Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

just when we were talkin bout farmers using off-road fuel

then the thread went to shit again

It's the same trap everyone falls into sooner or later. When the theory and the reality don't match up, it's suddenly very complicated and hard to explain. But when we can point to a stretch where the theory and reality match up, it is suddenly simple and beautiful.

I don't have much in the way of an ideological argument here. Generally, immigration is good for business. Restricting immigration is bad for business. It's been shown over and over and over and over. Since I am generally on the side of reality, I think immigration is good. The data is overwhelmingly on my side. If the data changes, so will my opinion. But I'm not generally interested in beautiful theories that don't match up with reality, like the ones you present on immigration.

https://youtu.be/vf-k6qOfXz0?si=qS9RzjJb4k1vu6QZ


The Koch Brothers money is apparently well spent. They've got you snowed.

Instead of pretending reality is on your side, why don't you actually address a point that I actually made. Pick any, you haven't refuted anything.

This all started because @847badgerfan posted a link indicating that FEMA's ability to help victims of the recent hurricane because they spent BILLIONS on migrants.

Just to be clear the link is from a pro-regime source so don't try claiming bias.

Are you disagreeing with the link facts?

Are you disagreeing with the fact that adding people below median income lowers per-capita income?

Do you disagree with the fact that SS and Medicare are fiscal catastrophes?

Do you fail to comprehend that since SS and Medicare are losing money, adding average or below-average participants makes the fiscal catastrophe worse?

You can't actually "disagree" with the above facts because while you are entitled to your own opinion you are not entitled to your own facts.

As far as your "data", as I said, the Koch brothers' money is well spent. Of course business wants more immigrants, cheap labor helps them screw the workers!

We as a society lose money on all but the wealthiest immigrants and you can't make up losses on volume no matter how hard you try.

You can, however, flood the already oversupplied unskilled labor market, screw the workers, increase income inequality, further weaken SS, further weaken Medicare, etc.

So, this is "factually" based in a lot of misconceptions. Immigration has historically always been pretty unpopular. This is true among pretty much every population every where. Look at this graph, which shows popular support for increased immigration has pretty much always been minimal. I don't think that is surprising - that people are suspicious of outsiders, especially racial outsiders, is a pretty consistent part of history.


But the idea that the Koch brothers have me snowed is silly. Your position is unsupported by your own data, by history, and by the bulk of economists and historians who study the issue. Reality is against you, not just the Koch brothers. And when you think about it for ten seconds, of course it is.

• Immigration is one of the strongest signals we have about relative economies. People don't pack up and move for worse outcomes.
• Economies cannot grow without more people. Certainly, there are economies that thrive on gold mine like resources, like oil rich countries. But economies need people to sell, buy, and work, and without these things, they don't grow. Japan has a highly able workforce and a very protectionist policy. They are poorer than we are.
• Immigrants are just plain great. People that would risk their safety and travel thousands of miles for uncertain rewards are the kinds of people who excel in work and business. Our policy should be to attract as many of these people as we can, not cut them off based on silly references to Medicare.

When did we stop calling the ones invading our country illegals

We all welcome legal immigrants

20 million illegals not so much

So, this is "factually" based in a lot of misconceptions. Immigration has historically always been pretty unpopular. This is true among pretty much every population every where. Look at this graph, which shows popular support for increased immigration has pretty much always been minimal. I don't think that is surprising - that people are suspicious of outsiders, especially racial outsiders, is a pretty consistent part of history.

But the idea that the Koch brothers have me snowed is silly. Your position is unsupported by your own data, by history, and by the bulk of economists and historians who study the issue. Reality is against you, not just the Koch brothers. And when you think about it for ten seconds, of course it is.

• Immigration is one of the strongest signals we have about relative economies. People don't pack up and move for worse outcomes.
• Economies cannot grow without more people. Certainly, there are economies that thrive on gold mine like resources, like oil rich countries. But economies need people to sell, buy, and work, and without these things, they don't grow. Japan has a highly able workforce and a very protectionist policy. They are poorer than we are.
• Immigrants are just plain great. People that would risk their safety and travel thousands of miles for uncertain rewards are the kinds of people who excel in work and business. Our policy should be to attract as many of these people as we can, not cut them off based on silly references to Medicare.

I've refuted this nonsense probably a thousand times but here goes 1,001 maybe you'll actually respond this time instead of ignoring reality when it doesn't conform to what you have been told to believe.  

Years ago the libertarian leaning economist Milton Friedman said that you cannot have open borders and a welfare state.  He was right then and the point stands today.  

The fact is that, like it or not, we have a welfare state.  Even if you ignore what we typically think of as "welfare" and just focus on SS and Medicare these are effectively welfare programs.  They both bring in substantially less than they pay out.  This, it is indisputable that the average participant in SS and Medicare is a net drain on the nation's resources.  In truth the programs are so hopelessly underwater than nearly every participant is a net drain on the nation's resources but I've chosen to ignore that because I don't need those to win this argument, I only need the ones that are average and below.  

Every single immigrant who is at or below average (average for existing, not for immigrants) in earnings makes the SS and Medicare fiscal catastrophes worse.  

That is indisputable and you can't make up those losses on volume.  

Your theory that immigrants are "people that would risk their safety and travel thousands of miles for uncertain rewards are the kinds of people who excel in work and business" is cute but silly.  First, even to the extent that they are, if they are below-average earners they are driving down our per-capita GDP and further undermining our SS and Medicare systems.  Second, the rewards are absolutely NOT uncertain.  Back in the high-immigration late 19th and early 20th centuries, immigrants to the US actually did face "uncertain rewards".  Back then there were almost no government programs for the poor, SS and Medicare didn't exist, etc.  Back then we didn't have to worry about people coming here for the free stuff because there wasn't any free stuff being handed out.  

You can't have open borders and a welfare state.  

Back then a non-trivial number of immigrants ended up retuning because they found the going too difficult here.  Today we have welfare programs to take care of them and SS and Medicare and free ER Healthcare that is the world's best so there is plenty of free stuff to draw people in.  

Low earners and criminals are OBVIOUSLY bad for the country, can you even admit that?  

We all welcome legal immigrants

Those of us who are fiscally literate absolutely do NOT welcome all legal immigrants.  

I welcome immigrants who make us wealthier and do NOT further conflate the SS and Medicare catastrophes.  Realistically this is only a very small percentage of even legal immigrants and practically no illegal immivaders.  

The longshoremen's strike is over. 

Every single immigrant who is at or below average (average for existing, not for immigrants) in earnings makes the SS and Medicare fiscal catastrophes worse.  

That is indisputable and you can't make up those losses on volume. 

Undocumented immigrants don't get social security or medicare. Some law immigrants only can in limited circumstances. Your whole theory is based on nonsense.

I get a news feed from the New York Times daily, this is part of it:

For much of the Biden administration’s first three years in office, migration surged at the Mexican border. Administration officials frequently argued that the problem was beyond their control — a reflection not of U.S. policy but of global forces pushing people toward the border.

[img width=498 height=369.516 alt=A bar chart that shows how the monthly encounters with U.S. Border Patrol along the Southwest border have declined this year.]https://ci3.googleusercontent.com/meips/ADKq_NbgKmqQQirOhJJMYFl4guYMWnjx-Oq_d65-6LaAEqfjziNG3Vz8o0Y2z7xwDAfa-K38ZgBFsvw0_3RxNqJyAE2gHQnJUnNTawUfANu3pc65fD0JTfNhN91aePPBevA5_L9_KKDqtBdNNV7L9Iw2zDpvbVd0-ljm5YV0l1LQ2LsqVc5C6A=s0-d-e1-ft#https://static01.nyt.com/images/2024/10/02/briefing/oakImage-1727899980864/oakImage-1727899980864-jumbo-v2.png[/img][/size][/color]

Source: Department of Homeland Security | By The New York Times

At the same time, Democrats in Congress were trying to pass an immigration bill to slow the number of arrivals and save Biden’s candidacy. Although Republicans had largely backed those objectives, they voted against the measure for political reasons, and it failed.