happy beltane
I’m ashamed that capitalists have allowed socialists to co-opt the illegal immigration problem. Every immigrant worker that crosses the border makes me richer without me having to lift a finger. More people do not merely reduce the costs of labor in border states; they also create their own demand for products and services from the native labor force and increase competition which benefits us all. Eventually, it all balances out while at the same time lifting our economy as a whole. If our cavemen ancestors kept the population stunted at one million, we’d still be knapping stone knives and wearing bearskins. By the same token, if all the “illegals” disappeared tomorrow, the negative effects would be felt across the US, which is why the socialists took advantage by rounding up Hispanics today. Socialists love pretending this is a May Day rally, but this isn’t a cry for more socialism and unions. The whole brouhaha is about eliminating statist laws that prevent the movement of this good into the country where there is a demand for it. Socialists, on the other hand, are merely hoping to get more people addicted to government handouts. Capitalists should take back this issue and call for the relaxation of immigration laws, if not their outright elimination, while amputating the government teat the socialists keep using as a lure to the dark side.
I've noticed that one of the many ironies of the immigration "debate" is that those who want to keep out the darkies are the same people who moan endlessly about outsourcing and companies setting up call centres in India. Well what the hell do they expect? If the cheap labour can't go where the capital is, then the capital will go where the cheap labour is (as Rothbard noted decades ago).
ReplyDeleteJulius
Yeah, I've giggled about that as well, but my favorite irony is when an immigrant bitches about the door not being closed fast enough behind him or her. Classic example of wanting to stifle competition once you've got your foot in the door.
ReplyDeleteActually to be fair, some immigrants who take this position are not doing so because of a fear of competition. Rather, they are worried that the new immigrants will give the established ones a bad name. This was certainly the case for the jews in England in the late 19th/early 20th c. The established Sephardim had a horror of hordes of dirty ill-educated Russian jews giving English jews a bad name; hence many were actively opposed to permitting further jewish immigration.
ReplyDeleteMy Asian in-laws take a similar stance about more recent Asian immigrants.
Doesn't make it right but it is at least not so hypocritical!
Many Irish were distressed when I arrived in England for just the reason Julius states.
ReplyDeleteSo sometimes it's just plain old racial/ethnic prejudice between non-WASPS? I've never heard such crazy talk. :D
ReplyDeleteI am not much impressed with all the hysteria about illegal immigration. I don't think it would be a problem if not for the burden on "government services" (i.e., school overcrowded with alien kids), or "health care" (hospitals have to treat everyone who comes in, left with the bill for illegals, pass costs on to their insured patients). If we eliminated the government services, I don't think it would be a problem. However, I'm not sure I understand why every immigrant makes us richer without lifting a finger. Is it because wages are kept depressed and thus goods and services are cheaper? Just wondering.
ReplyDeleteAlso, the irony of white people complaining about "immigrants" is not lost on me. Next time someone says that, ask them what tribe they belong too. Indians are the only ones who have a right to complain!!!!
Woody calls Indians "Siberian-Americans."
ReplyDeleteI sometimes call them Sibero-Americans but the archaeological evidence points to several invasions from all over the place. It appears the last batch--the ones that pushed out the older population in North America were from Siberia though.
ReplyDeleteIf you are a Pure-L Libertarian, none of this matters because laws controlling immigration are from the git impermissible because they were passed by a not-purely-voluntary association of all relevant property owners.
ReplyDeleteWhew. Got that out of the way.
For the rest of us, culture matters. Not only for its own sake, but also because of the effect it has on the political events which willy-nilly affect all of us.
I know, I know. Many of the earlier immigrants did not come with the explicit, avowed, and honored intention to abide entirely by the ways of their new homeland.
But that does not make it uninteresting to notice that many of those crossing our borders with the intention to stay as long as they feel like it, and while here make such use of the available material -- and politico/cultural/... -- resources as is possible and in their view desirable have views substantially, even radically, different from those of either "the average American" or True-BlueLs, and will actively seek to implement those views. And they will find panderers aplenty (as the Federalists noted).
If we wake up one morning and find that sharia has become the basic law, for example, we can -- quite as fruitfully as ever -- point out that sharia violates TBL principles and is therefore impermissible, or we can regret, at least slightly, that those who accomplished the transformation were permitted to come in.
The Siberian-Americans do not seem so infected with anti-western values. If we're going to pass out green cards (or white cards, work permits, whatever) we should show some favoritism. . Siberian-Americans are working out just as well as the Irish did. I have no problem awarding the Siberian-Americans most of the immigration credits. Most Asian immigrants have worked out pretty well too, at least with groups not partial to sharia. I'm all for a realistic vs idealistic immigration policy, and, of course, I'm all for immigration, lot's of it.
ReplyDeleteI just love the snotty attitude people like Michael take towards those who do not condone the initiation of aggression. I suppose in 1800 there were similar folks mocking the "Pure-A Abolitionists" and their pie-in-the-sky ideas about eliminating slavery.
ReplyDeleteIf "illegals" weren't worried about hiding from La Migra, they might be bothered to learn English, gangsta rap and that one should wear plaid pants to a golf game. We might also steal the best aspects of their culture, which are not, by the way, human sacrifice, eating dogs and drinking like the Irish. Oh wait, nix that last one.
ReplyDeleteI was willing to admit that american culture would be a good idea. I guess that I didn't give it enough thought... gansta rap and plaid pants. After considering this, I should hope that immigration helps to destroy what passes for culture in this country.
ReplyDeleteWould you trade the gangsta rap for human sacrifice? Free trade=muy bueno.
ReplyDeleteI don't have any gansta rap, but if I did I'd probably trade it for almost anything.
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