I enjoyed this piece, essentially reminding us that the effects of immigration on wages and the economy are extremely complex.
Keeping it simple, for those who might argue that immigration is a net negative, that it depresses wages and crushes growth, how did the United States rise to become the largest, wealthiest country this planet has ever seen?
One cannot stand against all immigration on one hand and call themselves a patriot on the other. They cannot speak out of both sides of their mouths.
Or farmer's might automate and/or improve their processes and/or buy more types of equipment or fertilizers or better seeds and then the increased demand for those hoods might boos investment in the space increasing their aggregate amounts while lowering price and likely boost R&D in the area (even attracting new science entrants) which might produce break throughs in Agricultural techs that lead to far more being produced for far less labor and resource. Or who knows? I mean, really, who knows? There's a great many historical examples that can be drawn on for multiple -- some of them even contradictory -- predictions of what will happen if we reduce immigration. There lots of different things to consider about when pondering immigration levels and those things spread across whole different spheres from labor force to housing to culture to on and on, and each of those areas then have lots of different things to consider within them, no one has precise answers or perfect predictions for the headline decision. And different people can reasonably go in different ways.
I enjoyed this piece, essentially reminding us that the effects of immigration on wages and the economy are extremely complex.
Keeping it simple, for those who might argue that immigration is a net negative, that it depresses wages and crushes growth, how did the United States rise to become the largest, wealthiest country this planet has ever seen?
One cannot stand against all immigration on one hand and call themselves a patriot on the other. They cannot speak out of both sides of their mouths.
Imagine saying things such as by preventing workers to emigrate from California wages are going to be increased in Texas?
One of my intellectual colleagues once sid that Thomas Sowell is a good intellectual for lazy conservatives
Or farmer's might automate and/or improve their processes and/or buy more types of equipment or fertilizers or better seeds and then the increased demand for those hoods might boos investment in the space increasing their aggregate amounts while lowering price and likely boost R&D in the area (even attracting new science entrants) which might produce break throughs in Agricultural techs that lead to far more being produced for far less labor and resource. Or who knows? I mean, really, who knows? There's a great many historical examples that can be drawn on for multiple -- some of them even contradictory -- predictions of what will happen if we reduce immigration. There lots of different things to consider about when pondering immigration levels and those things spread across whole different spheres from labor force to housing to culture to on and on, and each of those areas then have lots of different things to consider within them, no one has precise answers or perfect predictions for the headline decision. And different people can reasonably go in different ways.
Note that Stephen Colbert tried to get US workers to do farm labor in ~ 2013. He was not very successful. https://youtu.be/ewPburLEZyY?si=Hs3OUT3ts8m1SAUV
Low wage labor is heavily subsidized by the state. If wages rose then those workers wouldn't be dependent on that state subsidy.
Subsidized labor is oversupplied.