a pretty easy time immigrating to the US (e.g. investor and o1/e1 visas).

toomuchtodo 2y ago

> By that logic we should restrict the number of children being born. I disagree with this assertion. Controlling immigration is reasonable and proper when a nation state has boundaries, citizens vs non citizens, and an economic system to balance. Forcing people who want children to not have children is neither reasonable nor proper. With that said, we are in luck: the fertility rate is rapidly declining in almost every country [1], so this is not a problem we face. The future faces a worker shortage as the world ages rapidly, but we still must solve for today. > But the growth of our country from a population of 50 million to 300 million did not result in a job loss of 250 million jobs. To look at "jobs" in a vacuum is myopic. Are they good jobs? Do people need two or three jobs to survive? If not, we do not have enough good jobs, just jobs. We should be measuring someone's resulting quality of life from their economic activity, not the job(s). As I mentioned previously, if you cannot find domestic labor to perform a job at a market rate living wage, then perhaps immigration should be considered. We are at full employment and workers are still struggling to make ends meet. This does not call for more immigration; this calls for mechanisms to more rapidly push wages up. Take construction jobs for example. At any time, there are about ~300k-400k construction jobs that are going unfilled due to lack of labor. Would those jobs be filled if domestic workers were trained and wages pushed up? Or would builders prefer to hire immigrants to do the work at wages on offer [2] [3]? The evidence shows the latter. There is a market clearing price for every job to be filled. TLDR Maximize economic success for citizen workers, and then turn the knob on immigration accordingly. [1] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=fertility+rate&sort=byDate&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu... [2] https://limos.engin.umich.edu/deitabase/2024/05/28/undocumented-construction-workers-us/ https://limos.engin.umich.edu/deitabase/2024/05/28/undocumen... [3] https://eyeonhousing.org/2024/03/states-and-construction-trades-most-reliant-on-immigrant-workers-2022/ https://eyeonhousing.org/2024/03/states-and-construction-tra...

Kim_Bruning 2y ago
Interesting how legitster's reductio ad absurdum argument got missed here. They're using the birth rate comparison not to actually advocate for birth restrictions, but to expose a flaw in the original economic reasoning. Legitser is pointing out that every person you add to the population is not just a supplier, but also a customer. They create demand for goods and services even as they help produce them. This makes job creation/job filling calculations a bit more complicated than straight linear/zero sum behavior. Some quick back of envelope maths suggests job growth might even outpace population growth. I suppose it would have to, else -as legitser points out- the economy would have imploded long ago. And... we haven't even gotten around to the actual figure that matters: Net migration - People Emigrate too!
- toomuchtodo 2y ago
  Why do you focus on number of jobs vs poor economic outcomes current state across the economy for your median worker? Why do we care if immigration creates jobs from consumption if the jobs created (from said immigration) are going to be low quality, economically unfavorable (to the worker) jobs? “Think of the jobs!” arguments in this thread are optimizing for economic activity. I am arguing for workers to have better lives through better jobs, not more jobs. To understand this is to also better understand the shift to far right populism in the developed world as it relates to economic insecurity.
  - Kim_Bruning 2y ago
    I actually completely agree with you that people should have good and interesting jobs. I could use a lot of words, but... I just completely agree on that part. Now how this ends up in an immigration debate has me slightly mystified, I do have to admit. I'm treating the "if immigration creates [...] low quality [...] jobs" as one of a set of hypotheticals. Some others being that immigration creates high quality jobs, or indifferent jobs. So it seems we're in at least partial agreement (hopefully). Where would you like to take your argument from here?
    - 2y ago