6 ms·

This is probably for the best in the long term. They've added enough friction, insanity and disdain for foreigners that no sane person will immigrate and we can

This is probably for the best in the long term. They've added enough friction, insanity and disdain for foreigners that no sane person will immigrate and we can start to build stronger industries and trade relationships outside the US.

epistasis 5mo ago
How is this good in any way? How could this ever help to build stronger industries or trade relationships? If somebody hands you a shit sandwich you don't need to pretend it tastes good.
- zaptheimpaler 5mo ago
  It will help would-be immigrants understand that the US does not want them and that it would be a mistake to invest time and energy trying to build a future in a country that hates them and can nuke their lives at the drop of a hat. It will help other countries that are not the US retain their talent and build up their own industries. A greater diversity in distribution of talent and industry across the world is a more resilient system.
  - digitaltrees 5mo ago
    It’s not a more resilient system. It creates geographic isolation and friction. It dilutes the talent pool instead of concentrating it which limits cross pollination. It also reduces specialization that drives efficiency and lets each country focus on what it does best and then trade with others.
    - elzbardico 5mo ago
      Specialization is for insects. And on the contrary of what you say the real world show plenty of reasons to diversify: For example, the success of China with renewables and EVs shows exactly that: Every single EV company in the US wanted to be like Tesla, it was like an idée fixe, most of them failed miserably compared to BYD.
      - digitaltrees 5mo ago
        There are decades of economic research based on hundreds of years of economic activity that contradicts your analysis. EV and solar investments in the United States were on par with and exceeding china, they were gutted after republicans attacked the solindra investment for political reasons. China is itself moving up the value chain and specializing. That being said, I do think we have learned the hard way that outsourcing manufacturing destroys the ecosystem and supply chain that drives innovation. Simply put, invention happens where the work is being done
  - goodluckchuck 5mo ago
    I think that’s a bit dramatic saying the US hates them, but yes to your other point. The US is taking the position that it has more to gain from having strong and prosperous trading partners than it does from exploiting those nations and draining them of talent.
    - zaptheimpaler 5mo ago
      Yeah look at like any one of the 10,000 things this administration, Trump, Miller, republicans have said about immigrants. Look at ICE detention centres, how many hundreds or thousands of people have literally died, denied basic medical care or humane conditions, ICE agents who executed US citizens facing 0 consequences. ICE agents on camera ramming a car, radioing in to say that the car rammed them, and then shooting the driver. Cold-blooded execution. I could go on forever. Tell me again how stating that they hate immigrants is being dramatic. It’s just facts but they’ve been boiling the frog and doing so many idiotic and horrific things at once that people have completely checked out.
      - deleted 5mo ago
        [deleted]
    - RamenJunkie_ 5mo ago
      Except the US isn't trying to make strong trading partners, its a side effect of the xenophobia and racism. If anything they are alienating anyone who would ever trade because every trade deal for something benign like, steel or whatever will include some random unrelated bull shit like "also if you want to trade you have to round up your trans people."
    - vidarh 5mo ago
      If you read "US as a whole", then sure. I've met many a lot of very friendly people in the US, some of whome I'd love to visit again. If you read "the current US administration and their voter base" it sure feels like hate. I used to visit the US a lot. I haven't been for a long time and as long as the current regime remains in place I'll spend my time and money in places where I can be sure not to be mistreated. That's not because I fear I would be hated in the places I would actually visit, but because I have no interest in being at the mercy of US immigration. It doesn't matter that the risk isn't great - it is high enough and the potential consequences severe enough that it's put the US in the same category as high crime third world countries for me in terms of risk. Already 20 years ago it was more stressful to go through immigration in the US, even as a white man from a rich country, than in dictatorships like China. As it stands now, I wouldn't hesitate to visit China, but I would hesitate to even transit the US.
- hiddencost 5mo ago
  I think the parent is saying it's good because immigrants will go elsewhere and the US will continue to decline. Which will be good for humanity.
- drivingmenuts 5mo ago
  It could be good for anyone country that's not the US (despite our hubris, we're not actually the center of the universe). But for the US, a country built on immigrants ands immigration, probably not so much. We fucked around, we found out. Well, we're continuing to find out. We haven't exactly scraped rocked bottom yet.
- BrokenCogs 5mo ago
  I think it's sarcasm
- RamenJunkie_ 5mo ago
  They mean good for everyone NOT the US. Because now say, Germany or France, or where ever, come off as a better place to immigrate, so other countries can build stronger more competitice businesses. This move, like everything the MAGA administration does, will only weaken the US. Even better for other countries, anyone the US produces who isn't a raging idiot, also are more likely to want to immigrate from the US.
  - throw-the-towel 5mo ago
    Sorry but "France" and "build businesses" in the same sentence is insane.
rayiner 5mo ago
Isn’t it better for the smart people in India to stay there and make India richer, instead of coming to the U.S. to make billionaires here richer? These countries absolutely suffer from the brain drain.
- zaptheimpaler 5mo ago
  Yes exactly. One country sucking up all the best talent is not good for the world, its a single point of failure.
  - airstrike 5mo ago
    That's not really how it works. Immigrants also benefit from coming to the US. Skilled labor immigration is great for everyone involved, and bad only for the countries that suffer the brain drain. But it's not zero-sum. The damage to those countries from losing talent is smaller than the benefits to the immigrant, their new country, and ultimately all of humanity.
    - rayiner 5mo ago
      > and bad only for the countries that suffer the brain drain. That's a pretty big qualifier! > The damage to those countries from losing talent is smaller than the benefits to the immigrant, their new country, and ultimately all of humanity Isn't it the opposite? Creating wealth and technology in India helps a billion quite poor people. Creating wealth in the U.S. helps 300 million already rich people.
      - airstrike 5mo ago
        Except you can't create Google in India. Google isn't minted by divine inspiration hitting a couple of smart guys in a garage. It's created by an entire ecosystem that allows a project like that to be conceived and executed in such a way that has benefited the entire world, including the poor in India. It's a big qualifier, but like I said, it's not zero-sum. No economist will argue that limiting skilled labor immigration (or any immigration, really!) is an optimal policy for improving the lives of the poor elsewhere. It just doesn't work that way.
hermannj314 5mo ago
From what I could understand from the 6-page memorandum, (my paraphrase) "the law allows us to be nice and convenient, but doesn't require us to be nice and convenient, so we decided to make things hard and cruel going forward" The current administration is sending a pretty clear message to immigrants.

epistasis 5mo ago

How is this good in any way? How could this ever help to build stronger industries or trade relationships? If somebody hands you a shit sandwich you don't need to pretend it tastes good.

zaptheimpaler 5mo ago
It will help would-be immigrants understand that the US does not want them and that it would be a mistake to invest time and energy trying to build a future in a country that hates them and can nuke their lives at the drop of a hat. It will help other countries that are not the US retain their talent and build up their own industries. A greater diversity in distribution of talent and industry across the world is a more resilient system.
- digitaltrees 5mo ago
  It’s not a more resilient system. It creates geographic isolation and friction. It dilutes the talent pool instead of concentrating it which limits cross pollination. It also reduces specialization that drives efficiency and lets each country focus on what it does best and then trade with others.
  - elzbardico 5mo ago
    Specialization is for insects. And on the contrary of what you say the real world show plenty of reasons to diversify: For example, the success of China with renewables and EVs shows exactly that: Every single EV company in the US wanted to be like Tesla, it was like an idée fixe, most of them failed miserably compared to BYD.
    - digitaltrees 5mo ago
      There are decades of economic research based on hundreds of years of economic activity that contradicts your analysis. EV and solar investments in the United States were on par with and exceeding china, they were gutted after republicans attacked the solindra investment for political reasons. China is itself moving up the value chain and specializing. That being said, I do think we have learned the hard way that outsourcing manufacturing destroys the ecosystem and supply chain that drives innovation. Simply put, invention happens where the work is being done
- goodluckchuck 5mo ago
  I think that’s a bit dramatic saying the US hates them, but yes to your other point. The US is taking the position that it has more to gain from having strong and prosperous trading partners than it does from exploiting those nations and draining them of talent.
  - zaptheimpaler 5mo ago
    Yeah look at like any one of the 10,000 things this administration, Trump, Miller, republicans have said about immigrants. Look at ICE detention centres, how many hundreds or thousands of people have literally died, denied basic medical care or humane conditions, ICE agents who executed US citizens facing 0 consequences. ICE agents on camera ramming a car, radioing in to say that the car rammed them, and then shooting the driver. Cold-blooded execution. I could go on forever. Tell me again how stating that they hate immigrants is being dramatic. It’s just facts but they’ve been boiling the frog and doing so many idiotic and horrific things at once that people have completely checked out.
    - deleted 5mo ago
      [deleted]
  - RamenJunkie_ 5mo ago
    Except the US isn't trying to make strong trading partners, its a side effect of the xenophobia and racism. If anything they are alienating anyone who would ever trade because every trade deal for something benign like, steel or whatever will include some random unrelated bull shit like "also if you want to trade you have to round up your trans people."
  - vidarh 5mo ago
    If you read "US as a whole", then sure. I've met many a lot of very friendly people in the US, some of whome I'd love to visit again. If you read "the current US administration and their voter base" it sure feels like hate. I used to visit the US a lot. I haven't been for a long time and as long as the current regime remains in place I'll spend my time and money in places where I can be sure not to be mistreated. That's not because I fear I would be hated in the places I would actually visit, but because I have no interest in being at the mercy of US immigration. It doesn't matter that the risk isn't great - it is high enough and the potential consequences severe enough that it's put the US in the same category as high crime third world countries for me in terms of risk. Already 20 years ago it was more stressful to go through immigration in the US, even as a white man from a rich country, than in dictatorships like China. As it stands now, I wouldn't hesitate to visit China, but I would hesitate to even transit the US.
hiddencost 5mo ago
I think the parent is saying it's good because immigrants will go elsewhere and the US will continue to decline. Which will be good for humanity.
drivingmenuts 5mo ago
It could be good for anyone country that's not the US (despite our hubris, we're not actually the center of the universe). But for the US, a country built on immigrants ands immigration, probably not so much. We fucked around, we found out. Well, we're continuing to find out. We haven't exactly scraped rocked bottom yet.
BrokenCogs 5mo ago
I think it's sarcasm
RamenJunkie_ 5mo ago
They mean good for everyone NOT the US. Because now say, Germany or France, or where ever, come off as a better place to immigrate, so other countries can build stronger more competitice businesses. This move, like everything the MAGA administration does, will only weaken the US. Even better for other countries, anyone the US produces who isn't a raging idiot, also are more likely to want to immigrate from the US.
- throw-the-towel 5mo ago
  Sorry but "France" and "build businesses" in the same sentence is insane.

rayiner 5mo ago

Isn’t it better for the smart people in India to stay there and make India richer, instead of coming to the U.S. to make billionaires here richer? These countries absolutely suffer from the brain drain.

zaptheimpaler 5mo ago
Yes exactly. One country sucking up all the best talent is not good for the world, its a single point of failure.
- airstrike 5mo ago
  That's not really how it works. Immigrants also benefit from coming to the US. Skilled labor immigration is great for everyone involved, and bad only for the countries that suffer the brain drain. But it's not zero-sum. The damage to those countries from losing talent is smaller than the benefits to the immigrant, their new country, and ultimately all of humanity.
  - rayiner 5mo ago
    > and bad only for the countries that suffer the brain drain. That's a pretty big qualifier! > The damage to those countries from losing talent is smaller than the benefits to the immigrant, their new country, and ultimately all of humanity Isn't it the opposite? Creating wealth and technology in India helps a billion quite poor people. Creating wealth in the U.S. helps 300 million already rich people.
    - airstrike 5mo ago
      Except you can't create Google in India. Google isn't minted by divine inspiration hitting a couple of smart guys in a garage. It's created by an entire ecosystem that allows a project like that to be conceived and executed in such a way that has benefited the entire world, including the poor in India. It's a big qualifier, but like I said, it's not zero-sum. No economist will argue that limiting skilled labor immigration (or any immigration, really!) is an optimal policy for improving the lives of the poor elsewhere. It just doesn't work that way.

hermannj314 5mo ago

From what I could understand from the 6-page memorandum, (my paraphrase) "the law allows us to be nice and convenient, but doesn't require us to be nice and convenient, so we decided to make things hard and cruel going forward" The current administration is sending a pretty clear message to immigrants.