9 ms·

Any chance you'd be willing to write a bit more about your support for open borders? In particular, I'm interested in knowing whether you think this is a situa

by geebee 11y ago

Any chance you'd be willing to write a bit more about your support for open borders? In particular, I'm interested in knowing whether you think this is a situation where it would be both moral and beneficial, or if you feel that it is simply wrong to limit where people can live and work based on where they were born (or even where their grandparents were born) even if the overall effect on current citizens of some regions would be negative. Interesting that the author of this piece comes from New Zealand, because NZ is the country that often springs to mind when I think of a nation that might could change dramatically with open borders. I haven't been there, but I understand New Zealand is a country about the geographical size of California and Oregon put together (a bit larger), with spectacular natural landscapes, and a very small population (much smaller than the island would be capable of supporting). What would happen to New Zealand if they unilaterally opened up their borders? To keep it simple, let's not worry about malicious people, I just mean honest, hard working immigrants who seek a better life. Should New Zealand open up borders to unlimited migration? Is there a moral imperative for them to do so?

zerr 11y ago
One would think, countries like USA, Australia or NZ might be afraid of immigration because they know what they did to native inhabitants... Generally, think about the situation where all (most) countries abolish borders, not just NZ or other small country. Moving is the basic human right, and the sooner we realize the better for mankind, assuming the culture of the host country is respected. Of course the culture needs adjustments to respect human rights as well.
- talmand 11y ago
  Why would one be afraid of immigrants because of past treatment of original natives when chances are the immigrants are descended from people who did similar things to the original natives of their homeland? As an easy example, I'm fairly certain the original natives of the southern portions of the North American continent weren't speaking Spanish when the conquistadors showed up. I would disagree that is is for the better of mankind. In some cases, it could be, sure. In most cases, it eventually is not. How is it good for anyone to move from one stagnant area into a prosperous one to the point of dragging it down to be stagnant as well? Never mind the affect this has the people who are currently inhabiting the area. Plus, it would seem to be that once a level of immigration has happened in an area the newcomers no longer feel the need to respect or to assimilate into the local culture, so they maintain their own. Hopefully they are carrying over their bad habits that led to their homeland sucking enough to force them to move, because they'll eventually want to move again. In the long term, that eventually makes things worse for those that lived there before, much like you pointed out in your first statement. We have a long road to travel before mankind as a whole can, in masses, move about freely throughout the world without there being local consequences.
  - squidbidness 11y ago
    Guilt. Making a change towards better treatment of people from different places brings up the poor past treatment, which people don't like to take responsibility for.
  - ericdschmidt 11y ago
    "Move from one stagnant area into a prosperous one to the point of dragging it down to be stagnant as well?" Wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong... 100 times wrong. Productivity is the root of all prosperity. First read this excellent article: http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2015/02/always_keep_you.html http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2015/02/always_keep_you..... Workers become on average ~20x more productive when they migrate to the first world. Because we are capital rich and we have sane government and law and order. Imagine if you were moved to Haiti and you got stuck there. How much could you contribute to society in Haiti? You could maybe slice some coconuts on the side of the road - is that gonna make the world a lot richer? Roadside sliced coconuts? Nah, much better for you to be in first world even if you're doing a low skilled job here like delivering catering to a high tech startup. That catering company is able to produce food much more efficiently, and in SF or NYC you're able to distribute it much more efficiently, and you're part of this souped-up economic engine that's changing the world. That's why they make 20x or up to 40x more (in the case of the extreme poor) when they migrate to the first world. It's better for everyone! Economists estimate that moving from the status quo to fully liberalized migration (i.e. open borders) would roughly double global gdp - that's an insane silver bullet. That's everyone getting way fucking richer in one fell swoop. Please see my comment here for more info: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9769632 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9769632
    - deleted 11y ago
      [deleted]
      - ericdschmidt 11y ago
        Making cheap clothes and electronics in factories are good jobs relative to the kind of work that the extreme poor do - scrounging for food in a garbage dump in Manila or farming shitty land. And they make clothing and electronics in Mexico (which is a relatively rich country by global standards) and in America and other first world places. It's not like the economy would just stop making clothes or electronics. It would adjust to satisfy the forces of supply and demand at some optimal equilibrium. Just keep your eye on production, keep your eye on production, keep your eye on production.
- crusso 11y ago
  assuming the culture of the host country is respected That's a huge and unfounded assumption, though.
  - zerr 11y ago
    Lets say there are lot of would-be-immigrants willing to respect the culture of prospective host country, become "American person", "NZ person" etc... (this doesn't necessary mean assimilation), but they are denied to do so. We need to fix this.
    - crusso 11y ago
      I agree with you, but unfortunately, the real problem with immigration is that it's a war between traditional views that value the indigenous culture vs multicultural forces that consider the host culture to be irrelevant. Poor souls like the author of this article are caught in the middle. They don't have representatives in the traditional views camp and the multicultural views camp considers them to be secondary since they're not as likely a voting block once they come in.
  - pvaldes 11y ago
    Culture can not be respected in fact. Even if people wish to do so. The problem is that the thing is a moving target. When a lot of still alive people where born 'culture' was: 'a black woman was not supossed to sit in the best places of a bus', 'the children roam free with their friends and dogs and can go everywhere' and 'Is acceptable if I slap my wife in the face sometimes because I feel frustrated for the work'. Yes, this was a small part of the tradition not so long time ago. Each generation have been educated in a different point of view about what was acceptable or not. What 'culture' should be honored for newcomers?. West coast 1966? Sometimes 'culture' is just plain wrong and should not be respected.
    - crusso 11y ago
      That's cherry picking. I'm talking about cultural basics like learning the country's history, learning the laws and the Constitution, free market capitalism, etc. Just having an immigration system that is followed legally would be a lesson in culture that we've currently abandoned for political purposes.
- incompatible 11y ago
  It's an interesting issue. The right to move around freely seems more appealing than expecting people to be essentially imprisoned in their countries of citizenship. On the other hand, there are obviously billions of people living in poor and otherwise dis-functional countries, and if even a fraction decided to move to a country like New Zealand, you can imaging it becoming ridiculously overpopulated. Alternatively, should we accept that population groups that have a higher birth rate should naturally dominate future generations, or is it acceptable to fence off certain parts of the world with lower birth rates and a better natural environment?
murbard2 11y ago
It's a very tough question to answer because it's very hard to predict. I have some model of the general effects of allowing greater immigration, but the predictive value of the model breaks down the more radical the change. - I see letting in anyone with the equivalent of a bachelor's degree (or say anyone that anyone is willing to hire for more $40k a year) as basically having no downsides at all. Empirical data on immigration reveals that it has no impact on wages except at the very low end, among unskilled high-school dropouts. - As you allow lower incomes, welfare tends to become an issue. Currently, people do not immigrate in the US for the welfare (illegal immigrants tend to be net taxpayers, even when including healthcare) but people do immigrate to Europe for the welfare, so it's something that happens. However, if you take a country like France (where I grew up in), welfare payments aren't the biggest drag on the economy. Taxation is high, but other places with similar levels of taxation fare much better. Regulatory drag, in particular in the job market is a much bigger concern. In turns, this creates unemployment which aggravates any welfare problem. Evidence shows that as societies become more culturally and ethnically mixed, they tend to be less and less in favor of welfare. So higher immigration of welfare seeking immigrants may undermine popular support for welfare. It's a whole other discussion, but I'd consider disappearance of state funded welfare as a good thing. In addition, it's also possible to selectively deny welfare to immigrants, or to require a twenty year residency period before becoming eligible. - Political externalities are often mentioned. Won't immigrants vote for the same policies that made their home country a living hell? I find this doubtful for two reasons: a) The evidence points that in most democracies, the policies that end up being enacted are the ones favored by a wealthy elite, not the ones that have popular support. If you compare the actual policies of the US compared to the views of the median voter, they are strikingly better than you'd expect. How this comes to be is unclear, but the effect is important. b) The favorite political view of most people is the status quo, or some very minor version around it Now getting to New Zealand. Assuming only honest hard working immigrant seeking a better life? You've cut out the work for me! I think you'd see a lot of high rises build up in New Zealand. Consider that the current population of New Zealand could fit in a circle 7 km in radius in a city with the density of New York. If Stewart Island was all built up, it could hold the entire population of Canada. In practice, as more people would emigrate, real estate prices would appreciate, to the point where it wouldn't be economical for immigrants to come in, even if the borders were open.
kuschku 11y ago
The debate the politicians in my state (Schleswig-Holstein, a state in Germany) had about this was really interesting, sadly it’s in German. Essentially, it boils down to two issues: Morally, we all are descendants of immigrants, or at least most. Economically, most immigrants are willing to work hard. Combined with the fact that our society has a birth rate below replacement rate (1.3 vs. 2.1) we need immigrants just to keep our standard of living. And if we can give them a better life at the same time, it’s definitely great.
- johnchristopher 11y ago
  > Economically, most immigrants are willing to work hard. `Hard' as in `cheaper' ?
  - anthony_d 11y ago
    'cheaper' is a comparison. 'hard' is not. I don't think anyone wants salaries to go into free-fall but that's not a necessary result of easing immigration.
    - pc86 11y ago
      Isn't it? By definition wouldn't an increase in supply of talent for a given job decrease market wage for that talent unless it was already in a shortage (which we never really know until it's over)?
      - murbard2 11y ago
        It would also decrease prices and thus raise living standards. Customers would then turn their attention to better goods and services, increasing the demand for labor. You're committing the lump of labor fallacy. Think about it this way, if two countries were to merge, would everyone be worse off because of the increased competition on the job market? No, people would be better off due to the increased amount of trade.
        11y ago
hluska 11y ago
I'm not the OP, but I mostly support the idea of open borders and I'm from Canada. Canada has many of the same issues that New Zealand has. We are the second largest country (by landmass) in the world, yet our population is slightly smaller than California. Much of our land is quite rugged, or very cold but our country is still capable of supporting more than the 35 million we currently have. The best argument that I have ever heard against opening up our border is that we are big, but size does not equal the ability to support a decent quality of life. Some argue that if we open up our borders, dreams of higher incomes will compel lesser skilled people to move to Canada. These people often will not understand basic labour laws like minimum wage, or the need for benefits and so they will drive down the cost of labour. Others argue that adding even five million people sounds like a good idea, but that it would require massive investments in health care, housing, and basic infrastructure. Like I said, I mostly support open borders but have never been too impressed by the moral arguments. Canada is a great country and I love it dearly, but I have spent a little too much in some bad neighbourhoods and become friends with too many unhappy immigrants. Rather, I would argue that we are an amazing country, but that many immigrants who bought into the hype, came here and live in poverty far worse than that which they escaped. I say 'far worse' because, while our social safety net is fairly good, it involves navigating an intense bureaucracy that is difficult for native English speakers and near impossible for immigrants, especially those with more limited English language skills. And, unfortunately, parts of our population are very anti-immigration and argue that they should 'stay home' instead of clogging up our social services. Morally, I think that I could just as easily argue that we should stop all immigration entirely until we can do a better job of caring for the immigrants that we already have. My all-time favourite argument in favour of opening up our immigration system is that it is one of the best chances that we have of saving our manufacturing industry. Since the 2008 financial crisis, much of the manufacturing industry has been in a horrible shambles and years later, factory jobs simply have not returned to eastern Canada. Factory jobs have mostly been a victim of cost and so the theory goes that opening up borders to lesser skilled people will drive down the cost of lower skilled labour. If you drive the cost of lower skilled labour down closer to minimum wage and get rid of the often union negotiated benefits, suddenly the cost disparity between producing in Canada versus China or Mexico looks a little better. Another argument I love is that the last time our borders were mostly open, we allowed an influx of mostly eastern European people to come into our country. (My last name is Hluska and my great grandfather was one of them). There were some growing pains and for many people (my great grandfather included), the move to Canada was really difficult. However, after a few generations, these immigrants' children and grandchildren have become important entrepreneurs, business and political leaders. So, the argument goes that in our history, mostly open borders lead to a difficult decade or two, but that the kind of person who will immigrate tends to be resourceful enough to bring enhanced opportunity for many generations after.
glass- 11y ago
> Interesting that the author of this piece comes from New Zealand, because NZ is the country that often springs to mind when I think of a nation that might could change dramatically with open borders. You might want to do some research about New Zealand's current housing crisis and other socio-economic issues (such as Māori being significantly over-represented in poverty statistics) before unilaterally advocating a country that you admit you have never been to and know nothing about (other than its size and population) open its borders because you won't have to deal with the consequences.
- geebee 11y ago
  Why do you think I'm advocating this?
- ericdschmidt 11y ago
  Open borders would enrich everyone, not just the immigrants or the poor. Please see my comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9769632 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9769632. I live in SF where there's a "housing crisis". All it means is that a lot of people want to live here and so it's expensive. And NIMBY pieces of trash vote against high rise development so supply isn't allowed to naturally keep up with demand. It's not really a 'crisis', it's less than peanuts compared to the crisis of extreme poverty. Rich first worlders like you and me, we can deal, we'll be fine.
lancewiggs 11y ago
We haver good immigration numbers at the moment, and society is ever-changing for the better as we balance a healthy mix of cultures. The trick is to constrain the rate of immigration so that the infrastructre and society can adapt. As it is out biggest city, Auckland, is experiencing insanely high house prices that folks in the Bay area would grimace at. Aside from that it's a wonderful wonderful place to live, and the start-up ecosystem is thriving.
- davegardner 11y ago
  > As it is out biggest city, Auckland, is experiencing insanely high house prices that folks in the Bay area would grimace at. I was a little surprised by this comment and wondered how true it actually was. According to Numbeo, rental prices in Auckland are 67% lower than SF. Likewise property purchase prices are between 66% and 71% lower on a price per square metre basis. Something worth noting these figures are for SF on average, not just the Bay Area. http://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/compare_cities.jsp?country1=United+States&country2=New+Zealand&city1=San+Francisco%2C+CA&city2=Auckland http://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/compare_cities.jsp?coun... Edit: Formattting
ericdschmidt 11y ago
Absolutely they should. Open borders would enrich everyone, not just the immigrants and not just the poor. Please see my comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9769632 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9769632

by geebee 11y ago

zerr 11y ago

One would think, countries like USA, Australia or NZ might be afraid of immigration because they know what they did to native inhabitants... Generally, think about the situation where all (most) countries abolish borders, not just NZ or other small country. Moving is the basic human right, and the sooner we realize the better for mankind, assuming the culture of the host country is respected. Of course the culture needs adjustments to respect human rights as well.

talmand 11y ago
Why would one be afraid of immigrants because of past treatment of original natives when chances are the immigrants are descended from people who did similar things to the original natives of their homeland? As an easy example, I'm fairly certain the original natives of the southern portions of the North American continent weren't speaking Spanish when the conquistadors showed up. I would disagree that is is for the better of mankind. In some cases, it could be, sure. In most cases, it eventually is not. How is it good for anyone to move from one stagnant area into a prosperous one to the point of dragging it down to be stagnant as well? Never mind the affect this has the people who are currently inhabiting the area. Plus, it would seem to be that once a level of immigration has happened in an area the newcomers no longer feel the need to respect or to assimilate into the local culture, so they maintain their own. Hopefully they are carrying over their bad habits that led to their homeland sucking enough to force them to move, because they'll eventually want to move again. In the long term, that eventually makes things worse for those that lived there before, much like you pointed out in your first statement. We have a long road to travel before mankind as a whole can, in masses, move about freely throughout the world without there being local consequences.
- squidbidness 11y ago
  Guilt. Making a change towards better treatment of people from different places brings up the poor past treatment, which people don't like to take responsibility for.
- ericdschmidt 11y ago
  "Move from one stagnant area into a prosperous one to the point of dragging it down to be stagnant as well?" Wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong... 100 times wrong. Productivity is the root of all prosperity. First read this excellent article: http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2015/02/always_keep_you.html http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2015/02/always_keep_you..... Workers become on average ~20x more productive when they migrate to the first world. Because we are capital rich and we have sane government and law and order. Imagine if you were moved to Haiti and you got stuck there. How much could you contribute to society in Haiti? You could maybe slice some coconuts on the side of the road - is that gonna make the world a lot richer? Roadside sliced coconuts? Nah, much better for you to be in first world even if you're doing a low skilled job here like delivering catering to a high tech startup. That catering company is able to produce food much more efficiently, and in SF or NYC you're able to distribute it much more efficiently, and you're part of this souped-up economic engine that's changing the world. That's why they make 20x or up to 40x more (in the case of the extreme poor) when they migrate to the first world. It's better for everyone! Economists estimate that moving from the status quo to fully liberalized migration (i.e. open borders) would roughly double global gdp - that's an insane silver bullet. That's everyone getting way fucking richer in one fell swoop. Please see my comment here for more info: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9769632 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9769632
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
    - ericdschmidt 11y ago
      Making cheap clothes and electronics in factories are good jobs relative to the kind of work that the extreme poor do - scrounging for food in a garbage dump in Manila or farming shitty land. And they make clothing and electronics in Mexico (which is a relatively rich country by global standards) and in America and other first world places. It's not like the economy would just stop making clothes or electronics. It would adjust to satisfy the forces of supply and demand at some optimal equilibrium. Just keep your eye on production, keep your eye on production, keep your eye on production.
crusso 11y ago
assuming the culture of the host country is respected That's a huge and unfounded assumption, though.
- zerr 11y ago
  Lets say there are lot of would-be-immigrants willing to respect the culture of prospective host country, become "American person", "NZ person" etc... (this doesn't necessary mean assimilation), but they are denied to do so. We need to fix this.
  - crusso 11y ago
    I agree with you, but unfortunately, the real problem with immigration is that it's a war between traditional views that value the indigenous culture vs multicultural forces that consider the host culture to be irrelevant. Poor souls like the author of this article are caught in the middle. They don't have representatives in the traditional views camp and the multicultural views camp considers them to be secondary since they're not as likely a voting block once they come in.
- pvaldes 11y ago
  Culture can not be respected in fact. Even if people wish to do so. The problem is that the thing is a moving target. When a lot of still alive people where born 'culture' was: 'a black woman was not supossed to sit in the best places of a bus', 'the children roam free with their friends and dogs and can go everywhere' and 'Is acceptable if I slap my wife in the face sometimes because I feel frustrated for the work'. Yes, this was a small part of the tradition not so long time ago. Each generation have been educated in a different point of view about what was acceptable or not. What 'culture' should be honored for newcomers?. West coast 1966? Sometimes 'culture' is just plain wrong and should not be respected.
  - crusso 11y ago
    That's cherry picking. I'm talking about cultural basics like learning the country's history, learning the laws and the Constitution, free market capitalism, etc. Just having an immigration system that is followed legally would be a lesson in culture that we've currently abandoned for political purposes.
incompatible 11y ago
It's an interesting issue. The right to move around freely seems more appealing than expecting people to be essentially imprisoned in their countries of citizenship. On the other hand, there are obviously billions of people living in poor and otherwise dis-functional countries, and if even a fraction decided to move to a country like New Zealand, you can imaging it becoming ridiculously overpopulated. Alternatively, should we accept that population groups that have a higher birth rate should naturally dominate future generations, or is it acceptable to fence off certain parts of the world with lower birth rates and a better natural environment?

murbard2 11y ago

It's a very tough question to answer because it's very hard to predict. I have some model of the general effects of allowing greater immigration, but the predictive value of the model breaks down the more radical the change. - I see letting in anyone with the equivalent of a bachelor's degree (or say anyone that anyone is willing to hire for more $40k a year) as basically having no downsides at all. Empirical data on immigration reveals that it has no impact on wages except at the very low end, among unskilled high-school dropouts. - As you allow lower incomes, welfare tends to become an issue. Currently, people do not immigrate in the US for the welfare (illegal immigrants tend to be net taxpayers, even when including healthcare) but people do immigrate to Europe for the welfare, so it's something that happens. However, if you take a country like France (where I grew up in), welfare payments aren't the biggest drag on the economy. Taxation is high, but other places with similar levels of taxation fare much better. Regulatory drag, in particular in the job market is a much bigger concern. In turns, this creates unemployment which aggravates any welfare problem. Evidence shows that as societies become more culturally and ethnically mixed, they tend to be less and less in favor of welfare. So higher immigration of welfare seeking immigrants may undermine popular support for welfare. It's a whole other discussion, but I'd consider disappearance of state funded welfare as a good thing. In addition, it's also possible to selectively deny welfare to immigrants, or to require a twenty year residency period before becoming eligible. - Political externalities are often mentioned. Won't immigrants vote for the same policies that made their home country a living hell? I find this doubtful for two reasons: a) The evidence points that in most democracies, the policies that end up being enacted are the ones favored by a wealthy elite, not the ones that have popular support. If you compare the actual policies of the US compared to the views of the median voter, they are strikingly better than you'd expect. How this comes to be is unclear, but the effect is important. b) The favorite political view of most people is the status quo, or some very minor version around it Now getting to New Zealand. Assuming only honest hard working immigrant seeking a better life? You've cut out the work for me! I think you'd see a lot of high rises build up in New Zealand. Consider that the current population of New Zealand could fit in a circle 7 km in radius in a city with the density of New York. If Stewart Island was all built up, it could hold the entire population of Canada. In practice, as more people would emigrate, real estate prices would appreciate, to the point where it wouldn't be economical for immigrants to come in, even if the borders were open.

kuschku 11y ago

The debate the politicians in my state (Schleswig-Holstein, a state in Germany) had about this was really interesting, sadly it’s in German. Essentially, it boils down to two issues: Morally, we all are descendants of immigrants, or at least most. Economically, most immigrants are willing to work hard. Combined with the fact that our society has a birth rate below replacement rate (1.3 vs. 2.1) we need immigrants just to keep our standard of living. And if we can give them a better life at the same time, it’s definitely great.

johnchristopher 11y ago
> Economically, most immigrants are willing to work hard. `Hard' as in `cheaper' ?
- anthony_d 11y ago
  'cheaper' is a comparison. 'hard' is not. I don't think anyone wants salaries to go into free-fall but that's not a necessary result of easing immigration.
  - pc86 11y ago
    Isn't it? By definition wouldn't an increase in supply of talent for a given job decrease market wage for that talent unless it was already in a shortage (which we never really know until it's over)?
    - murbard2 11y ago
      It would also decrease prices and thus raise living standards. Customers would then turn their attention to better goods and services, increasing the demand for labor. You're committing the lump of labor fallacy. Think about it this way, if two countries were to merge, would everyone be worse off because of the increased competition on the job market? No, people would be better off due to the increased amount of trade.
      - 11y ago

hluska 11y ago

I'm not the OP, but I mostly support the idea of open borders and I'm from Canada. Canada has many of the same issues that New Zealand has. We are the second largest country (by landmass) in the world, yet our population is slightly smaller than California. Much of our land is quite rugged, or very cold but our country is still capable of supporting more than the 35 million we currently have. The best argument that I have ever heard against opening up our border is that we are big, but size does not equal the ability to support a decent quality of life. Some argue that if we open up our borders, dreams of higher incomes will compel lesser skilled people to move to Canada. These people often will not understand basic labour laws like minimum wage, or the need for benefits and so they will drive down the cost of labour. Others argue that adding even five million people sounds like a good idea, but that it would require massive investments in health care, housing, and basic infrastructure. Like I said, I mostly support open borders but have never been too impressed by the moral arguments. Canada is a great country and I love it dearly, but I have spent a little too much in some bad neighbourhoods and become friends with too many unhappy immigrants. Rather, I would argue that we are an amazing country, but that many immigrants who bought into the hype, came here and live in poverty far worse than that which they escaped. I say 'far worse' because, while our social safety net is fairly good, it involves navigating an intense bureaucracy that is difficult for native English speakers and near impossible for immigrants, especially those with more limited English language skills. And, unfortunately, parts of our population are very anti-immigration and argue that they should 'stay home' instead of clogging up our social services. Morally, I think that I could just as easily argue that we should stop all immigration entirely until we can do a better job of caring for the immigrants that we already have. My all-time favourite argument in favour of opening up our immigration system is that it is one of the best chances that we have of saving our manufacturing industry. Since the 2008 financial crisis, much of the manufacturing industry has been in a horrible shambles and years later, factory jobs simply have not returned to eastern Canada. Factory jobs have mostly been a victim of cost and so the theory goes that opening up borders to lesser skilled people will drive down the cost of lower skilled labour. If you drive the cost of lower skilled labour down closer to minimum wage and get rid of the often union negotiated benefits, suddenly the cost disparity between producing in Canada versus China or Mexico looks a little better. Another argument I love is that the last time our borders were mostly open, we allowed an influx of mostly eastern European people to come into our country. (My last name is Hluska and my great grandfather was one of them). There were some growing pains and for many people (my great grandfather included), the move to Canada was really difficult. However, after a few generations, these immigrants' children and grandchildren have become important entrepreneurs, business and political leaders. So, the argument goes that in our history, mostly open borders lead to a difficult decade or two, but that the kind of person who will immigrate tends to be resourceful enough to bring enhanced opportunity for many generations after.

glass- 11y ago

> Interesting that the author of this piece comes from New Zealand, because NZ is the country that often springs to mind when I think of a nation that might could change dramatically with open borders. You might want to do some research about New Zealand's current housing crisis and other socio-economic issues (such as Māori being significantly over-represented in poverty statistics) before unilaterally advocating a country that you admit you have never been to and know nothing about (other than its size and population) open its borders because you won't have to deal with the consequences.

geebee 11y ago
Why do you think I'm advocating this?
ericdschmidt 11y ago
Open borders would enrich everyone, not just the immigrants or the poor. Please see my comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9769632 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9769632. I live in SF where there's a "housing crisis". All it means is that a lot of people want to live here and so it's expensive. And NIMBY pieces of trash vote against high rise development so supply isn't allowed to naturally keep up with demand. It's not really a 'crisis', it's less than peanuts compared to the crisis of extreme poverty. Rich first worlders like you and me, we can deal, we'll be fine.

lancewiggs 11y ago

We haver good immigration numbers at the moment, and society is ever-changing for the better as we balance a healthy mix of cultures. The trick is to constrain the rate of immigration so that the infrastructre and society can adapt. As it is out biggest city, Auckland, is experiencing insanely high house prices that folks in the Bay area would grimace at. Aside from that it's a wonderful wonderful place to live, and the start-up ecosystem is thriving.

davegardner 11y ago
> As it is out biggest city, Auckland, is experiencing insanely high house prices that folks in the Bay area would grimace at. I was a little surprised by this comment and wondered how true it actually was. According to Numbeo, rental prices in Auckland are 67% lower than SF. Likewise property purchase prices are between 66% and 71% lower on a price per square metre basis. Something worth noting these figures are for SF on average, not just the Bay Area. http://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/compare_cities.jsp?country1=United+States&country2=New+Zealand&city1=San+Francisco%2C+CA&city2=Auckland http://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/compare_cities.jsp?coun... Edit: Formattting

ericdschmidt 11y ago

Absolutely they should. Open borders would enrich everyone, not just the immigrants and not just the poor. Please see my comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9769632 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9769632