I heard a great point while listening to a back episode of Free Talk Live today (specifically, the show from 2007-06-30) - "illegal" immigration is a welfare problem, not an immigration problem. If you put out a bowl of milk every night for the stray cats in your neighborhood, don't complain when the strays from other neighborhoods start turning up for the free meal. Of course they're going to come for the handouts - if it's there, and there's a reasonably low chance of getting caught, there's no compelling reason not to. If you take away the free food, the strays will stop showing up and learn to procure their own food (or go somewhere else that offers handouts).
The real problem here, then, is not immigration itself, but our welfare state. For my part, I don't much care who comes to the United States, as long as they're willing to work and contribute. The people who come to this country for a free ride, however, are indeed a problem. I have enough of a problem with my tax dollars going to support lazy American citizens - the idea of lazy people from other countries showing up to take even more of the money stolen from us by the taxman is even worse. As far as people who legitimately can't work, there are private charitable organizations who are able to do a much better job than the government can (which, really, isn't all that hard). These people, however, are relatively very few. With things like the Internet and telecommuting, you'd really have to be bad off for there to be truly no job you could do.
As for the immigrants who do show up here to work and provide better for their families, I say more power to 'em. So many people complain that "They're taking our jobs!" but, really, they're not. They're just willing to work hard for minimum wage (or lower, in some cases), because they understand that a good work ethic is more important than a good flat-screen TV or a good sports car. For these people, the reason they come illegally is because it's so ridiculously hard and expensive to go through all the red tape and fees in our current system.
I apologize for the cliché, but this one happens to be true - this country was built on the backs of immigrants from all over the world. Unfortunately, with every wave there has been discrimination from the bulk of the citizenry. Many of these people forget that they themselves are only 2 or 3 generations removed from immigrants themselves. Since when does being born on one side of an imaginary line make a person better or more worthy than those born on the other side of that imaginary line?
So, taking these points into consideration, what reason could we really have to stop people from coming here from other countries to work? More workers means more production, more production means more wealth to be spread around, more wealth to be spread around is better for everybody. I'd very much like to hear from anybody who can give me a good reason why we really need to limit and regulate immigration, as opposed to just eliminating welfare.
2007-07-23
Don't shut that gate!
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2 comments:
There are 2 basic reasons why immigration, legal or illegal, is bad if there is too much of it. First off the addition of large groups of laborers that are accustomed to getting very little money for their effort, tends to reduce wages simply by supply and demand. The argument that they do jobs that Americans wont do is a farce. The truth is that Americans would, and have done those jobs in the past, they just wont do them for poverty wages. This depresses wages across the board and takes away the jobs that would have been done by new to the workforce young people. For example, I worked as a landscaper when I was in my 20's. It wasn't big money but it was honest work. Do you think I could get that job today? Would it pay enough to bother doing? I suspect not.
reason 2:
Culture! Smaller groups are forced to assimilate. Large groups tend to stay separated and keep their original language and culture. Then we end up with press 2 for english and americans losing jobs because they dont for example speak spanish. Our schools have to accomodate this also, reducing the effectiveness of an already compromised school system.. My 2 cents
JS
Hi, John!
Thanks for being my first commenter!
For your first point, the issue of "too much" immigration, I'd ask this - at what point does it become too much? Who gets to decide what is too much? I certainly don't believe that some federal government bureaucrat with an Excel spreadsheet can determine that accurately. It goes without saying that too much immigration is a bad thing, but without a way to logically and reasonably define what is "too much" or "enough" there's no way to enforce that kind of thing without being arbitrary, and arbitrary laws are bad laws across the board, by their very nature.
The issue of culture has also been brought up many times, and it is a tough one. I suppose the best answer I can come up with is this - all cultures change over time. While it is an admirable thing to want to hold on to "the way things were," frequently that just doesn't jibe with "the way things are." Having an influx of external cultural influences brought us things like lasagna, really good beer, Kung Pao chicken, the Beatles, and Jennifer Lopez. In any melting pot, you'll have a few clots of unmelted ingredients, and that's okay by me. Frequently the best part of the soup is the dumpling floating in the middle.
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