More immigration please (Making America Great Again)

This post is not about open borders; it’s about the need for dramatically higher rates of immigration.  Let’s consider three objections:

1.  The impact on US workers.

What impact?  Why should more immigration cost jobs?  The unemployment rate Canada is 7.1% and Australia’s unemployment is 5.7%.  The US has 9 times as many people as Canada, and 14 times as many as Australia.  That’s a huge difference in the number of immigrants we’ve let in, and yet our unemployment rate is only 5.0%.  If we went to having 10 or 11 times as many people as Canada, would we suddenly have lots more unemployment?  I don’t see why.

Another argument is that immigration has disproportionately hurt the wages of low skilled workers.  Hmmm, that must be why so many conservatives object—a sudden concern with the welfare of the poor.  In fairness, this argument may have a bit of merit, which is why we might want to consider adjusting the mix of immigrants so that the average skill level of immigrants is comparable to the current US population.

2.  The groups we are letting in are inferior to the native population.

The largest group of immigrants now come from Asia.  In America, average household income is $49,800.  For Asian Americans it’s $66,000.  Some argue that this is misleading, as only certain Asian groups do well, like Japanese and Chinese Americans.  Actually, both those groups have median family incomes of below $66,000.  Filipinos (the Hispanics of East Asia) and Indians do far better.

Much faster population growth would lead to much more housing construction, as well as infrastructure construction.  More need for Trump Towers, for rich Asians (are you listening Donald?)  More jobs for blue collar workers.  The zero bound on interest rates would probably go away, making recessions less likely.

3.  The groups we are letting in support big government.

How do we know this?  Again, Asians are now the biggest immigrant group (in flow terms, not stock), and in almost all Asian countries the government’s share of GDP is smaller than in the US, often far smaller.  In fairness, that’s partly because developing countries normally have low G/GDP ratios.  But what makes Asia unique is that even the wealthy East Asian countries have low G/GDP ratios.  In most US states, the top income tax rate is higher than in Communist China.

And why do we assume their views are carved in stone?  Didn’t lots of the white immigrant groups switch from Democrat to Republican during the 1970s and 1980s?  Things change.  I know “red Chinese” who have become “red-voting Americans.”

I’m not saying that our current system is perfect, far from it.  I’d like much higher rates of immigration (3 million a year is a good start) and a better balance of skilled and unskilled, so that the people at the bottom in America are not bearing the brunt of the competition for jobs.  As a practical matter, my proposal would skew the immigrant mix even more towards Asia.  However, I’m perfectly happy with immigrants from other areas as well; ethnicity should not be the criterion we use to decide who gets in.  And certainly not religion.

PS.  Here’s the IMF data on government spending as a share of GDP, for 2014 (we don’t get many immigrants from Japan):

Japan  39.8%

USA  35.6%

China  29.3%

Malaysia  26.5%

S. Korea  20.7%

Taiwan 18.3%

Singapore 18.1%

Hong Kong  17.3%

PPS.  If we allowed immigration at levels equal to 1% of the US population, it would allow the US to surpass China in total popuation in about 100 years, when their population is expected to have fallen back to 750 million.  We would again become the world’s largest economy.  Let’s make America’s economy a great big one again.

India?  No chance of passing them; in 2116 India will have vastly more people than either the US or China.  And a bigger GDP.


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100 Responses to “More immigration please (Making America Great Again)”

  1. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    23. May 2016 at 11:38

    1. We already have historically high rates of inflow.

    2. The welfare benefits of immigration are small and the distribution of benefits is injurious to the domestic working class.

    3. We already have problems with national cohesion, starting with the complete absence of loyalty to the country or to people lower on the social scale exhibited by bicoastal professional managerial types and by the political class.

  2. Gravatar of Randomize Randomize
    23. May 2016 at 11:50

    I have a more valid objection: Traffic. It’s bad enough already without 3 million more people pouring in every year.

  3. Gravatar of XVO XVO
    23. May 2016 at 12:31

    Only immigrants with an IQ>110. Better build the wall though, when Mexico is fully brain drained and descends into anarchy (a la Venezuela) we’re going to want it.

  4. Gravatar of LK Beland LK Beland
    23. May 2016 at 12:46

    “The unemployment rate [in] Canada is 7.1%”

    Interesting fact: StatCan does not account the active population in the same manner as the US. While the US considers one has to actively apply to work to be considered active, StatCan considers one only needs to be looking at job opportunities. The best estimate is that this increases the unemployment rate by about one percentage point.

    In other words, using the US method, Canada would have an unemployment rate of about 6.1%. Mind you, this detail does not change your argument in the slightest.

  5. Gravatar of Philo Philo
    23. May 2016 at 12:56

    “I’d like . . . [a higher proportion of skilled immigrants], so that the people at the bottom in America are not bearing the brunt of the competition for jobs.” OK, but the reason for this preference is purely political: in the American political system unskilled Americans and their associates can vote, and so have to be accommodated in setting policy. On the other hand, unskilled potential immigrants cannot vote (in America), so their preferences can (and, for political purposes, must) be greatly discounted. But there is no ethical justification for this imbalance in political power.

  6. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    23. May 2016 at 12:57

    Art,

    1. It’s not that high relative to population–compared to 1890-1910.

    2. That’s an argument in support of my proposal.

    3. I see no evidence that immigration affects national cohesion.

    Randomize, Sure, you can find minor issues that push against, but also minor issues that push the other way, like more Thai restaurants, or more Elon Musks.

    XVO, Who will pick vegetables in the hot sun all day?

    Thanks LK.

  7. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    23. May 2016 at 12:58

    But there is no ethical justification for this imbalance in political power.

    Yes there is. Foreigners belong to another body politic and responsibility for their welfare lies with their own politicians, not ours.

  8. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    23. May 2016 at 12:59

    Philo, Just to be clear, I think any boost in immigration is likely to be good in a global utility sense. But one must deal with fairness perceptions, in order to get anything done.

  9. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    23. May 2016 at 13:01

    1. It’s not that high relative to population–compared to 1890-1910.

    I had a fever of 104′ during the first week of December, 1972. Ergo I have never been ill since.

    2. That’s an argument in support of my proposal.

    Yes, if you care about nickels and dimes to the exclusion of anything else and you do not care about ordinary wage earners. We knew that.

    3. I see no evidence that immigration affects national cohesion.

    Because you’re determined not to. (Bryan Caplan’s more straightforward. He despises the idea of national cohesion. I despise the idea of him taking up space here).

  10. Gravatar of Brian Donohue Brian Donohue
    23. May 2016 at 13:08

    Scott,

    You obviously enjoy making White Nationalists apoplectic. It’s your blog, and I’ll admit I chuckle a bit.

    But these folks are just a tiny sliver of those questioning the need for more immigration. I mean, Thomas Sowell: is he the worst kind of racist in your view, the self-hating black Uncle Tom-type racist? Or Milton Friedman, who points out the incompatibility of open borders and the welfare state?

    Hey, it’s your blog, but I think you’re allowing the whole tenor of this joint to be hijacked by a tiny number of vociferous commentators. God know you’ve been smart enough not to indulge Major Freedom or Ray Lopez in their cranky monomanias. Why this fringe group?

  11. Gravatar of E. Harding E. Harding
    23. May 2016 at 13:11

    “But what makes Asia unique is that even the wealthy East Asian countries”

    -I.e., not India and the Philippines.

    “Didn’t lots of the white immigrant groups switch from Democrat to Republican during the 1970s and 1980s?”

    -Maybe. But how much did that have to do with changing attitudes to government?

    “And certainly not religion.”

    -Why not? Does not religion affect human behavior?

    “And a bigger GDP.”

    -I doubt this strongly. There is no evidence South Asians are as well-equipped to build a first-world country as East Asians. In 100 years, India will have twice China’s population and a third of the per capita income, if that.

    I’d be fine with more immigration if there’s a strong selection process, they would be all temporary with only a very narrow door to citizenship, and with swift and permanent deportations for any committed for serious crimes.

    “It’s not that high relative to population–compared to 1890-1910.”

    1896 Democratic platform:
    We hold that the most efficient way of protecting American labor is to prevent the importation of foreign pauper labor to compete with it in the home market, and that the value of the home market to our American farmers and artisans is greatly reduced by a vicious monetary system which depresses the prices of their products below the cost of production, and thus deprives them of the means of purchasing the products of our home manufactories; and as labor creates the wealth of the country, we demand the passage of such laws as may be necessary to protect it in all its rights.

    1896 Republican platform:
    For the protection of the equality of our American citizenship and of the wages of our workingmen, against the fatal competition of low priced labor, we demand that the immigration laws be thoroughly enforced, and so extended as to exclude from entrance to the United States those who can neither read nor write.

    1876 Democratic platform:
    Reform is necessary to correct the omissions of a Republican Congress and the errors of our treaties and our diplomacy, which has stripped our fellow-citizens of foreign birth and kindred race, re-erasing [re-crossing] the Atlantic from the shield of American citizenship, and has exposed our brethren of the Pacific coast to the incursions of a race not sprung from the same great parent stock, and in fact now by law denied citizenship through naturalization as being unaccustomed to the traditions of a progressive civilization, one exercised in liberty under equal laws; and we denounce the policy which thus discards the liberty-loving German and tolerates the revival of the coolie-trade in Mongolian women for immoral purposes, and Mongolian men held to perform servile labor contracts, and demand such modification of the treaty with the Chinese Empire, or such legislation within constitutional limitations, as shall prevent further importation or immigration of the Mongolian race.

    1876 Republican platform:
    It is the immediate duty of congress fully to investigate the effects of the immigration and importation of Mongolians on the moral and material interests of the country.

  12. Gravatar of dw dw
    23. May 2016 at 13:38

    if i wee to guess, argument 2 is why conservatives object to more immigration, even if they wont admit to it.

    but then most or at least a lot of them have 0 credibility in the cost to low wage earners (or even higher wage earners). after all they seem to either deny it exists, or that the low wage earner can ‘instantly’ have other jobs (the magical there will be other jobs for them to go too. what they are nobody knows). and those who have higher incomes, can just transfer to new ‘magical’ jobs. and they too are unknown

  13. Gravatar of SD000 SD000
    23. May 2016 at 13:40

    Scott – unrelated (though not sure how else to make sure you saw) – but Michael Darda gave you a plug on Bloomberg Surveillance this morning

    http://www.bloomberg.com/news/audio/2016-05-23/darda-fed-is-on-the-wrong-track

  14. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    23. May 2016 at 14:08

    There is no evidence South Asians are as well-equipped to build a first-world country as East Asians. I

    Real per capita income in India has trebled in the last 35 years, 3/4 of the adult population is now literate, and they’ve managed since partition to build a working political society in a country which has 16 major languages. The crime rates in India are within the tolerance level for westerners as well. I would not place any bets against them.

  15. Gravatar of Randomize Randomize
    23. May 2016 at 14:12

    Dr. Sumner,

    What’s the point of having more Thai restaurants or Tesla vehicles when the traffic is too bad to utilize either?

    My complaint is mostly tongue-in-cheek. Traffic is a pet peeve of mine. 😛

  16. Gravatar of Jeff Jeff
    23. May 2016 at 14:20

    Do the IMF data on government spending over GDP include accounts of the public enterprises (financial and nonfinancial, state-owned)? Probably not because for many of these Asian economies (China, Malaysia, Singapore etc) government-owned enterprises are big players in the economy.

    In addition, why do Asian Americans as a group consistently vote Democrat in large majorities? For new Asian immigrants, I would look to culture (Confucianism) and history for possible clues to views about the role of government to do good in the economy, to right wrongs, so to speak.

    Of course, cultural and political views are not “carved” in stone. They can be influenced and changed. That’s why assimilation is very important, a topic which open borders-type tend not to deal with in greater depth. Those who push for immigration based on proportions of population or some other artificial measures usually ignore assimilation issues. Didn’t the U.S. stop all immigration for 40 years (1920s-60s) which facilitated assimilation?

    “Hmmm, that must be why so many conservatives object—a sudden concern with the welfare of the poor”

    The question of low-skilled native wages being adversely affected is standard economics. Why is there a need for snark here? Lawn mowing, landscaping, construction are dominated by Hispanic immigrants. Imagine all these workers not being here. It seems to me reasonable to hypothesize low-skilled wages have been dampened. All my neighbors and I like our mowers because they are cheaper (anecdotal evidence).

    Too much snark and heat on this issue; too little substance.

  17. Gravatar of Tom Brown Tom Brown
    23. May 2016 at 14:30

    “Scott,

    You obviously enjoy making White Nationalists apoplectic. It’s your blog, and I’ll admit I chuckle a bit.

    But these folks are just a tiny sliver of those questioning the need for more immigration.”

    Tiny sliver indeed! The ones here are literate, which I suspect is a pretty rare trait in that crowd. =)

  18. Gravatar of Lorenzo from Oz Lorenzo from Oz
    23. May 2016 at 14:34

    Well, obviously speaking as a resident of a country with a (proportionately) much higher immigration flow than US, yes you could.

    But I will re-iterate some standard points of mine:
    (1) Border control. So much of what is producing feral politics is folk feeling they have no say or control. The Australian experience is very clear — effective border control hugely reduces angst about immigration. (Of course, lots of folk WANT angst about immigration, because it gives them millions of fellow citizens to feel superior to and sneer at.)

    (2) Labour/capital balance. Immigration that roughly maintains the balance does not put downward pressure on labour incomes. (Of course, if the newcomers raise the capital level relative to labour, they can significantly raise labour incomes — as in Jewish migration to Palestine.)

    (3) “I see no evidence that immigration affects national cohesion.”
    You perhaps are not following events in Europe quite close enough. But big lumps of Sunni migration are a very specific problem–no other migrant group (including other Muslims) generates the same problems. (In particular, Alevis, Ahmadis, Ismailis and similar have no record of creating problems, nor are likely to, while Shia who want to leave Iran probably are not after religious rule.)

    On Randomize’s traffic point, an issue with migration is that it increases the proportion of market entrants who are non-citizens and so non-voters, tending to increase the political appeal of entry-blocking regulation. It is not entirely coincidental, for example, that land supply rationing is particularly strong in high migration cities.

    Except for Texas: but Texas is different.

  19. Gravatar of Tom Brown Tom Brown
    23. May 2016 at 14:39

    Scott: another good post.

    Deco:

    “Foreigners belong to another body politic and responsibility for their welfare lies with their own politicians, not ours.”

    A quote from Jesus? Or was that Paul of Tarsus?

  20. Gravatar of E. Harding E. Harding
    23. May 2016 at 14:48

    “Real per capita income in India has trebled in the last 35 years, 3/4 of the adult population is now literate, and they’ve managed since partition to build a working political society in a country which has 16 major languages.”

    -And the country still looks pathetic. Sure, Indians have a much greater capacity for order than, say, Congolese, but they’re naturally corrupt and most of them are sorely lacking in intelligence. That’s why I predict that India will never surpass the U.S. in GDP (it only surpassed the U.K. in the 1990s, and even there only in PPP -it still hasn’t surpassed the U.K. in nominal GDP).

  21. Gravatar of Mike Sax Mike Sax
    23. May 2016 at 15:27

    Regarding white folks, we see that blue collar whites-who are opposed to immigration- are becoming more Republican while college educated whites are becoming more Democrat.

    Three fourths of college educated whites believe immigration is good for the country-I guess Scott is part of that 3/4

    http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/05/an-election-in-negative/483905/

    Among whites then, the big story is that white voters are inverting. It used to be blue collar whites were Dem and white collar whites were with the GOP.

  22. Gravatar of Benjamin Cole Benjamin Cole
    23. May 2016 at 16:00

    Largely agree…with proviso the US should try to be nation of law and thus legal immigration.

    The GOP establishment has been for illegal immigration as a labor-bashing tool.

    The Donks as they play relentless identity politics.

  23. Gravatar of dtoh dtoh
    23. May 2016 at 16:04

    @Scott,
    I’m a strong proponent of more liberalized legal immigration, but I you might want to check your data. I suspect you are just looking at data for “immigrant visas.” The bulk of immigrants (and workers) come into the U.S on non-immigrant visas, border crossing cards, visa exemptions or illegally. If you add in the number of American citizens whose parents aren’t legal immigrants, I think you get pretty close to your 1%.

  24. Gravatar of Massimo Heitor Massimo Heitor
    23. May 2016 at 16:05

    “Who will pick vegetables in the hot sun all day?”

    This is not a major problem of American citizens. Invest in automation, efficiency, raise prices, shift to less labor intensive produce?

    If people vote by race, why should one racial group want to hand over voting ownership of their body politic to a rival racial group?

    We are watching that voting in western nations being converted to contests between rival ethnic groups. Why should host ethnic groups not have the right to rule themselves in exclusive body politics?

    Our leaders have cited group equality as a top institutional imperative, and use mass forced redistribution, and mass affirmative action state discrimination in school, government, and private employment to achieve this. This is clearly against the interests of the host population.

    Also, if mass immigration is so great, why is opposition to immigration being shamed so aggressively? Global leaders are saying opposing mass immigration is morally unacceptable. With free trade, you need a willing buyer and seller, with mass immigration, the migrant must choose to move, but the host people are not given a choice to decline.

    One alternative compromise that I would like to see more of is private cities. People vote with their feet. Use some of the territory in failed nations that majorities want to flee in large numbers as a basis.

  25. Gravatar of Rajat Rajat
    23. May 2016 at 16:14

    Basically, what Lorenzo said. Scott, what do you see as the reason the US has experienced less ethnic disharmony than western Europe (and fewer terrorist acts, given you also seem opposed to most national security activity)? Is it because the US has a more assimilationist/integrationist culture, or fewer labour market regulations combined with a less generous welfare state, or something else?

  26. Gravatar of XVO XVO
    23. May 2016 at 16:37

    @Sumner

    Robots, my robots maybe.

  27. Gravatar of E. Harding E. Harding
    23. May 2016 at 17:06

    “Regarding white folks, we see that blue collar whites-who are opposed to immigration- are becoming more Republican while college educated whites are becoming more Democrat.”

    -I’m becoming increasingly convinced that intellectuals, in general, are gay. Why else would they vote for someone as disastrous as Rubio and be so against Cruz and Trump?

    BTW, this is a big reason to expect the Donald to win the great state of Pennsylvania come the general. Pennsylvania was one of the most Democratic-leaning states during the Age of Reagan -even more so than New York State, mostly due to the area bordering Ohio.

    Problem for Hillary: Trump does best in high-unemployment southern and eastern Ohio, as well as places like Wilkes-Barre and Uniontown.

    I don’t think immigration to the U.S. is bad, per se, but I am against open borders. Allowing too much immigration lets other nations ignore their own problems.

  28. Gravatar of Sleazy P. Martini Sleazy P. Martini
    23. May 2016 at 17:23

    Bottom line: the ability of American liberals to silence debate by yelling “racist” or “gas chambers” or whatever, is rapidly waning. They will have to institute laws against free speech as exist in Western Europe. It will all be called “progressive”, of course.

  29. Gravatar of Massimo Heitor Massimo Heitor
    23. May 2016 at 18:39

    Sumner is an expert economist. There’s a range of technical issues in monetary policy and such that he has legitimate expertise and authority and non-economists such as myself aren’t really equipped to comment on.

    Issues like immigration and race and the basic fabric of nations are well outside the bounds of economics. Sumner has a political opinion just like everyone else, but nothing more. None of his education or skill set gives his views on these subjects any particular authority. He’s a respected professor, which carries some clout, but he is offering political viewpoints completely outside of his technical expertise.

  30. Gravatar of Brian Brian
    23. May 2016 at 20:44

    Do you see many North American-born Filipino accountants / programmers / dentists / bank analysts / engineers / CNBC stock pundits?

    I would agree the East Indians do well.

  31. Gravatar of ChargerCarl ChargerCarl
    23. May 2016 at 21:14

    Miles Kimball wrote an article on the nationalist case for higher immigration that I find convincing:

    http://qz.com/114098/benjamin-franklins-strategy-to-make-the-us-an-economic-superpower-worked-once-why-not-use-it-again/

  32. Gravatar of Christian List Christian List
    24. May 2016 at 00:39


    in 2116 India will have vastly more people than either the US or China. And a bigger GDP.

    I’m always very skeptical when I hear people making predictions over the next 100 years. What makes you think you can predict the future? You simpy can’t.

  33. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    24. May 2016 at 04:17

    A quote from Jesus? Or was that Paul of Tarsus?

    Neither. Something one of BO Sr.’s relatives told him applies here: when everyone is your brother, no one is.

  34. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    24. May 2016 at 04:44

    And the country still looks pathetic.

    To the extent that you can validly measure it over distances in time, per capita income in India is similar to what it was in this country in 1895 – i.e. in the modern era during my great-grandparents young adulthood. Industry now exceeds agriculture as a contributor to national product. India is less affluent than Latin America, but most Latin American countries are less economically dynamic; in India, there has not been one year in the last 10 wherein annual growth rates dropped below about 4%. It also has homicide rates 1/5th of Latin American normal. Life expectancy (currently 68) is at a level not reached in this country until about 1948, when my parents were in their late adolescent years. As for the political order, experimentation with electoral and conciliar institutions began under the British Raj more than a century ago. India is one of about two dozen countries wherein legal continuity in this respect has hardly been breached since the end of the 1st World War, and one of only four countries outside of western Europe, North America, and the Antipodes.

  35. Gravatar of Mike Sax Mike Sax
    24. May 2016 at 05:44

    “I’m becoming increasingly convinced that intellectuals, in general, are gay. Why else would they vote for someone as disastrous as Rubio and be so against Cruz and Trump?”

    I was always for Trump in the GOP primary. Rubio’s meltdown in NH was epic: ‘Let me dispel with the fiction that Barrack Obama does not know what he’s doing, he knows exactly what he’s doing’

    (REPEAT)

  36. Gravatar of John S John S
    24. May 2016 at 06:08

    Why on earth do you care if the United States has the world’s largest population or the world’s largest economy? What good will that do for current US citizens?

    And if progress in automation, AI, and robotics continues apace, plenty of Americans will already be out of a job within a decade or two. Will they really need increased competition from 30-60 million more Asian and Hispanic workers for the ever-shrinking pool of middle/low income jobs?

  37. Gravatar of Massimo Heitor Massimo Heitor
    24. May 2016 at 06:19

    “Do you see many North American-born Filipino accountants / programmers / dentists / bank analysts / engineers / CNBC stock pundits?”

    Actually, I know a handful of super smart, skilled Filipinos. I know other Filipinos that may not be the smartest, but they are unusually kind and pleasant people, which is arguably more important.

  38. Gravatar of Philo Philo
    24. May 2016 at 06:59

    “But one must deal with fairness perceptions, in order to get anything done.” You often don’t distinguish (as I think you should) between a utopian picture of how, ideally, society might be arranged and a practical political proposal about what might (in the near future?) realistically garner enough public support to “get done.” (Really there is a sliding scale here, depending on *how likely* it is that a given proposal will be enacted in a given time period.) This present post of yours offers not your ideal immigration policy but rather something you think would be *not too unlikely* to be enacted (rather soon); I don’t think you made that clear.

  39. Gravatar of John S John S
    24. May 2016 at 07:35

    And why do we assume their views are carved in stone? Didn’t lots of the white immigrant groups switch from Democrat to Republican during the 1970s and 1980s? Things change. I know “red Chinese” who have become “red-voting Americans.”

    Scott, why do you consistently assume that Asian and Hispanic political leanings are so malleable? According to exit polls, Asian-Americans supported Obama by about 3-to-1 in 2012. Hispanic voters have picked Democratic Presidential Candidates by at least 18 points in every election since 1980, and the gap is growing (Obama got 71% of the Hispanic vote in 2012).

    http://www.pewhispanic.org/2012/11/07/latino-voters-in-the-2012-election/

    Those patterns aren’t just going to suddenly change. Even with current rates of legal immigration, Florida, Nevada, Arizona, Colorado, Virginia, and N. Carolina will lean strongly Blue within 2-3 cycles (NM is already there). Your plan of 3 million legal immigrants per year would hasten that to 1-2 cycles and flip those states permanently.

    Do you want to live under a Democratic majority for the rest of your life?

    Trump is the GOP’s last stand. Amnesty proposals must be stopped, bithright citizenship should be abolished, and even legal immigration needs to be lowered. A good start would be killing off the H-1B program, thereby opening up opportunities in technology for young American workers.

  40. Gravatar of james elizondo james elizondo
    24. May 2016 at 07:43

    Scott this is unrelated but I would appreciate your opinion on the usefulness of DSGE models. I would like to make macroeconomic forecasts but first I’m trying to determine which model is best. Prob not that simple but any input would be great.

  41. Gravatar of Mike Rulle Mike Rulle
    24. May 2016 at 08:13

    My preference for immigration is 3-5 million a year and implemented by lottery. As an efficient market person, I do not think we can guess what ethnic group or background status will ultimately prove to be most beneficial to growth.

    However, I also do not think immigration ranks high on what is most important for us as a nation. The most important problem facing us is the out of control bureaucratic state. Laws are written so vaguely, that their implementation is subject to the arbitrary and unaccountable actions of the executive branch.

    This is the ultimate source of the drag on growth (even as a monetarist I am sure there is room in your policy prescriptions besides NGDP). Examples include Dodd-Frank, Obamacare, the IRS, the EPA, and the TSA as the most egregious actors in this arena.

    Unlike the private sector, which is limited in its actions by the potential for failure, there are no natural predators to the Bureaucratic state whose instinct is to grow its influence. As Walter Russell Meade wrote today, the Trump movement is a desire to do a “control-alt-delete” on the system which is like a monstrous leach on the body politic. This does not mean it will succeed—it likely will not—but maybe the public’s first effort to force change will lead to more politicians understanding what needs to be focused on for them to get elected in the future.

    I wish you would use your economic skills—in addition to monetary policy— to focus on these issues and more, rather than joining the herd of superficial political commentary. Of course, I enjoy reading all your stuff—but your intellectual opportunity cost is too high—in my humble opinion.

  42. Gravatar of E. Harding E. Harding
    24. May 2016 at 08:22

    “To the extent that you can validly measure it over distances in time, per capita income in India is similar to what it was in this country in 1895 – i.e. in the modern era during my great-grandparents young adulthood.”

    -This isn’t 1895.

    Yes, India’s lack of civil wars has been its one redeeming feature.

    “but they are unusually kind and pleasant people, which is arguably more important.”

    -Sure. But ask Ray Lopez how they’re like in the only country in which they’re a majority.

    “My preference for immigration is 3-5 million a year and implemented by lottery.”

    -Both are really bad ideas.

  43. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    24. May 2016 at 08:22

    My preference for immigration is 3-5 million a year and implemented by lottery.

    Annual birth cohorts run to about 4 million, so you’re saying you’d like mechanical increase to account for half the total. That’s pretty much without precedent. (Fully half the population of the United States in 2000 was attributable to natural increase upon the foundation of the 1790 population). Immigration of 3.5 million persons would incorporate a rate of entry (given the host population) which is unprecedented. Please note, immigration in accordance with lull periods (1790-1840, 1924-1965) would suggest immigration of 1/8th of 1% of the extant population per annum, or about 400,000 people.

  44. Gravatar of brendan brendan
    24. May 2016 at 08:29

    You make a good case Scott but this:

    “I see no evidence that immigration affects national cohesion.”

    is crazy. To clear things up, rather than talk about immigration, let’s talk about the more general thing which immigration is a source of, diversity.

    “I see no evidence that diversity affects national cohesion.”

    Japanese soldiers during WW2 – is it remotely plausible a diverse nation could’ve generated that level of fanaticism and commitment to the cause?

    How about US traitors during the Cold War – how many with deep roots in the US?

    Communist Party USA – what fraction were founding stock British/German type Americans?

    What are the happiest places within the US? Where on earth is corruption lowest?

    We could go on.

    Yes, of course, many things influence cohesion, and cohesion and diversity aren’t monotonic, etc.

    But to say you see no evidence of the connection? C’mon Scott.

  45. Gravatar of brendan brendan
    24. May 2016 at 08:34

    One more:

    I recall you noting how impressive it was that Japan was able to substantially raise taxes and there citizens were OK w/ it whereas there would’ve been a violent revolt in America.

    I also recall Lee Kuan Yew saying he had to restrict speech/media because in a diverse society *every* policy is interpreted in terms of ethnic winners/losers. Nothing is ethnically neutral.

    And of course there’s the daily newstream in the US where we see exactly that.

    Every single bit of policy in the modern US is interpreted in terms of “is it good for (or imply nice things about) ethnic group X?”

    Diversity weaponizes policy debates.

  46. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    24. May 2016 at 08:47

    -This isn’t 1895.

    No, but 1895 is the late Victorian – i.e. modern period, and India is advancing rapidly. Making use of public health and nutrition metrics emphasizes the point. Infant and early childhood mortality rates in India are similar to those of the United States in 1940. The prevalence of satisfactory nutrition in India (85% of the population) wasn’t reached until the early decades of the 20th century in this country. It’s a poor country, but it’s poor to a degree older Americans have experienced.

  47. Gravatar of collin collin
    24. May 2016 at 09:11

    Several points on why there can be too much immigration:

    1) The US poverty rate is still higher than Australia and Canada. Having a job in the US can still leave people very poor.

    2) Sure the unemployment rate is 5% but everybody is still pissed off. Maybe we need to have rising wages to make young people believe in capitalism. We have not rising wages for over 15 years.

    3) High immigration can create political instability. Donald Trumps are doing well in Europe.

    4) Asian-Americans are voting overwhelming (higher than Latinos) for Democrats. I don’t think that lasts but it does show Republican weaknesses with minorities.

    5) Most Asian nations (not city states Singapore or Hong Kong) are a lot lower immigration than the US. Japan is very low and until recently so was Korea.

    6) If you like population rising, then find ways for the modern economy to better support working families. Developed world birth rates are low and continue to slowly drop.

  48. Gravatar of Massimo Heitor Massimo Heitor
    24. May 2016 at 09:13

    @brendan

    “Japanese soldiers during WW2 – is it remotely plausible a diverse nation could’ve generated that level of fanaticism and commitment to the cause?”

    The Japanese in WW2 were aggressors, were universally considered the immoral party. If diversity stops that, that is good.

    “Japan was able to substantially raise taxes and there citizens were OK w/ it whereas there would’ve been a violent revolt in America.”

    Wow, if diversity stops major tax raises and redistribution, that’s another win.

    Those are the two worst arguments against diversity I’ve ever heard.

    I’m also emphatically for creating completely ethnically neutral, mass immigration friendly privately owned city states that give you more freedom of exit rather than voting rights.

  49. Gravatar of Tom Brown Tom Brown
    24. May 2016 at 09:16

    “I’m becoming increasingly convinced that intellectuals, in general, are gay. Why else would they vote for someone as disastrous as Rubio and be so against Cruz and Trump?”

    Lol… you don’t have to be gay to be against Cruz and Trump. Cruz spends a lot of time on his knees “worshiping” a fabulous invisible magic bearded man in a dress (because it soothes his infantile fears and anxieties I guess), and Trump… he’s for Trumpism, which is an ethereal “ideology” which changes from tweet to tweet. Oftentimes it changes within a single spoken Trump sentence. It’s clear he just makes it up as he goes along. Plus Trump is as thin skinned as any whiny little bitch I’ve ever seen. Being opposed to that that cloud of noxious hot gas doesn’t make one gay. Plus Cruz is full of it too. He let everything Trump said slide for months and months, until it was the last minute; and then Cruz said Trump was the scum of the Earth: a pathological liar and narcissist unfit for office. And he’s still not backing Trump, is he?

  50. Gravatar of Brendan Brendan
    24. May 2016 at 09:33

    Massimo I clearly was narrowly talking about its effect on national cohesion. A cohesive nation can get lots done – good or bad.

    Your dream is a nice one but it ain’t gonna happen.

  51. Gravatar of Benny Lava Benny Lava
    24. May 2016 at 09:38

    “Much faster population growth would lead to much more housing construction, as well as infrastructure construction”

    I don’t think this is true. Sadly.

  52. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    24. May 2016 at 10:08

    “I’m becoming increasingly convinced that intellectuals, in general, are gay. Why else would they vote for someone as disastrous as Rubio and be so against Cruz and Trump?”

    Cannot say about most vocational faculties. I’ll wager you the arts and sciences and fine-and-performing-arts faculties are, to a man, for Hellary or Sanders. Same deal with the vocational faculties trading in teacher training, social work, library administration, and professional psychology. Same deal with newsrooms. Same deal with the salaried employees of museums and libraries. Same deal with school administrators everywhere. Same deal with television writers. Two suggestions:

    1. Thomas Sowell’s: the Democratic Party is the vehicle of articulate people appended to which are clients of the social work industry, alienated ethnic minorities, &c.

    2a. High school never ends for some people. Much more than is the case for ordinary people, politics among the word merchant element consists of social signaling. Consider Tyler Cowen commending a loser like Corey Robin while meticulously avoiding any suggestion he ever reads the starboard press.

    2b. Given that Sumner has been having serial apoplectic seizures over Trump, I’d wonder what the Mercatus crew have to say about Ted Cruz. It’s likely no candidate in the last 50 years has been both competitive in party primaries and caucuses and had a more libertarian outlook bar the goofy Dr. Paul. The answer is…very little. When you scrape away the passing references and the trivia, you find one set of commentary on his remarks on monetary policy and one set on some comment he made about air power in the Near East. One was congenial, the other critical. They’re not interested in this guy. They’re not interested in Mrs. Clinton’s skeezy past. They’re not interested in the abuse of dissidents like the proprietors of Sweet Cakes or the Little Sisters of the Poor. Only David Henderson had even a passing interest in Lois Lerner and the IRS. Megan McArdle, who voted for BO, has been an astringent critic of him. Mercatus are just above all that (until someone suggests you enforce the immigration laws).

    2c. Note that people suffering from arrested development have an affinity for each other, Tom Brown’s remarks above being Exhibit A.

  53. Gravatar of myb6 myb6
    24. May 2016 at 10:59

    Scott, you’re making the argument that China is small-government because tax/GDP is low? I have a deep affection for East Asia but they operate differently and I prefer to live in our political culture over theirs. I’d let nearly every Swiss immigrate, though, but why would they want such a decline in living standards? And I also understand that not every American would agree with me about the Swiss, and that stance doesn’t make them evil.

    Cohesion: What about Putnam? Or the results of cross-cultural competition through nearly all of history and geography? Man is a social animal, you can’t just wish away social effects. They mean something to people, reflected by their revealed preferences which you demonize so you can feel morally superior.

    Sure, let’s take immigrants with (reliable) records of good behavior at a rate we can easily assimilate (no immigration of mono-cultural blocs large enough to isolate themselves), tied to US births so we don’t end up up cohort problems. No more reunification favoritism; yes families are incredibly important but we’re not forcing them to immigrate here. Instead let them bid, and use the earnings to mitigate or to reward natives for their goodwill.

    This isn’t really that hard, and we’re not evil. I think it’s evil to force costs on me by policy from which I yield no benefit, and then morally shame me when I voice opposition.

  54. Gravatar of Mark Mark
    24. May 2016 at 10:59

    I think that if you impose the simple requirement that one must have full-time employment to stay in the US will solve nearly all the real problems, if not the imagined ones. You get a six month trial run; if you can find a job you get provisional citizenship (if you can’t you get deported); if you keep your job for, I don’t know, a year, or some other length of time, you get full citizenship. (Note: they must also pass a background check, that is, not have committed any violent crimes in the past; though for most countries of origin this stipulation probably won’t help much, given their lack of good record-keeping)

    This way, the immigrants aren’t a burden to the taxpayers, they increase production and consumption. Employment and citizenship (which means ability to travel freely without fear of deportation) will speed up assimilation. I see no real reason why a conservative would object to such an arrangement.

    The Jared Taylor crowd says many will low IQs. So what? The world needs ditch diggers too, and the more ditch diggers, the lower the cost of ditch digging.

    And everyone who’s worried about ‘national cohesion’ can go cohere with each other in private on their own time, I want no part of it. I prefer Puccini and ricotta to Rock’n Roll and hot dogs in any case. The only cohesion that matters here is the willingness to follow the law. Beyond that, it’s just a matter of imposing your personal preferences regarding the company you keep on the rest of us.

  55. Gravatar of HW HW
    24. May 2016 at 11:10

    “…Asian Americans tend to prefer a bigger government that provides more services (55%) to a smaller government that provides fewer services (36%). In the general public, 41% of adults prefer a bigger government providing more services, while a 48% plurality prefers a smaller government providing fewer services.”

    Data is from: http://www.pewforum.org/2012/07/19/asian-americans-a-mosaic-of-faiths-social-and-political-attitudes/

    And while true that East and Southeast Asian countries have smaller governments, that doesn’t necessarily tell us that much about the views of Asian-Americans. For that matter, the countries with the biggest governments (measured as public spending as a % of GDP) are in Europe, yet White Americans are the least likely to support big government. That being said, it’d be a good thing for the US to have a larger Asian-American population.

    Also, according to UN population projections (medium variant) China will still have 1 billion people in 2100, compared to less than 1.7 billion. It’s not unthinkable that India’s GDP will not surpass China’s at this point.

  56. Gravatar of Thiago Ribeiro Thiago Ribeiro
    24. May 2016 at 11:11

    “The world needs ditch diggers too, and the more ditch diggers, the lower the cost of ditch digging.”

    And the lower the wages of ditch diggers.

  57. Gravatar of HW HW
    24. May 2016 at 11:12

    *less than 1.7 billion in India.

  58. Gravatar of Justin Justin
    24. May 2016 at 11:28

    “I see no evidence that immigration affects national cohesion.”

    Robert Putnam’s Bowling Alone: Greater diversity lowers social capital.

    My bigger concern is population growth period. There’s such a thing as a Malthusian Good, I’ve written about this before: Lake houses, wild-caught fish, space in prime locations (So. Cal, Bay Area for example). There’s a reason why nearly every family in Finland can afford a summer cottage while few in Germany can: Finns have loads of space. I see lots of evidence that people in lower density countries are individually better off than Particular Individuals in high density countries. And of course because I’m not insane, I care more about myself and my fellow citizens more than random foreigners (which is different form foreigners whom I know).

    There’s also the idea of the Malthusian limit. It’s likely that one day our descendants will evolve defenses against the modern world and return to a level of fertility which swamps gains in food production technology. As long as there is surplus food, this will be the direction which selection pushes. We should thus save extra space in our country so that it is *our* descendants who stand to fill that space. This is the whole point of a country, a coalition of citizens working together to maximize Darwinian fitness. An immigration policy which respects this, will maximize the number of copies of all Americans’ genes (regardless of subgroup) in the future. Straightforward.

  59. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    24. May 2016 at 11:35

    I think that if you impose the simple requirement that one must have full-time employment to stay in the US will solve nearly all the real problems,

    Trying to craft boundary conditions which trigger a deportation proceeding will be an amusing and endless exercise. As for reliably enforcing this, well, you’re not going to turn around and tell the rest of us that a wall is ‘impractical’?

  60. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    24. May 2016 at 11:37

    And everyone who’s worried about ‘national cohesion’ can go cohere with each other in private on their own time, I want no part of it. I prefer Puccini and ricotta to Rock’n Roll and hot dogs in any case. The only cohesion that matters here is the willingness to follow the law.

    I see Dr. Caplan is now using an alias

  61. Gravatar of Floccina Floccina
    24. May 2016 at 12:16

    Want more social mobility, let in more poor immigrants from China and Vietnam.

    Want lower per capita crime let in more immigrants.

    Want to end USA lagging other developed countries in infant mortality, let in more immigrants especially Hispanics and Chinese, Vietnamese, Japanese and Koreans.

    Want schools in poor areas to do better, let in more poor immigrants from China and Vietnam. Let in enough and the school in poor areas will do better than schools in rich areas.

    Worried about under performance of immigrants from Latin America, let in more from China, Africa and Vietnam and college educated Latin Americans.

    Want to beat Europe on life expectancy and strike a blow against socialized medicine let in more immigrants. Also let in lots of Chinese MD’s and let them practice.

    Want to narrow the black/white education and earning gaps let in more college graduate African immigrants.

    But of course we need to end county slow growth policies and let builders build, especially up in already developed areas.

    It is the solution all of our supposed under-performance to other developed countries. Strike a blow agaist Bernie Sanderism let in more immigrants. The USA is great for everyone.

  62. Gravatar of Massimo Heitor Massimo Heitor
    24. May 2016 at 12:47

    @Mark,

    “The Jared Taylor crowd says many will low IQs. So what? The world needs ditch diggers too”

    Even the Jared Taylor crowd mostly doesn’t mind low IQ workers who don’t bother others. They are thinking of a mean spirited unemployed underclass that endlessly mooches off of government and is good at blaming their problems on everyone else. The low IQ itself isn’t a problem. Almost everyone prefers living among kind and dumb, rather than mean and smart.

    One really legitimate concern here is government driven group equality. If you are ethnic/demographic group A, and a large number of ethnic group B enters, and there’s massive government push to drive equal representation in wealth, housing, schools, government, and all forms of employment, this is explicitly against your interest, and you are absolutely right to resist.

  63. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    24. May 2016 at 13:29

    They are thinking of a mean spirited unemployed underclass that endlessly mooches off of government and is good at blaming their problems on everyone else.

    I’ve read some comment threads at that site. They’re not that discerning.

  64. Gravatar of Floccina Floccina
    24. May 2016 at 13:39

    @Randomize traffic is function of roads. Roads and can be built and added to. Heck you could even have 2 story roads if need be. Also there is an economic solution that is raise the price of driving and lower income taxes.

  65. Gravatar of Lorenzo from Oz Lorenzo from Oz
    24. May 2016 at 16:30

    Rajat: thanks.

    (1) The US only has about 2% Muslims.
    (2) They are more highly educated (on average) than European Muslims.
    (3) The US public space is comfortable with God talk and US structures are used to operating through churches and synagogues: adding mosques to the mix is not such a big deal.
    (4) American is an ideocratic nation, not really an ethnic one (despite the claims of the Alt Right, it never really has been) so there is less awkwardness about newcomers embracing an American identity.
    (5) Europe has great big lumps of (specifically) Muslims, rather than a high diversity of migrants.
    (6) Yes on labour markets and welfare systems.

  66. Gravatar of Matthias Goergens Matthias Goergens
    24. May 2016 at 16:43

    > Another argument is that immigration has disproportionately hurt the wages of low skilled workers. Hmmm, that must be why so many conservatives object—a sudden concern with the welfare of the poor. In fairness, this argument may have a bit of merit, which is why we might want to consider adjusting the mix of immigrants so that the average skill level of immigrants is comparable to the current US population.

    No need for the government to assess skill:

    Tax immigrants / people on visas, then distribute the proceed equally amongst the natives.

    Multiple ways to tax the immigrants:
    – determine a quota each year, auction it off. All winners pay a dollar more than the highest losing bid.
    – or just slap an extra few percent of income tax on immigrants.

    The first one is of course more economically efficient, and will automatically bias the immigration towards more skilled workers (via the proxy of disposable wealth).

    The people at openborders have the interesting concept of keyhole solutions. (http://openborders.info/keyhole-solutions/)

  67. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    24. May 2016 at 17:22

    The US only has about 2% Muslims.

    About 1%.

  68. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    24. May 2016 at 17:23

    The US public space is comfortable with God talk

    You mean in this country where federal judges are issuing injunctions to prayer leaders at ball games?

  69. Gravatar of Matthias Goergens Matthias Goergens
    24. May 2016 at 17:56

    One benefit of asking immigrants for a lump sum on entering the country is that there will be no heart wrenching deportations later when people can’t pay.

    (At most, they’ll be heartwrench if they paid the lump sum with borrowed money and can’t pay back their creditors. But that’s a private problem. Ie the government doesn’t have to look mean.)

  70. Gravatar of Mark Mark
    24. May 2016 at 19:09

    “Trying to craft boundary conditions which trigger a deportation proceeding will be an amusing and endless exercise. As for reliably enforcing this, well, you’re not going to turn around and tell the rest of us that a wall is ‘impractical’?”\
    Not much would need to be done to enforce it at all. If you don’t file a tax return, don’t have a drivers’ license or any documentation to suggest you have an address, and don’t collect any benefits, then you’re probably not leeching off the system (sure, I guess they could still be walking on taxpayer-funded sidewalks, but if someone is living that far off the grid, odds are they’re not imposing much cost on society.

    Note that the point isn’t to deport people; it’s to eliminate costs while retaining benefits. And in all likelihood, even without increasing enforcement at all, if we just started fast-tracking employed immigrants for citizenship, it would greatly increase incentives to find jobs, rendering the immigrant population more productive. We also wouldn’t end up wasting money and kneecapping ourselves production-wise by deporting productive, employed people.

  71. Gravatar of Mark Mark
    24. May 2016 at 19:15

    “I see Dr. Caplan is now using an alias”
    Oddly enough, he’s one person at econlog whose articles I never read. Just never excited me that much. I think Henderson’s posts are more interesting.

  72. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    24. May 2016 at 19:42

    Everyone, All the arguments you are using against Hispanic, Arab and Asian migrants were used against the Irish, Jews, and Italians in the 1800s. They can’t assimilate to Anglo Saxon society. The nativists were wrong then, and you’ll be wrong again.

    Large numbers of Asians and Hispanics are intermarrying with whites. In 200 years we’ll all be tan. The millennials don’t have much problem with immigrants, I think most of the complainers are just grouchy old people who are out of touch with the modern world. It’s not that hard to get along with immigrants. Please learn from your children.

  73. Gravatar of Major.Freedom Major.Freedom
    24. May 2016 at 19:51

    Everyone, your arguments about the incompatibility of philosophy and ideals will be met with accusations of racism.

    We are to ignore ideas, and instead focus on people’s skin color.

    This diversion worked wonders for the open immigration of Goths into the ancient Roman Empire.

  74. Gravatar of Major.Freedom Major.Freedom
    24. May 2016 at 20:06

    Sumner, back in the 1800s the extent of democracy was far more subdued. Immigrants back then had a much more difficult time voting in politicians to flout the Constitution.

    Today, flouting the Constitution is everyday business. In THIS environment, immigrants with hatred of Western ideals are not as legally bound to assimilate to respecting individual rights.

    I would have no trouble having open immigration when the domestic laws of the lands are immune from Democratic overthrow. If private property rights and individual rights are strong, as they were in the 1800s, then immigration is primarily a good thing. But when there is mob rule, it can be a bad thing.

    You cannot compare today with the 1800s.

    Just imagine your own home being open to immigration, where the laws that apply in your house are determined by majority vote of the house occupants. Now imagine your house being overrun by Sharia law loving western hating jihadists. What will you think then? That immigration was a bad idea or a good idea GIVEN the Democratic voting for applicable laws?

    Now imagine that your house abides by laws regardless of majority vote. That individual rights are primary. Here immigration might be a very welcome thing would it not? To live among more people who accept your individual rights.

    Your stance is untenable. You do not seem to at all grasp the fact that it is Democracy that forces people to make blanket assessments about immigration when the domestic laws are subject to majority voting.

    You are so irresponsible!

  75. Gravatar of Massimo Heitor Massimo Heitor
    24. May 2016 at 21:10

    @Mark
    “I think that if you impose the simple requirement that one must have full-time employment to stay in the US will solve nearly all the real problems”

    That implies that the US will deport large numbers of immigrants who don’t get jobs, possibly have major life problems, are real sob stories, fully expect the US government to provide health, housing, and education, and have nothing to lose in terms of staging protests, publicity stunts, and fighting deportation. This seems unrealistic.

    That would also mean ending most refugee programs and accepting unaccompanied minors. The US already imports large numbers of those who clearly don’t have jobs and will need large amounts of government aid.

    Politically, it is much easier to bring them here and give them large amounts of aid than to give them much smaller amounts of aid in foreign nations.

    “In 200 years we’ll all be tan.”
    “most of the complainers are just grouchy old people who are out of touch with the modern world”

    Bad things have happened in the past, the world moves on, and the survivors adjust. You are arguing inevitablity that whites will be ethnically removed, it’s inevitable, the socio-political forces engineering this change are too strong, and resisting is grouchy and immoral. This doesn’t seem to be a moral high ground.

    Why not engineer a different ethnic-religious groups demise? Why target whites so aggressively? I don’t see the logic here.

  76. Gravatar of dtoh dtoh
    24. May 2016 at 21:17

    Scott,
    You’re criticizing with a pretty broad brush. Sure there are some xenophobic, racist Trump supporters (and blog commenters) out there, but I think you will find there are also a lot of people who while in favor of more legal immigration also think our current immigration policies need fixing…. especially making sure people are abiding by the laws.

  77. Gravatar of E. Harding E. Harding
    24. May 2016 at 21:30

    “Everyone, All the arguments you are using against Hispanic, Arab and Asian migrants were used against the Irish, Jews, and Italians in the 1800s.”

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Mafia

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Krugman

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_Mob

    BTW, the problem with Jews is not low IQ -it’s high. The problem is they use that IQ in the political realm largely to further causes deleterious to American society. Barbara Boxer, Dianne Feinstein (brr…), and Chuck Schumer are not good for the United States. Bernie Sanders is arguable, as he at least provided some kind of primary challenge to Her, which gave us a bunch of election data on who the youth want.

    And American Italians and Irish are more likely to support Trump, as are Soviet Jews. Back in the day, most Irish-Americans were vigorously pro-slavery.

    BTW, all ethnic groups have their flaws. I would not like to live in an America composed entirely of True Vermonters.

    “They can’t assimilate to Anglo Saxon society.”

    -Jews assimilated into Anglo-Saxon society?! Haven’t noticed. In the end, Irish mostly did assimilate into Anglo-Saxon society politically -but, then again, I doubt it was descendants of Puritans constituting the majority of Trump voters in New England. And would there have been an Italian mafia for Trump to deal with had there been no South Italian immigration into the United States?

    “Large numbers of Asians and Hispanics are intermarrying with whites.”

    -I’ve noticed.

    “In 200 years we’ll all be tan.”

    -You read Razib’s blog. You look at Rouseff in Brazil. You know that’s not true. In 200 years, the vast majority of Blacks will score lower than most Whites on IQ tests. In 200 years, roughly half of men imprisoned for homicide will be Black.

    “The millennials don’t have much problem with immigrants, I think most of the complainers are just grouchy old people who are out of touch with the modern world.”

    -I’m not old, and I actually come from an immigrant background, Scott. Art Deco is old, though.

    Mark, you’re a weird guy. The only guy I never read on Econlog is that Italian guy; I always find time to read Caplan’s posts; they’re intriguing.

    “who are out of touch with the modern world”

    -It’s the CURRENT YEAR!1!!!1!

  78. Gravatar of Mike Sax Mike Sax
    25. May 2016 at 00:32

    For Trump, Kim Jong’s rejection of his hand of friendship must be the unkindest cut of all.

    http://qz.com/690935/kim-jong-un-has-no-desire-to-talk-to-donald-trump-a-north-korean-ambassador-says/

  79. Gravatar of Major.Freedom Major.Freedom
    25. May 2016 at 01:47

    Mike Sax:

    “For Trump, Kim Jong’s rejection of his hand of friendship must be the unkindest cut of all.”

    Of course that tyrant would dislike a political candidate who says “America first”. North Korea depends on foreign aid. It would be much more difficult for said tyrant to lie and pretend to the North Korean people that it is his “glorious leadership” that prevented millions from starving to death.

    The only reason socialism has been prolonged in North Korea is because of foreign aid. Many Westerners with an infatuation with socialism are completely ignorant of this.

    It is why many Israeli elites dislike Trump.

    It is why Sumner dislikes him.

    Pro-America sentiment repulses the ivory tower intellectuals who arrogate themselves in speaking for humanity and sucking the US dry in the process.

  80. Gravatar of myb6 myb6
    25. May 2016 at 04:06

    “All the arguments you are using against Hispanic, Arab and Asian migrants were used against the Irish, Jews, and Italians in the 1800s.”

    Incorrect and you know it. The Irish, Jews, and Italians came legally. Hispanics aren’t converging. Extremist Arabs murdered thousands of our citizens. We’ll soon pass the prior immigration peak.

    But the WASPs still had a point, the 1880-1920 wave was too much and too poor, and so they tried to favor skills (literacy test), then essentially shut it down in 24. Just because it all turned out ok a century later doesn’t mean that the WASPs didn’t bear real costs in the interim.

    Even had the immigrant-critiques been indeed the same, and even had the WASPs never responded with policy changes, so what? We’re not condemned to always continue the policy of our forebears. Your commenters have addressed all this many times before, there’s no excuse for running everyone in circles again.

  81. Gravatar of brendan brendan
    25. May 2016 at 04:50

    It’s funny, after digesting Scott’s market monetarism, everyone else in macro looks silly. So many fallacies so easy to spot.

    Ditto on Sailer/Cochran and co. on immigration.

    Scott describes the last 100 years as one where nativists got everything wrong re race/culture/immigration. And as a Bentley academic says its the restrictionists that are out of touch and old and grumpy. (I’m 31, quite happy.)

    You should meet my friend, a young guy who immigrated from China when he was 17. He’s more Anglo in values than Anglos. He’s exactly who you want coming to your country.

    And he’d puke hearing about how unlimited immigration, no matter where from, is a boon. You see, he operates (as a side job) apartment buildings in an urban setting. Lot’s of hispanics and blacks, and, being from a less “vibrant” country like China, he can’t fathom the behavior he sees.

    Probably he’s an out of touch racist.

    Or maybe he sees first hand exactly what you’d know if you took seriously *all* the scientific and historic evidence we have on human difference.

    My own view is that this thing is complex but it’s easy to construct a spectrum of immigration sources (nations, peoples) ranked by the likelihood that their emigrants would benefit the US. Some almost certainly would, in aggregate.

    Others – with utter certainty – would not. (It’d be comforting if the open borders crowd let us know they knew this. It’s always difficult to guess what it is they know.)

  82. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    25. May 2016 at 05:42

    dtoh, You said:

    “You’re criticizing with a pretty broad brush. Sure there are some xenophobic, racist Trump supporters (and blog commenters) out there, but I think you will find there are also a lot of people who while in favor of more legal immigration also think our current immigration policies need fixing…. especially making sure people are abiding by the laws.”

    Including me.

    myb6. First you tell me that you are losing respect for me because of my misleading posts, and then you give me this garbage. Everything in your comment is misleading. Immigration rates are much lower than back around 1900. They only seem comparable because the country’s population is many times larger. We are taking in perhaps 0.3% per year, it was closer to 1% back in 1900.

    If Arabs want to sneak into the US illegally and commit terrorist attacks they are perfectly capable of doing so. Your point has nothing to do with the debate over legal immigration, which is the topic of this post.

    Terrorism is an issue that appeals to uniformed people who react with emotion, not logic. If we want to save lives there are much easier ways of doing so than the ineffective “war on terror”.

    And are you actually claiming the country would be better off if we have not allowed in the wave of immigrants during 1880-1920? If not, what’s your point? I freely concede their are some “costs” as you say, just look at the extra traffic congestion. But the benefits exceed the costs, and hence it’s the right thing to do.

  83. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    25. May 2016 at 05:50

    Brendan, So you know one Chinese immigrant who’s a great guy, and he notices some blacks (who originally came to the US as slaves, not legal immigrants) and this anecdote is an argument against legal immigration?

    Okay . . . .

    Have you looked at the data on recent immigrants from Africa, some of those groups (Nigerian, Ghanaian, etc.) do pretty well in the US.

    The rest of your comment does not even respond to the proposal in the post (which is for immigration heavily skewed to Asia, and non-open borders), so I won’t comment.

  84. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    25. May 2016 at 06:18

    Everyone, All the arguments you are using against Hispanic, Arab and Asian migrants were used against the Irish, Jews, and Italians in the 1800s. They can’t assimilate to Anglo Saxon society. The nativists were wrong then, and you’ll be wrong again.

    1. The decision-making classes in 1902 were typified by Theodore Roosevelt. The decision making classes today are typified by you. The implications of immigration at any level differ just due to that.

    2. The Ashkenazic Jewish population has gone in three or four directions over the last century.

    a. A portion followed the path of the German Jews who preceded them and disappeared into the larger gentile society. b. Another portion has built subcultural institutions and affiliations and selectively withdrawn from the larger society; most of these have very common-and-garden employments and are not troublesome in the political realm except in circumscribed loci, and in these loci they are as much aggressed against as aggressing. c. A third portion have ordinary bourgeois employments, have congenial day-to-day relations with the larger society, are slowly losing their children to that society, have modest civic engagement, and are uncomprehending about people unlike them. d. A fourth share are disproportionately affluent and influential and have an often aggressive contempt for the larger society or for important elements of it.

    3. Italians have not ‘assimiliated into the larger society’. However, they hit the sweet spot, remain very much themselves while negotiating congenially with that society. They’re about the only ethnic subculture for which the Canadian idea of a ‘mosaic’ actually works. The thing is, there are only about 12 million ethnic Italians and even they are losing their children, in part because subcultural markers have fallen victim to the acids of the 2d Vatican Council and in part due to intermarriage (though Italians tend to be quite adept at inducing non-Italian spouses to get with the program).

    4. Arabs? Whose making a fuss about Arabs? I belonged to a Melkite Church for eight years. The Eastern rites suffer the same problems others do – they lose their children. People are troubled by Muslims – Arab, Pakistani, Persian – it hardly matters (though Indonesian muslims are unproblematic). There are societies which handle Muslim minorities quite deftly, India and Israel to name two. Again, we do not have an elite who favors the common-and-garden population in this country. We have an elite who despises that population and uses immigrant streams and alienated ethnics against that population. Same deal re the professional-managerial bourgeoisie and the rest of us. Where that’s the case, you have trouble, as you do in Britain today, where a latent aggression and elite indulgence feed off each other.

    5. And, again, bar in localized areas and in regard to odd populations (the Hmong), Oriental and East Indian settlers are not generating much anxiety. It’s imported workers who do that. You are beginning to have a problem you had in inter-war Europe, where the bourgeoisie was ethnically distinct as well as socially distinct from the larger society. That’s made the interactive effect of immigrant Tiger mother cultures and the rest of us perturbing in its results. (The disreputable Mr. Sailer put it thus: “It’s much better to grow your own middle class than import one”).

    6. We’ve only briefly faced immigration flows this large, and, again, they were in a context wherein the people who ran the courts and the schools did not indulge immigrants or valorize being a stranger. You’ve offered no suggestions toward dismantling this institutional mollycoddling (even while spitting with contempt at ordinary people herein). That’s telling.

  85. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    25. May 2016 at 06:23

    And are you actually claiming the country would be better off if we have not allowed in the wave of immigrants during 1880-1920?

    The country would be different. It would be more congenial to people with certain dispositions. So, yes, some people were injured by that set of streams.

  86. Gravatar of Massimo Heitor Massimo Heitor
    25. May 2016 at 06:35

    To paraphrase Nathan Smith, the ideas of universal suffrage, non-discrimination, and equal access to education and health care and ethnic proportionate government initiatives are wildly incompatible with the idea of beneficial immigration.

    sumner, you are blatantly racially stereotyping Nigerians and Ghanians. It’s fun to celebrate positive racial stereotypes and uncouth to talk about negatives, but you have to weigh both in any reasonable analysis of mass demographic engineering.

    Logically, if immigration “complainers are just grouchy old people who are out of touch with the modern world” then immigration boosters are just establishment stooges and PC SJWs in the pockets of crony business and foreign interest donors, who want to hire more cheap maids and suppress working class wages.

  87. Gravatar of Major.Freedom Major.Freedom
    25. May 2016 at 07:15

    Sumner wrote:

    “Your point has nothing to do with the debate over legal immigration, which is the topic of this post.”

    “the proposal in the post (which is for immigration heavily skewed to Asia, and non-open borders).”

    See that folks? Sumner wants immigration to be controlled, where certain people are allowed in and certain other people are not allowed in, on the basis of government decree. For that is what “legal” immigration refers to. It refers to the immigration policies enforced by the executive branch of the US, rather than individual private property owners.

    Since there is a finite number of immigrants allowed in each year, more Asians means fewer non-Asians. Oh you’re not Asian? Sorry, we have enough of “you people.”

    How again is that different from Trump?

  88. Gravatar of Major.Freedom Major.Freedom
    25. May 2016 at 07:23

    Apparently non Asians are inferior races.

    If I were Sumner, I would probably respond to Sumner’s views on race with something like “I wonder who else had such beliefs about superiority and inferiority of races? Does his name rhyme with Schmidtler?”

    But I won’t do that.

  89. Gravatar of Massimo Heitor Massimo Heitor
    25. May 2016 at 07:26

    “Everyone, All the arguments you are using against Hispanic, Arab and Asian migrants were used against the Irish, Jews, and Italians in the 1800s.”

    An employer or a university makes people hire/admission choices that turn out good or bad and they used the same pro/con arguments for both. The logical response is to tune your people selection process to improve future outcomes; not to categorically reject any argument used against previous successful applicants.

    Universities/employers are brutally ruthlessly analytical when making hire/admit decisions. They reject the overwhelming majority of applicants and they hide their reasons for doing so. They tune their hire/admission process based on what is working for their goals and what isn’t. Almost no one feels like they are owed the right to join a prestigious company or university. Nations should work the same way.

  90. Gravatar of Floccina Floccina
    25. May 2016 at 08:14

    If you are going to let in fewer good healthy people (no criminal record, no infectious disease) than want to come in, it might as well be Muslims that you block as anyone else. It is arbitrary anyway. either way some good person who would like to come does not get to come to the USA.

  91. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    25. May 2016 at 09:27

    Art, That’s a bizarre way of describing the enormous and positive contributions of Jewish Americans, who only compose 2% of American society.

    This comment section provides me with a peek into some pretty sick minds.

    You said:

    “The country would be different. It would be more congenial to people with certain dispositions. So, yes, some people were injured by that set of streams.”

    Well in that case I’m not surprised that you don’t like the current wave of immigration. Your views on immigration remind me of those of HP Lovecraft, until he grew up in the mid-1930s.

  92. Gravatar of Massimo Heitor Massimo Heitor
    25. May 2016 at 09:39

    “This comment section provides me with a peek into some pretty sick minds.”

    Likewise, the opposition to Trump is more depraved than I had imagined.

  93. Gravatar of Art Deco Art Deco
    25. May 2016 at 09:52

    Art, That’s a bizarre way of describing the enormous and positive contributions of Jewish Americans, who only compose 2% of American society.

    I was not describing anyone’s ‘contributions’. I was describing how one group interacts with and views the larger society. This isn’t that difficult. Quit playing games.

    Well in that case I’m not surprised that you don’t like the current wave of immigration. Your views on immigration remind me of those of HP Lovecraft, until he grew up in the mid-1930s.

    Guess what, Sumner. The English West Country isn’t Texas. Some people nestle better in one than in the other.

    Oh, you’re pal Tyler Cowen has been nattering on about Trump supporters being ‘brutes’. I’m sure the B & G employees at the GMU campus would love spending time with you all.

  94. Gravatar of myb6 myb6
    25. May 2016 at 13:16

    My statement: “We’ll soon pass the prior immigration peak.”
    Current percent foreign-born is 13.7% and rising.
    All-time high among census years was 14.8% in 1890.

    You claimed that the immigration-skeptic arguments RE Asians/Arabs/Mexicans were the same as the immigration-skeptic arguments RE Italians/Irish/Jews. I disagreed, and cited organized terrorism as one example. Do you deny that terrorism is a larger concern among immigration-skeptics in 2015 vs 1895? This is completely tangent to whether you yourself share the concern.

    You’re free to disagree with my statements, but there’s no way to construe them as misleading, and I expect you to retract.

  95. Gravatar of E. Harding E. Harding
    25. May 2016 at 15:04

    “Do you deny that terrorism is a larger concern among immigration-skeptics in 2015 vs 1895”

    -Yes:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haymarket_affair

  96. Gravatar of Learn a language and listen! – Loving Language Learn a language and listen! – Loving Language
    26. May 2016 at 03:04

    […] More immigration please (Making America Great Again) […]

  97. Gravatar of myb6 myb6
    26. May 2016 at 05:29

    E. Harding, labor clashes with police are nothing like organized attacks from international terrorist networks. This in fact reinforces my point: socialism/anarchism, the instigation of labor unrest, was a major concern for 1880s immigration skeptics but is NOT a major concern for 21st C immigration skeptics.

  98. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    26. May 2016 at 10:32

    Myb6, I’ll give you that 9/11 was worse than back then, but otherwise terrorism was probably worse back then. Anarchists were assassinating presidents and blowing up bombs on Wall Street. Apart form 9/11 (admittedly a big exception) the problem was worse back then.

    If 9/11 type attacks become common in the future, then I’m completely wrong. But I doubt they will, I think we’ll face small attacks in the future.

    People may have cared less, because we’ve become hugely risk averse. Why would people care a lot in a world where over 100,000 Americans die in WWI, and then a year later 500,000 die in a plague. Life was short and cheap—a few bombs didn’t matter that much.

    The shortness of life made the stock data you cite misleading; immigration was rapidly reshaping our demographics, but immigrants were rapidly replaced by their children—considered American born. The flow of new immigrants is only a third 1900 levels.

  99. Gravatar of Myb6 Myb6
    26. May 2016 at 12:54

    Scott, I agree with you that another successful large attack is unlikely. But you’d be doing a disservice to risk management to pretend the phenomenon is similar to immigrant- heavy anarchism a century ago. I’m willing to be educated, but seems to me the anarchists showed no pattern of aiming for mass body counts.

    You’re assuming that stocks don’t matter to immigration skeptics. That’s a remarkably bad assumption. My statement holds.

  100. Gravatar of ssumner ssumner
    27. May 2016 at 13:40

    Myb6, You said:

    “You’re assuming that stocks don’t matter to immigration skeptics.”

    I’m assuming??? I thought it was the immigration skeptics that were complaining about 2nd and 3rd generation Hispanics not doing well. Now you tell me there is no Hispanic problem after the first generation?

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