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Long Term View's avatar

Another superb analysis and and another lost conclusion.

Dude, you fail to differentiate between (1) a reasonable volume of immigrants and (2) a flood. The flood in Denver is 60,000 against a population of 600,000. And another 60,000 are expected in the next 5 months. In two more years we will add perhaps another 120,000. How is it possible to finance the massive burden on needed infrastructure? Think "Flood" - what comes to mind these days - Oh, maybe North Carolina.

Not only are all the low rent properties full and rents rising, hospitals are going bankrupt. Further other costs are up, for example milk and cheese. The food supply does not automatically increase, for example, the dairy farmers did not add 10% more cows. The cities budget is cratered and essential services are being cut. The parks did not plant flowers this year.

You seem to think a rise is house prices is not problematic, but forget that a flood of immigrants has many effects on rising costs - schools, social services, crime, prostitution, children in the sex trade etc.

Remember - many people say these immigrants pay taxes - not true at the low income levels they are at. Not true for the children sold into the sex trade. So, the rest of us pay. If immigration to Denver was 2000 to 10,000 people a year - no problem - but 60,000. A disaster.

And it is worse - the suffering these immigrants receive is horrifying. Gangs prey on them and the border crossing is a bitch. Look no further than here to understand what I am saying: https://x.com/JamesOKeefeIII/status/1840423630682935752

The horrifying journey and abuse (And sale) of children as part of this massive flood if immigrants is one of the worse human rights violations I have seen - and I have been to war zones.

Go back to your computer and re-evaluate the whole picture. Figure out what is really going on. Get the silly housing numbers out of you brain and evaluate the TOTAL effect on the societal structure - schools, food, hospitals, transportation, crime and yes, housing.

I believe in managed and proper immigration, but the people paying you to analyze and publish this spin have something else in mind and it is not good. They want the pro-immigrant story out, but they do not give darn about the suffering or cost.

How is your conscience these days? How many pieces of silver are you willing to take to support this horror and suffering from the pro-immigration narrative?

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Nathan Smith's avatar

Alex, I think this analysis is kind of wrong, because it doesn't incorporate the all-important distinction between *average* housing prices and *marginal* housing prices. See my post at Open Borders:

https://openborders.info/blog/the-great-land-value-windfall-from-open-borders/#:~:text=The%20stock%20of%20existing%20housing%20is,%20by%20definition,%20fixed%E2%80%93

In a nutshell, theory predicts that immigration should raise the price of *land* (b/c more demand, inelastic supply) but reduce the price of *structures* (b/c cheap labor). A given home price conflates the two, so the impact is ambiguous, as the somewhat muddled empirical literature reflects. But theory clearly predicts that (a) there should be a big land value windfall for homeowners, and also (b) homebuyers should be able to get more value for money in terms of structure plus access to jobs and shopping.

Win-win.

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