Paul Krugman says that recent job growth is all about migrant labor. Immigration hawk Mickey Kaus isn't amused:
And the hell with marginally employed native minorities, high-school dropouts and ex-offenders who might have been hoping that a tight labor market would finally offer them a good shot at steady, decently paid employment ....
Anti-immigration folks have long suggested that high immigration produces a loose labor market and falling wages, and it's a perfectly plausible argument. But I wonder if it's reached its sell-by date? The last three years have been something of a destruction test of this idea, after all. Upwards of 2-3 million immigrants have poured into the country, but the labor market remains tighter than its pre-pandemic average and wages have gone up for the lowest paid workers.
Previous academic studies on the effect of immigration have been equivocal, but none of them have been a natural experiment this big. The effect of the Mariel boatlift on the Florida economy in 1980, for example, has been studied extensively, but even that only involved about 100,000 immigrants. Conversely, the past three years have seen a net increase in the immigrant population of several million with no noticeable effect on low-end employment or wages. At this point, it seems likely that immigration responds to labor tightness, not the other way around.
Seriously, Kevin: you still read Mickey "goat [lover]" Kaus?
I know, right? Mickey "Goatf@cker" Kaus has been a racist crank about immigrants for years.
Somebody has to do it, and no immigrants would take THAT job!
"...At this point, it seems likely that immigration responds to labor tightness, not the other way around."
This is a distinction without a difference. If immigration has risen because the demand for labor has risen the effect is to moderate the increase in wages. If oil imports rise because US demand rises the effect is to reduce the increase in US prices. That's how supply and demand and markets work. If additional demand induces additional supply that reduces the resulting price increase.
But you are forgetting the other factor here: as long as there are jobs available, and immigrants actually work at those jobs, then they all create something economists call Productivity. Productivity is good. It grows the economy and creates more jobs for others.
This factor does not apply to commodities like oil, which is why a simple supply-and-demand analysis of immigration is likely to miss the mark. As Kevin's data clearly shows.
"This factor does not apply to commodities like oil .."
Why doesn't it apply to oil? Cheap oil benefits the economy if you ignore the effects on the environment. And low wages benefit the economy if you ignore the effects on the workers.
Workers provide an ongoing benefit. Oil provides a one-time benefit.
And there's a concrete and permanent cost to burning oil, vs the "cost" of allowing a free market to set prices.
That's not even considering the cost when we spend billions attempting to regulate the labor market. I thought principled conservatives favored free markets? Or do we just toss principles when it's time to mount a political attack?
"... I thought principled conservatives favored free markets? ..."
Conservatives and libertarians are different. Conservatives are often suspicious of free markets. And even libertarians rarely favor free markets in everything. Like for instance slaves.
Huh. I thought conservatives were bitching that inflation is intolerable.
Sometimes the cure is worse than the disease.
In the fight between, "I took Econ 101 and can quote the law of supply and demand," and "I'm an actual economist who understands that there are classes beyond Econ 101, and have collected empirical data," you look like an idiot.
"In the fight .."
Not sure what the fight is. Krugman says we need these workers. I say we need these workers if we don't want the increasing demand for labor to raise wages.
I believe what you are missing is that without immigration we stagnate- similar to Japan.
"I believe what you are missing is that without immigration we stagnate- similar to Japan."
Do you think this applies to the world as a whole? That perpetual population growth is vital? I don't think so and it isn't really an option anyway.
And now the "principled conservative" is an internationalist, arguing that the US should allow itself to stagnate because a proposed policy can't work permanently for the entire world.
It's particularly rich that you make this quasi-internationalist argument in favor of the "America First" candidate.
People are both of a source of supply of labor and a source of demand for labor.
This is not really true of oil and the difference is a large one.
This is also true whether they are white guys from Wyoming or brown guys from Central America. Its odd how differently the bigots view migration from within the US vs immigrants from shithole countries.
Kevin, you need to stop interfering with people's pontificating. Actual real-world data only confuses things!
I note that the data reported do not address the question of the marginally employed.
There's also a population policy question. How many people should the United States have? Immigration is basically the only thing maintaining population growth.
Ya' see, there's a whole bunch of people living large on the dole...
If we just completely cut all welfare spending and force everyone of them to get a job--there'd be no need for immigration!
/s
Gap between U-6 and the unemployment rate.
One would assume this gap would increase rapidly if Kaus were right, given the scale of immigrants entering the US.
I think the pandemic years also put a dent in the theory that the principal mechanism is wage response to immigrant labor supply rather than vice-versa.
Also gotta say, I remain somewhat astounded at the complete neglect by "conservative" theorists of the HUMAN aspect of immigration. People don't leave their homes -- often the homes of their families for generations -- without a compelling reason. Sometimes it's survival -- fleeing violence or starvation -- but sometimes it's the prospect of a better life for themselves (and their children), for which they're willing to abandon almost everything and undertake something very risky and potentially even deadly. It's not just a numbers game!
"wages have gone up for the lowest paid workers"
&
"no noticeable effect on low-end employment or wages"
Maybe wages would go up more if there was less immigration. Why is that missing in the analysis?
It’s a good question that should be addressed.
Also, the chief complaint that people have with today’s economy is not that unemployment is high or that wages are low.
It’s that housing is unaffordable.
Surely adding millions of people without adding millions of units of housing negatively affects housing affordability.
Maybe wages would go up more if we enforced higher wage floors. That's a much better idea than restricting immigration.
"... That's a much better idea than restricting immigration."
If Drum is correct that immigration is driven by the demand for labor that would reduce immigration by reducing the demand for labor.
Jobs that don't pay a comfortable living wage shouldn't exist. They should either be MADE to pay a comfortable living wage, or they should vaporize.
"... They should either be MADE to pay a comfortable living wage, or they should vaporize."
I actually sort of agree with you. We should not be importing desperate people from all around the world to do jobs which otherwise would not exist.
Why do you think that?
If you enforce higher wage floors then people get priced out of the job market. Do you really think no job is better than a low wage job? Additionally, many of the people priced out of the market will be Americans while immigrants who work longer and harder and complain less will take them. Is that your objective?
If you reduce the number of low skilled immigrants then wages for low skill jobs will increase due to supply and demand and the people who get those now higher wage jobs will be Americans. Isn't that better?
Of course, if you prioritize economic growth and overall wellbeing you do neither - you let in immigrants, you do not put a floor on wages, and you limit government transfer payments to force more people into the labor market. This increases employment and GDP and keeps industries that rely on low wages onshore instead of killing them or moving them offshore.
Decide what you care about and then implement the policy that produces that result.
Oh, you want the rest of us to make up the slack with food stamps, heating oil aid, etc? Never would have figured this stupid troll would cut his head off and declare himself a Socialist.
Of course, he's adocating socialism for deadbeat business types, so I guess he's still running true to form.
Talk about magical thinking.
If you have a low minimum wage and some people cannot survive on their pay then you have to top up their pay with transfer payments.
If you have a high minimum wage then many of these people will get priced out of the labor market - if their labor was worth more than the new minimum wage then they would earn more money than the new minimum wage even if you did not have a minimum wage law. If people get priced out of the labor market and have zero earned income then you have to use transfer payments to provide all of their support instead of just topping up a low wage.
So which is better? Topping up a low wage with transfer payments or giving them all the money they need to survive with transfer payments?
Jobs shouldn't merely allow you to survive on their pay, they should allow you to thrive.
Also, you are specifically against transfer payments; you want them minimized to "goad" people into the job market.
Economically speaking, both are identical. Both involve the same total amount of productivity being generated, merely changing where it is directed.
In general, the second is to be preferred, as it means everyone who does have a job has a very good one, as opposed to lots of people having bad jobs. It maximizes human happiness.
"If you enforce higher wage floors then people get priced out of the job market."
There's a lot of debate about this and economists like Krugman have persuasively argued that increasing the minimum wage (obviously there are limits) does not necessarily decrease the number of available jobs in any significanct way. As the current minimum wage is effectively much lower than it was 60 years ago I think there's probably a lot of room to raise the "wage floor" without a meaningful impact on employment.
1. Please explain the relevance of the minimum wage 60 years ago to whether increasing the minimum wage today would price people out of the labor market.
2. Many people are already priced out of the labor market. See https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/employment-rate. 40% of working age Americans have no job. I do not think that is because 80% of women are stay at home moms.
Interesting that you pointed to a chart of only the past year. If, as you contend, higher minimum wages price people out of the market that would suggest that as the minimum has been effectively dropping for most of the past 60 years the employment rate should have risen. Instead the employment rate has been dropping since the end of the Clinton administration. Maybe this was driven mostly by baby boomers retiring ?
.
Anyone who wants a job should be provided with a job that pays well enough for a comfortable living and which treats them with dignity and respect. This should be enforced using state power.
These are terrible ideas. They do not lead to overall wellbeing being increased; instead they result in a massive class of immiserated laborers being worked to the bone. Imagine thinking "limit government transfer payments to force people into the labor market" is good, but "ensure the labor market provides only good jobs at good wages" is bad.
You're falling back on counterfactuals? Seriously? Let me guess: We also have to prove that your supposition is wrong ... and you get to be the arbiter of whether you're wrong or not?
We done here? Ace?
The idea that high immigration creates a loose labor market implies that immigrants consume less than they produce. Immigrants increase demand, but must produce more than what they demand. This ratio must be higher than it is for native born workers. So under this argument, immigrants lower production costs (are anti-inflationary).
But what they produce are marginally lower-priced groceries, fast food, and hotel rooms. Meanwhile, they compete for scarce, expensive housing that is not produced at any rate near what is needed to supply the numbers who come here. They also don’t produce schools or teachers or hospitals, all of which are required to be provided.
I’m not anti-immigrant, but it’s not clear that someone who works 60 hours a week at a fast-food job in a high-cost coastal city brings all that much to the table here.
You are making a lot of assumptions not supported by evidence. We've had housing shortages before and we always managed to build more housing. In a lot of cases, both today and in the past, it was the immigrants who built the housing. All those immigrants are growing the economy and it is a lot easier to finance and build new apartment buildings during a growing economy than during a downturn. You are also forgetting the rather obvious point that birth rates are so low that the total population is growing slower. This is not a new phenomenon. We can more easily build enough housing today to keep up than in the past.
Your other points also seem false. I've met teachers who were immigrants. Really not that rare. And there are many places that don't have enough school children to justify keeping schools open. Schools get money based on the number of students and having too few can be much worse for a community than too many.
And hospitals... are you really unaware that many hospital workers, from the doctors on down, are immigrants? Really?
But hey. Maybe I'm wrong and your relentless logic is correct and the reason $300,000 or $600,000 homes are so pricey is because they are all being bought by "someone who works 60 hours a week at a fast-food job in a high-cost coastal city."
You don't think home-building is constrained by available labor?
There's a team of people building a house down the block. There's a supervisor there who speaks English. At least on the job site, the rest speak Polish or Spanish. I can't say for sure, but I'm guessing those immigrants are producing exactly the housing (and other construction) you say you're concerned about.
Not quite sure what you mean about "producing teachers". I presume you're not talking about them having babies that grow up to teach, and instead suggesting that immigrants are unlikely to become teachers. Anecdata to the contrary: a good friend who came here from Colombia in the 70s just retired after a long career as a grade school teacher. Immigrants are quite able to perform skilled labor. Perhaps not on the day they arrive, but...
"But what they produce are marginally lower-priced groceries, fast food, and hotel rooms"
Well, they also seem to produce a lot of construction labor, fwiw. I know that housing costs are only partially due to construction labor costs, but then again, the fairly modest national population growth isn't what's driving housing prices. Housing prices rise quickly in the economically vibrant places to live, because lots of people in this country want to live there. So I don't think that the high housing prices in like Queene Anne or Greenlake or Leschi are driven particularly by low wage folks outbidding you for a house.
If immigrans consume more than they produce then the rest of us must be supporting them. That's not good. Immigration should make us all richer, not poorer.
Immigrants who consume more than they produce and are not supported by their families should not be allowed in the US or should be deported when we find them except in exceptional circumstances.
Wow. This guy has obviously thought through this issue. I might disagree with some of the people here, but I don't feel the need to call them morons. I assume that "consume more than they produce" is the latest right wing barf salad description to degrade immigrants. An idea made up out of thin air with no reasoning or intelligence behind it. The idea, no doubt, is to ignore every fact of American history that shows that immigrants are what made America great. Ignoring that today, as we speak, communities all over America, both big and small, are being revitalized by immigrants.
For those who don't know, 100+ years ago a big surge in immigration came from eastern and southern Europe (a large percentage of Americans are descended from them). To stop this surge, really dumb people in power wanted to convince Americans that these new immigrants were feeble-minded and would permanently dilute the intellect of those already here. So they invented a new word, moron, to describe them. For some reason, the word seems appropriate to apply to this guy who never questions anything he is told and just blindly repeats what he hears.
Well, "they consume more than they produce" is absolutely true of *some* people. Hedge fund managers and trust fund kids are high on that list.
Then you obviously do not understand economics.
When you need to be taxed for transfer payments or other support services for trust fund kids or hedge fund managers, then start complaining.
On the other hand, when someone needs transfer payments funded by our taxes to survive, then he is a net drain on our wellbeing. We have less money in our pockets because some of our money has to go to him.
For our fellow Americans, that is necessary. If someone is a non-American then why are we keeping him here and supporting him?
I have spent the last 30 years as an expat in various countries. NONE of them would have supported me with any kind of transfer payment if I could non support myself. They would just have deported me back to the US. Why should the US be any different?
"On the other hand, when someone needs transfer payments funded by our taxes to survive, then he is a net drain on our wellbeing . . . . For our fellow Americans, that is necessary. If someone is a non-American then why are we keeping him here and supporting him?"
Moron. Non-Americans aren't eligible for welfare. A legal immigrant who even applies for welfare can have their visa revoked for that reason. An illegal immigrant can't even apply for benefits in the first place.
By the way, the reason I called you a moron is because I'm trying to be charitable. It's possible that you understood the facts here already, but made your statements anyway because you are a liar. But I'm trying to assume the best about you: stupid, not evil. Try not to prove me wrong.
Nope, he's both, as many of us have already found out. Never acknowledges he's wrong when forked, then circles back to the same debunked talking points? Check. Makes stupid and unsupported claims, then expects others to produce evidence that he's wrong? Check. Says more or less explicitly "If you can't make me say I'm wrong I win"? Check.
I thought about pointing out to him that the most egregious parasites in America are not people on welfare but are actually billionaires, but I seriously doubt he's even capable of grasping that.
The simplest answer is that immigration lowers both wages AND prices, with the latter being stronger overall. Everyone but the previous round of immigrants and high school dropouts benefits. Overall the effects are modest regardless.
Of course immigration mechanically increases GDP, because after immigration their income is included when it wasn’t before, but this is a rather banal observation once you think about it. It says nothing as to how the incomes of natives are affected.
The likelihood that in todays economy, the day an immigrant arrives they add sufficient value to provide themselves with housing, education, health care, and transportation seems far-fetched.
To whom?
Got data?
Newborn children have a strongly positive net present value to the government. Immigrants if anything are better because they generally have skipped one of the two cost-center phases of life.
"... Immigrants if anything are better because they generally have skipped one of the two cost-center phases of life."
The part where they receive an education, acquire useful skills and learn the rules and customs of their country?
Most immigrants are a net positive.
Where we have gone loco is the crazy idea that non-Americans who do not support themselves and who commit crimes should be allowed to stay in the US. This is just STUPID.
If there is a preponderance of evidence that a non-American resident has committed a crime or he becomes a public charge then he should be deported. Fast.
Compositional effects must be looked at. Currently about half the US population is considered part of the workforce. So, if immigrants as a group are, say, 70% of working age, this should tend to increase production. And that, in turn, means more goods and services available per person. Which puts upward pressure on real wages. And needless to say, real wages are more important than nominal wages.
But sure, if you're an immigrant who arrived ten years ago who's employed as an asbestos remover—and five hundred low skill workers move to your area tomorrow—you might see some moderate, temporary downward pressure on your wages.
But for most Americans most of the time, immigration is good for their personal financial situations, at least if adequate housing can be built.
So now I am supposed to believe that immigrants are stealing jobs from ex-cons?
Right.
"You haven't proved I'm wrong, BOOYAH!"
Based on anecdotes, I think it may be the folks who rely on the underground economy who are hurting the most. Not sure how off the grid data can be captured.
Here's an idea; if wages are too low, the state could use its massive power to set a wage floor and punish those who violate it.
That's a full win/win. Why the hell is anyone worrying about tinkering around the edges by messing with the labor market to try and create labor scarcity in order to drive wages up? That's weird and complicated, and wages shouldn't depend on a tight labor market. If you're working , the job should pay well!
Set wage floors. Problem solved.
It is desirable to put upward pressure on wages that are higher than either the current minimum wage or any seriously proposed minimum wage. The way to do that is to have labor shortages.
How very convenient that this forecloses any possible policy avenue that isn't "kick'em out and stop more from coming."
I'm a firm believer in zero population growth. Labor shortages and a resultant rising average standard of living would be beneficial consequences of ZPG but it's worth pursuing for its own sake.
Do you have a better idea?
Enforcing ZPG would involve grotesque and horrific human rights abuses, so my better idea is "don't do that."
The US domestic birth rate is low enough that ZPG can be achieved simply by limiting immigration. No grotesque and horrific human rights abuses required. (If it were needed, I would not regard requiring people to get licences for children and limiting the number of licences as a human rights abuse, but it's not required.)
Oh, you meant for just the US, not worldwide.
My response to that is that kicking people who want to come here in the face and throwing up barriers to doing so is awful.
Do you have a better idea for putting upward pressure on wages?
Direct state intervention. Set wage floors and enforce them. None of this shilly-shallying of trying to achieve that through weird indirect means.
"That's a political non-starter, but we can ally with the xenophobes to achieve upward wage pressure in other ways!" is awful.
Wage floors, if enforced, insure that everybody is paid minimum wage. How do we encourage employers to pay more than minimum wage?
If the minimum wage is ensuring a comfortable existence, what do I care if nobody is being paid more than it? My goal of "people are living comfortable lives" has been achieved.
Tax the rich. At punishing rates, as you would have it. And make it clear why this is happening. If certain news outlets don't get with the program ... force them.
There, that was simple enough. And effective as all get-out to boot.
I fail to see how charging the rich high taxes is going to get more pay for low income people.
Direct redistribution should be a thing.
Actually, it's re-resdistribution.
"Set wage floors. Problem solved."
For those workers who remain employed. Not so good for those whose jobs are eliminated because it is now cheaper to do them by machine or because their value added no longer covers their wage.
Then redistribute wealth downward to said unemployed people, though either a job guarantee or a generous direct cash transfer. Also a pretty easy solve.
A job, especially a full-time one, should pay enough to guarantee a comfortable living, and anyone who wants a job should be able to have one. The economy exists for the benefit of those participating in it; it should be forced to bow to peoples needs, rather than people being forced to contort themselves to bow to its.
If you do that then some American workers will be forced out of the workforce by foreigners. Why would you want to allow that?
Why would YOU want to have jobs that pay poor wages? A job should comfortably support those working at it; that is what jobs are FOR. If a job doesn't do that, it has failed at its purpose and should be changed or destroyed. If people want a job, one should be provided for them.
As for "foreigners," if someone wants to come here and work and make a life for themselves, my response to that is a resounding "good, welcome to America. You can become an America just like millions before you." We should go back to the pre-Chinese Exclusion Act model of immigration.
Keeping wages low no matter what has long been state policy in Mississippi and Alabama. We have all had plenty of time to see how well that works for their overall quality of life.
Why, the quality of life is higher than ever! Why would you even say such a - oh. You mean the quality of life for people who don't count. People, in fact, who barely qualify as human.
Why'cha say so?
"If people want a job, one should be provided for them."
Really?!?! So the government should create make work jobs for people?!?!?
The purpose of a job is defined by the employer since the employer pays the bills. In general, it is to create more value than the cost of the employee.
If a job does not provide a high enough wage for the worker to survive then we need to top up the worker's income with transfer payments. That is certainly better than regulating that job out of existence, forcing the worker out of the work force, and having to cover his entire income with transfer payments, right?
The logical leap you made here is a bit comical.
Minimum wages are bad because IMMIGRANTS are bad! WHY ARE YOU BAD!?
Xenophobeconomics 101.
Um... I think you are confused.
If you eliminate the minimum wage then in general you will get more immigrants coming to take jobs at low wages that Americans will not accept.
Elected Dems know they have to run, not walk, from Krugman. That's why after he does a column and a bunch of tweets about how safe and wholesome NYC is, the Gov sends out the National Guard. When Krugman says NYC should be renamed "Everyonewelcomeland," the mayor declares a migrant emergency.
If only Kevin had posted about subway crime a few days ago. What! He did?
When he did I looked into it a bit. There was a jump in subway crime at the beginning of the year. In January 2024 the subways had significantly more crime than January 2023 including some high profile cases that got a lot of coverage. In response the police increased their presence and subway crime in February 2024 was lower than February 2023. In the first week of March, just before the governor acted, there was an even bigger dip in crime.
What! I bet the next thing that's suggested is that the people on the internet claiming NY is a nightmare are exaggerating to score political points and get clicks. What!
The next thing you know someone might point out that NY has one of the lowest crime rates in the country. WHAT!
>> The next thing you know someone might point out that NY has one of the lowest crime rates in the country. WHAT!<<
You can’t win with that argument. When you make it people will just say “that’s because crime is so rampant that most crimes just don’t get reported”. With all the cameras around, there’s plenty of fodder for the nightly news. Every crime is amplified and people become fearful. Additionally, I think most people tend to conflate homelessness with crime.
Except for the pandemic, unemployment has been below 4% for a very long time. Why hasn't there been more increase in wages? Average real production worker wages (by the CPI) are still below the 1973 level. Is it just a coincidence that immigration increased about 1970? Of course there is also outsourcing and other factors, so this is not simple.
Why do people hire unauthorized immigrants if they don't work for lower wages? Why have immigrants replaced "natives" in many areas such as construction? The simple answer is that they work for less.
Overall the idea that bringing in people who are willing to work for much less than natives doesn't keep wages down is just indefensible. Of course if you don't compete with the immigrants for jobs or housing you benefit from lower prices. And no, the lower prices do not outweigh lower wages for those near the bottom - this is why real wages have not increased since 1973.
I say once again that the situation would be different if we had meaningful minimum-wage laws or strong unions. But of course companies can use immigrants to avoid or break unions.
You are way off. Your analysis only makes sense if there are a fixed number of jobs. Labor shortages slow or even stop economic growth. Low unemployment makes it harder to expand. Maybe you have to raise wages or have some other plan to find enough workers. But if you can't hire more workers because there are no more workers you simply don't expand.
When the economy is growing there are lots of people making enough money to buy more things (everything from houses to clothes to services). Which causes more production which causes more jobs. If the economy doesn't grow and lots of employed people lose their jobs or take pay cuts, then all those people you were talking about end up worse off.
"Is it just a coincidence that immigration increased about 1970?"
The number of women entering the workforce dwarfed the number of immigrants. And the size of the workforce grew at an incredible pace. More workers means more growth and more job creation. You are just wrong here.
Are there a number of immigrants that produce negative results? I'm sure there are, but we are nowhere near it. I am reminded of people who talk about immigration in the late 19th century being bad because it kept wages low. They never catch on that, without a steady supply of immigrants, that new factory would never have been built. Or it would have been built somewhere far away.
If there is real demand and you don't have enough workers to meet it (and can't get them from low-wage countries), you raise wages to get the workers you need. This has not been happening over the last 50 years. There has been some increase in wages at the lower end very recently, but the reason for this is not clear.
I am not saying that immigration is solely responsible for the stagnation in wages over the last 50 years. That stagnation is a fact that Kevin tends to obscure by looking only are recent data and claiming that any increase over prices is good. As you say, entry of women into the work force is a factor, and so are international competition and outsourcing. Determining the contribution of immigration is very complex, beyond Kevin's usual 24 hour analysis.
Bringing in low-paid workers is one way of preventing businesses from outsourcing. But the process either way is a matter of keeping wages down. It is a matter of flattening wages world-wide, which must obliterate the advantage that US workers currently have. Is it fair to flatten wages for agricultural workers, say, but not to flatten salaries for white-collar workers? Do you think that your job should be done by an educated person in India or China, whether that person does the job remotely or immigrates to the US? Is that the way to improve things for the majority of US citizens?
i was in college back in 1973. I remember friends of mine who worked in the packing houses during the summer making $5/hr. I worked for the railroad that summer making $4/hr. The equivalent wages wages today would be in the $30-$35/hr range. The current wage in the meat packing industry is around $15-$17/hr. about half of what it should be. This is solely because of the use of illegal immigrants.
Similar situations exist in construction and leisure/entertainment industries.
Any business that employees illegal immigrants should be shut down and the owners jailed. With extreme prejudice.
"Any business that employees illegal immigrants should be shut down and the owners jailed. With extreme prejudice."
Well first you need to make it illegal to employ illegal immigrants which it currently isn't. You as an employer are required to ask if the person you are hiring is legally allowed to work in the US. If they say yes and provide you with documentation to that effect which is not obviously invalid then you are okay to hire them. That means only the most stupid or complacent employers have criminal exposure.
Thank goodness we got lots of teenagers to work 3rd shift at the chicken packing plant. Oh well.
People talk like there is some real labor shortage needing hundreds of thousands of new workers. I don't see it. Is there something you need or want that you can't get? Where is this unmet need?
Have never understood why the Mickey Kaus’s of the world say their goal is increasing wages but they advocate this double bank shot strategy of reducing immigration to achieve it. Why not just be for a $25 minimum wage? Presumably that would make the jobs more attractive and more natives would take them, resulting in lower immigration. If you want to raise wages, just raise wages. Right?
"...Why not just be for a $25 minimum wage? ..."
Why only $25? Make it $1000000 and then everyone will be rich. Right?
So, if I understand what you are implying, higher wages will fail?
Sorry, does that mean reducing immigration will fail because anything that increases wages will slow the economy.
I get that you are being sarcastic and making fun of my comment, but don’t fully understand what you are saying.
"Sorry, does that mean reducing immigration will fail because anything that increases wages will slow the economy."
No, reducing the labor force will decrease total GNP but increase GNP per person. Of course starting a plague to reduce the labor force by 99% is probably a bad idea.
Salt is good for you, in fact, you can't live without it. So according to this dimwitted troll we should be consuming pounds and pounds of the stuff every day.
That's one the hallmarks of the troll, BTW: The complete and total inability to think things through before flapping their gums.
"Salt is good for you, in fact, you can't live without it. So according to this dimwitted troll we should be consuming pounds and pounds of the stuff every day."
So how do you determine the optimum minimum wage? Since I think you are acknowledging that it could be set too high.
Nope, doesn't work like that. You've got to admit you made a mistake first. You need to say, I made a stupid argument, it was wrong, and I won't do it again. Think you can manage that?
For people who don't know, I've already been on the merry-go-round with him on this one. Twice. At least twice that is. That's the thing with trolls, at some point when they're completely overmanned they just drop out and refuse to give a straight answer. Wouldn't do to burn their taling points when they can simply trot it out again at a later date.
Three points
1. Clearly immigrants both buy items and also work: meaning, its not a single impact or variable that one must examine.
2. Based on observation, low skilled/undocumented labor does negatively impact some labor pools. My proof, drive to a place in your area that has a group of undocumented men and hire one. Try offering that same work and wage in another forum.
3. Australia, for a clear reason, has very limited undocumented labor. Low skilled jobs in Australia are well paid, or done by technology (machines in agriculture). Wages rise to attract local talent....
I have a dream that little children will one day live in a nation where they will be taught not to judge based on exclusive evidence and flawed logic so that, by the time they graduate from elementary school, they'll be practiced at judging others by the content of their character, aka based on inclusive evidence and logic that has been vetted by mature adults who do not share the same hidden agenda.
For a long time the population of unauthorized immigrants seemed to be about 10-11 million (as far as I can determine). During that time immigration may have been responsive to job availability or relative conditions in Mexico vs US as Kevin has said before. People were probably moving back and forth to Mexico in particular. But the recent surge is different - people are coming from more remote places, making very arduous and probably irreversible journeys.
It's really too early to evaluate the effects of this immigration on wages and employment, because of the effects of the pandemic, such as compositional effects on average wages, and inflation.
Kevin, I am sure Data is available to you on H1B use by US corporation to import massive numbers of IT workers. This has been a massive disincentive to eductate US based students.
The "free market" should have push salaries up, attracting students. Instead we imported well below market workers. the long term impact on the general level of Education is tremendous. Sure it helped the shareholders and management, but not the millions potential IT workers that never will be.