The economy will be fine without mass illegal immigration. The real crimes against humanity are open borders that fuel human trafficking and suffering. You should live in the nyc migrant shelters which have seen rape, murder, and many other violent crimes.
I like to see reading lists on specific subjects, but one should generally also include critical sources if you're trying to be thorough. Four persuasive sources supporting your position, one of which appears to be an illustrated children's book.
If one were to explain why being allowed to drive anywhere, anytime, for any reason should or shouldn't be allowed, there would inevitably be a question about the limiting principle. In the driving freedom question, the limiting principle is safety to the public. Speed limits, vehicle safety requirements, and other restrictions are limitations on freedom of travel that are generally enacted most places with a lot of people. But there are other types of considerations that matter to people, like the risk one can control behind the wheel that feels safer than the risk in the passenger seat of a plane that is lower because of complex regulations and other restrictions.
In other words, do these books adequately convey the meaning behind whether a lower-trust society of multi-cultural, multi-lingual people who only share a common neighborhood (or more typically a common wealth or income level) is actually more desirable for those who can choose than a high-trust, homogenous society in which people have common language, idioms, cultural backgrounds, and experiences? Globalization has improved everyone's finances, but what about individual and group happiness?
I like the voting with feet idea, but in America that increasingly means we're at risk of civil war due to political polarization and geographical sorting, so nothing is really that simple.
i recommend reading those books really. They are written by academic philosophers and economists who directly engage with the arguments by common people and other academic philosophers who defend limited-immigration or (mostly) closed borders such as David Miller, Michael Blake, Garret Jones, etc.
I’ll add these to my reading list, thanks, but since you seem to have spent time reading these already, do you happen to know if the linked study on trust accounts for the effects of high trust among middleman minorities on subnational economic scales?
The paper by Alex Nowrasteh and Andrew C Forrester shows major flaws with 'trust' literature. Here's the abstract (of an earlier draft) - "Economists have developed a vast empirical literature on how cultural traits like generalized trust affect economic output. Much of this literature finds a positive causal relationship between measures of generalized trust, as gathered by international surveys, and economic output. However, the trust literature commits five deadly empirical and theoretical sins that undermine its findings. From the quality of the survey questions and responses to the paucity of theoretical models used to explain how trust affects economic outcomes to the radically different results from experimental evidence, the trust literature is riven with poor methods and bad data that undermine its conclusions. Even so, applying the best methods in the trust literature to regional level analysis in the United States reveals no statistically significant correlation between economic output and trust. We see no reason to trust the findings of the trust literature." - https://www.cato.org/publications/working-paper/trust-doesnt-explain-regional-us-economic-development-five-other
The published paper abstract is pretty close to the above abstract.
These look like general treatments of the notion of open borders. @yuribezmenov was making a claim that OUR Southern border is a huge target for Mexican cartels, which DO traffic people and drugs and commit thousands of murders. Are you really saying that, without any other policy changes (drug legalization, etc) opening the border with Mexico and allowing the unfettered access of Mexican Cartels to their market won't fuel human trafficking and suffering? Do you dispute that the unprecedented numbers of migrants in NIC and elsewhere are leading to situations wherein unhoused women are raped and men are stabbed? None of these sources seem to deal with those claims whatsoever. We're not talking about the concept of borders or the general benefits of immigration averaged across all societies. We're talking about the US Southern border right now. There is a historically unique level of human movement across that border right now and to claim that this movement is not fueling suffering would be a strange claim indeed.
The best way to reduce suffering and deaths is to deregulate the border - that means that - yes, you need to make legal immigration very very easy. Let people easily migrate to the US from Mexico. When it comes to drugs, drug decriminalization is the best way to reduce suffering and deaths. https://fakenous.substack.com/p/the-drug-laws-dont-work
These might be absolutely true... but that doesn't specifically rebut the claim that the CURRENT border issues are fueling misery and death. Maybe abolishing the nation-state is the way to go... but-like drug decriminalization-that's not on the table here. We have a situation wherein the largest market for drugs and prostitutes in the world is next to a haven for organized crime. Under THOSE conditions, which is better? Allowing free (criminal) movement over the border or trying to enforce our laws? It's very possible that signals from the Biden administration (plus increased crime activity in Mexico) is actually driving a surge in border crossings. Something certainly is, and it's not the relative economic performance of the US and Mexico. If signals that the border is effectively open is driving immigration WITHOUT any change to our laws or policies (or government spending, or labor market regulations, etc.) it could very well be true that those signals are actually causing more chaos and death in the aggregate, especially if we're only considering the short term. Academic studies of immigration ethics (really just a synopsis of past situations, with some general moral assumptions and rules overlaid) CAN'T give you a fulsome description of this situation, in the same way that studies of the dynamics of revolutions don't have any predictive power about the next revolution. Social science doesn't work that way.
I was curious if you had any examples of any area of human activity wherein an academic treatise could give a reader a complete understanding of the issue? And I was also curious what your professional/occupational background was.
“Awareness of ignorance is the beginning of wisdom.” - Socrates
If you can give me some sources defending the claim that the changes in border policy which have corresponded with a HUGE surge in migration from Mexico to the US is NOT fueling crime and suffering or creating massive unintended effects for governments or American citizens I would be intensely interested in exploring those. I suspect that none of the academics who authored the works you provided have much direct experience with cartel crime or border control or homeless shelters. That doesn't mean that their perspective is invalid but it does man that it's incomplete.
The books I mentioned are written by people who know what they are talking about based on empirical evidence and training in economics, and/or law, and/or moral philosophy. Alex Sager's book has a chapter called - "The inherent violence of Border Control". How can you say their knowledge is incomplete without even reading all those books?
I know nothing about you but I’m going to guess, from your bafflement earlier, that YOU are an academic. It’s just a guess but… who has a better understanding of the reality of homelessness on a daily basis? A homeless man or an academic specialist? How about combat? A soldier or a military historian?
Economists, law professionals, and moral philosophers deal with aggregate data and empirical evidence and not just anecdotes. A laborer (like a carpenter, factory worker, mechanic, etc.) or an average person absolutely does not know the aggregate utility changes due to immigration from personal experience even in their own field. The long term AND the short term effects of immigration and border control have been studied by economists and immigration policy analysts like Alex Nowrasteh.
The moral and political arguments with respect to immigration have been examined by moral, political, and legal philosophers or theorists.
Telling these people, who have been working in this field for years, that their knowledge is incomplete because of lack of personal experience is simply arrogant and anti-intellectual.
I make that claim academic generalizations will NEVER give a person a complete understanding of a real-world situation involving millions of people. It can give a person a general understanding and that could even suffice for policy-making but it could never address all of the factors at play in THIS situation and it simply can’t ever lead a person to say, with certainty, ‘false’, when confronted with a claim like: millions of border crossings on the US-Mexico border last year have fueled misery and death. Of course they have, and any border patrol agent will know more about THAT situation than the most brilliant academics who studied every immigration and border issue in the 20th century… but never THAT one. There are different levels of resolution and different applications for general and specific knowledge. In every subject I have real-world experience with (business, crime, poverty, sociology, war, homelessness) EVERY academic work I’ve ever read would be insufficient to understand the real, daily demands of the pursuits and circumstances themselves. Can you give me one example (sports, combat, dating… anything) where an academic treatise would be sufficient to understand an entire range of human activity? I can say that, if they have no personal experience with cartel activities or homelessness, their knowledge is incomplete, because it’s (by definition) academic and general. I imagine even the authors of these books would grant that. ONE example…
>> I can say that, if they have no personal experience with cartel activities or homelessness, their knowledge is incomplete, because it’s (by definition) academic and general.
You don't need personal experience but data and lots of empirical evidence to argue for something. The books I mentioned do exactly that. Alex Nowrasteh also absolutely does know about US Mexico border and migration. He has been working in this field for years.
Sorry but denying entry and expelling people crossing the U.S. border is not a “crime against humanity”. No one crossing illegally is in any danger if they stay in Mexico and thus their rights are not being violated. Doubly so if those crossing are Mexican citizens.
I also fail to see how expanding legal migration would solve the problem in any shape or form - whoever fails to pass the U.S. governments vetting process will still go ahead and cross illegally, which is the crux of the problem.
You know what *would* though? Building a giant wall, trenches and other forms of entry barriers that will make illegal crossings considerably harder.
Thank you, Alex! You're the voice of libertarian integrity. Why do so many self-described libertarians suddenly transform into nationalists and statists when the subject of immigration arises?
In relative terms, the United States is one of the world's most libertarian countries. For most of its history, it has been one of the most welcoming of immigrants. This would suggest that immigration can make a society more libertarian, not less.
If we just shoot people crossing the border, the crossings will stop.
It’s not a crime against humanity to defend yourself from an invasion.
Immigration on this scale will permanently change the nation in much the same way an invading army would.
Legalizing the invasion won’t stop it from being an invasion. The reason you can’t get the votes for legalization is because nobody wants it. It’s not a solution to the problem of not wanting these people in the country.
“I argued that expanding legal immigration is the only way to reliably and permanently reduce illegal immigration...”
There are other ways.
Mexico, Central and South America are some of the most mineral rich regions on the planet. The people and workforce are excellent. North America needs to readdress Mexico, Central and South America with a fair, culturally balanced/aware engagement strategy addressing the most prominent drivers of cartel resourcing. Those nation states cannot compete with first world funding of drug production; it dwarfs all aspects of their legal and taxable economies.
It’s just fascinating that people can still write about immigration and not mention at all US policies in other countries that make life so unlivable for other people that they are willing to take great risks to come here.
Structural adjustment policies make it very difficult for nations in the global south to be anything but pawns in the larger politic and I will also add that the policies that governments choose often have little to do with what the people at the base actually need so there is a huge disconnect with what polices are say in El Salvador vs realities in the pueblos.
The economy will be fine without mass illegal immigration. The real crimes against humanity are open borders that fuel human trafficking and suffering. You should live in the nyc migrant shelters which have seen rape, murder, and many other violent crimes.
>>The real crimes against humanity are open borders that fuel human trafficking and suffering.
That is false. Here's why - https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250316967/openborders
https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/phl_fac/52/
https://academic.oup.com/book/36806?login=false
https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/wretched-refuse/47A037EB552CDB16DC77906072A590AB
I recommend reading all four books. That will get you up to speed with respect to migration ethics and economics literature.
I like to see reading lists on specific subjects, but one should generally also include critical sources if you're trying to be thorough. Four persuasive sources supporting your position, one of which appears to be an illustrated children's book.
If one were to explain why being allowed to drive anywhere, anytime, for any reason should or shouldn't be allowed, there would inevitably be a question about the limiting principle. In the driving freedom question, the limiting principle is safety to the public. Speed limits, vehicle safety requirements, and other restrictions are limitations on freedom of travel that are generally enacted most places with a lot of people. But there are other types of considerations that matter to people, like the risk one can control behind the wheel that feels safer than the risk in the passenger seat of a plane that is lower because of complex regulations and other restrictions.
In other words, do these books adequately convey the meaning behind whether a lower-trust society of multi-cultural, multi-lingual people who only share a common neighborhood (or more typically a common wealth or income level) is actually more desirable for those who can choose than a high-trust, homogenous society in which people have common language, idioms, cultural backgrounds, and experiences? Globalization has improved everyone's finances, but what about individual and group happiness?
I like the voting with feet idea, but in America that increasingly means we're at risk of civil war due to political polarization and geographical sorting, so nothing is really that simple.
i recommend reading those books really. They are written by academic philosophers and economists who directly engage with the arguments by common people and other academic philosophers who defend limited-immigration or (mostly) closed borders such as David Miller, Michael Blake, Garret Jones, etc.
Here's Alex Nowrasteh and Andrew C Forrester paper on 'trust' (with respect to economics literature) - https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/kykl.12335
The stuff you are thinking about is actually addressed in those books.
I’ll add these to my reading list, thanks, but since you seem to have spent time reading these already, do you happen to know if the linked study on trust accounts for the effects of high trust among middleman minorities on subnational economic scales?
The paper by Alex Nowrasteh and Andrew C Forrester shows major flaws with 'trust' literature. Here's the abstract (of an earlier draft) - "Economists have developed a vast empirical literature on how cultural traits like generalized trust affect economic output. Much of this literature finds a positive causal relationship between measures of generalized trust, as gathered by international surveys, and economic output. However, the trust literature commits five deadly empirical and theoretical sins that undermine its findings. From the quality of the survey questions and responses to the paucity of theoretical models used to explain how trust affects economic outcomes to the radically different results from experimental evidence, the trust literature is riven with poor methods and bad data that undermine its conclusions. Even so, applying the best methods in the trust literature to regional level analysis in the United States reveals no statistically significant correlation between economic output and trust. We see no reason to trust the findings of the trust literature." - https://www.cato.org/publications/working-paper/trust-doesnt-explain-regional-us-economic-development-five-other
The published paper abstract is pretty close to the above abstract.
These look like general treatments of the notion of open borders. @yuribezmenov was making a claim that OUR Southern border is a huge target for Mexican cartels, which DO traffic people and drugs and commit thousands of murders. Are you really saying that, without any other policy changes (drug legalization, etc) opening the border with Mexico and allowing the unfettered access of Mexican Cartels to their market won't fuel human trafficking and suffering? Do you dispute that the unprecedented numbers of migrants in NIC and elsewhere are leading to situations wherein unhoused women are raped and men are stabbed? None of these sources seem to deal with those claims whatsoever. We're not talking about the concept of borders or the general benefits of immigration averaged across all societies. We're talking about the US Southern border right now. There is a historically unique level of human movement across that border right now and to claim that this movement is not fueling suffering would be a strange claim indeed.
Read Alex Nowrasteh's other posts on US Mexico border and migration.
https://www.alexnowrasteh.com/p/my-recent-congressional-testimony
and
https://www.alexnowrasteh.com/p/dont-conflate-us-and-israeli-border?utm_source=%2Fsearch%2Fmexico&utm_medium=reader2
The best way to reduce suffering and deaths is to deregulate the border - that means that - yes, you need to make legal immigration very very easy. Let people easily migrate to the US from Mexico. When it comes to drugs, drug decriminalization is the best way to reduce suffering and deaths. https://fakenous.substack.com/p/the-drug-laws-dont-work
These might be absolutely true... but that doesn't specifically rebut the claim that the CURRENT border issues are fueling misery and death. Maybe abolishing the nation-state is the way to go... but-like drug decriminalization-that's not on the table here. We have a situation wherein the largest market for drugs and prostitutes in the world is next to a haven for organized crime. Under THOSE conditions, which is better? Allowing free (criminal) movement over the border or trying to enforce our laws? It's very possible that signals from the Biden administration (plus increased crime activity in Mexico) is actually driving a surge in border crossings. Something certainly is, and it's not the relative economic performance of the US and Mexico. If signals that the border is effectively open is driving immigration WITHOUT any change to our laws or policies (or government spending, or labor market regulations, etc.) it could very well be true that those signals are actually causing more chaos and death in the aggregate, especially if we're only considering the short term. Academic studies of immigration ethics (really just a synopsis of past situations, with some general moral assumptions and rules overlaid) CAN'T give you a fulsome description of this situation, in the same way that studies of the dynamics of revolutions don't have any predictive power about the next revolution. Social science doesn't work that way.
I was curious if you had any examples of any area of human activity wherein an academic treatise could give a reader a complete understanding of the issue? And I was also curious what your professional/occupational background was.
“Awareness of ignorance is the beginning of wisdom.” - Socrates
If you can give me some sources defending the claim that the changes in border policy which have corresponded with a HUGE surge in migration from Mexico to the US is NOT fueling crime and suffering or creating massive unintended effects for governments or American citizens I would be intensely interested in exploring those. I suspect that none of the academics who authored the works you provided have much direct experience with cartel crime or border control or homeless shelters. That doesn't mean that their perspective is invalid but it does man that it's incomplete.
The books I mentioned are written by people who know what they are talking about based on empirical evidence and training in economics, and/or law, and/or moral philosophy. Alex Sager's book has a chapter called - "The inherent violence of Border Control". How can you say their knowledge is incomplete without even reading all those books?
I know nothing about you but I’m going to guess, from your bafflement earlier, that YOU are an academic. It’s just a guess but… who has a better understanding of the reality of homelessness on a daily basis? A homeless man or an academic specialist? How about combat? A soldier or a military historian?
Economists, law professionals, and moral philosophers deal with aggregate data and empirical evidence and not just anecdotes. A laborer (like a carpenter, factory worker, mechanic, etc.) or an average person absolutely does not know the aggregate utility changes due to immigration from personal experience even in their own field. The long term AND the short term effects of immigration and border control have been studied by economists and immigration policy analysts like Alex Nowrasteh.
The moral and political arguments with respect to immigration have been examined by moral, political, and legal philosophers or theorists.
Telling these people, who have been working in this field for years, that their knowledge is incomplete because of lack of personal experience is simply arrogant and anti-intellectual.
I make that claim academic generalizations will NEVER give a person a complete understanding of a real-world situation involving millions of people. It can give a person a general understanding and that could even suffice for policy-making but it could never address all of the factors at play in THIS situation and it simply can’t ever lead a person to say, with certainty, ‘false’, when confronted with a claim like: millions of border crossings on the US-Mexico border last year have fueled misery and death. Of course they have, and any border patrol agent will know more about THAT situation than the most brilliant academics who studied every immigration and border issue in the 20th century… but never THAT one. There are different levels of resolution and different applications for general and specific knowledge. In every subject I have real-world experience with (business, crime, poverty, sociology, war, homelessness) EVERY academic work I’ve ever read would be insufficient to understand the real, daily demands of the pursuits and circumstances themselves. Can you give me one example (sports, combat, dating… anything) where an academic treatise would be sufficient to understand an entire range of human activity? I can say that, if they have no personal experience with cartel activities or homelessness, their knowledge is incomplete, because it’s (by definition) academic and general. I imagine even the authors of these books would grant that. ONE example…
>> I can say that, if they have no personal experience with cartel activities or homelessness, their knowledge is incomplete, because it’s (by definition) academic and general.
You don't need personal experience but data and lots of empirical evidence to argue for something. The books I mentioned do exactly that. Alex Nowrasteh also absolutely does know about US Mexico border and migration. He has been working in this field for years.
Sorry but denying entry and expelling people crossing the U.S. border is not a “crime against humanity”. No one crossing illegally is in any danger if they stay in Mexico and thus their rights are not being violated. Doubly so if those crossing are Mexican citizens.
I also fail to see how expanding legal migration would solve the problem in any shape or form - whoever fails to pass the U.S. governments vetting process will still go ahead and cross illegally, which is the crux of the problem.
You know what *would* though? Building a giant wall, trenches and other forms of entry barriers that will make illegal crossings considerably harder.
I recommend reading this - https://rintintin.colorado.edu/~vancecd/phil215/Huemer3.pdf
Thank you, Alex! You're the voice of libertarian integrity. Why do so many self-described libertarians suddenly transform into nationalists and statists when the subject of immigration arises?
Because most immigrants hate libertarianism and every place they moves becomes less libertarian.
In relative terms, the United States is one of the world's most libertarian countries. For most of its history, it has been one of the most welcoming of immigrants. This would suggest that immigration can make a society more libertarian, not less.
For most of its history the immigrants were white.
So what? Does melanin make people hate libertarianism? How does that work?
Can you explain asylum? Don’t you need to be on US soil to claim asylum? If so, why not just keep them off US soil?
Can asylum be claimed even if someone has passed thru multiple countries and is therefore not in harms way from their home country by definition?
It’s just some bullshit people claim to get in.
If we just shoot people crossing the border, the crossings will stop.
It’s not a crime against humanity to defend yourself from an invasion.
Immigration on this scale will permanently change the nation in much the same way an invading army would.
Legalizing the invasion won’t stop it from being an invasion. The reason you can’t get the votes for legalization is because nobody wants it. It’s not a solution to the problem of not wanting these people in the country.
“I argued that expanding legal immigration is the only way to reliably and permanently reduce illegal immigration...”
There are other ways.
Mexico, Central and South America are some of the most mineral rich regions on the planet. The people and workforce are excellent. North America needs to readdress Mexico, Central and South America with a fair, culturally balanced/aware engagement strategy addressing the most prominent drivers of cartel resourcing. Those nation states cannot compete with first world funding of drug production; it dwarfs all aspects of their legal and taxable economies.
A number of the arrivals were on the terrorist watch list. This aspect is a hostile invasion.
It’s just fascinating that people can still write about immigration and not mention at all US policies in other countries that make life so unlivable for other people that they are willing to take great risks to come here.
Do you think that other countries have any agency in choosing their own policies? Or are they all just helpless pawns of the USA?
Structural adjustment policies make it very difficult for nations in the global south to be anything but pawns in the larger politic and I will also add that the policies that governments choose often have little to do with what the people at the base actually need so there is a huge disconnect with what polices are say in El Salvador vs realities in the pueblos.
I agree that legal immigration is the way forward. But the bloated federal bureaucracy isn’t up to that job.
Yup. Too many illegals coming in? Make 'em legal. Problem solved. Oh, wait...