Democratic Presidential Debate

[xerx]

Okay, so embrace automation and we don't need immigration.

What makes you think I don't?? I want to see all dirty and backbreaking work become automated everywhere.

[mfckrz]

What makes you think I don't?? I want to see all dirty and backbreaking work become automated everywhere.

So we don't need all these superfluous people coming here (not that we ever did, but there's no sane labor economics argument for it either).

[Grendel]

So we don't need all these superfluous people coming here (not that we ever did, but there's no sane labor economics argument for it either).

And add to that.....departing from Labor theory economics is part of why we're in the foreign policy mess we're in. You know you fucked up when your country works on an economic theory of "Oh, even if we're digging an absolutely useless hole, laborers will have to be paid for digging the hole and filling it up again, so it's economic stimulus!"
Fuck Keynesianism in every form. Fuck the MIC and fuck the Petrodollar too.

[xerx]

Real incomes (insofar as what one can purchase with their earnings) have been flat for 40 years. More women entered the workforce because they had to—impossible now for most to reasonably rear a family on one income.

Expanding the labor supply has been great for business, not so much for the economy.

If that were true, then real incomes should have been flat or gone down since population increased from 3 million (during the American revolution) to 325 million (today).

So we don't need all these superfluous people coming here (not that we ever did, but there's no sane labor economics argument for it either).

I guess it depends on how much you believe in the principle of liberty. Some people believe they should have the liberty to invite immigrants of different races and mingle with them.

The acid test to be a principled Libertarian is whether you support completely open borders; I mean completely open. In my experience, Libertarians who support enforcement are usually Conservatives that want to smoke weed and maybe fuck hookers.

[mfckrz]

If that were true, then real incomes should have been flat or gone down since population increased from 3 million (during the American revolution) to 325 million (today).

Economic growth kept pace with (or exceeded) population growth, so it wasn't true then. This has no longer been the case.

I guess it depends on how much you believe in the principle of liberty. Some people believe they should have the liberty to invite immigrants of different races and mingle with them.

Or, liberty to live away from people that don't improve one's quality of life. Dunno about you, but hearing clown polka mariachi music at 2AM is a 'liberty' I can live without.

The acid test to be a principled Libertarian is whether you support completely open borders; I mean completely open. In my experience, Libertarians who support enforcement are usually Conservatives that want to smoke weed and maybe fuck hookers.

Open borders socialize an entire country into the world's public toilet.

The only coherent libertarian position would be privatized borders. Expanding the franchise of democracy so more people can vote against your interests doesn't make sense.

[xerx]

Economic growth kept pace with (or exceeded) population growth, so it wasn't true then. This has no longer been the case.

Then why is population growth the cause of economic stagnation??

Or, liberty to live away from people that don't improve one's quality of life. Dunno about you, but hearing clown polka mariachi music at 2AM is a 'liberty' I can live without.


Open borders socialize an entire country into the world's public toilet.

The only coherent libertarian position would be privatized borders. Expanding the franchise of democracy so more people can vote against your interests doesn't make sense.

Hey, change the channel if you don't like what's on TV. You have the freedom to live in a gated community / safe space and censor the presence of Mexicans (and presumably Black people). I have the right to trade as much saliva as I want with shaved or unshaved Mexican pussy.

[mfckrz]

Then why is population growth the cause of economic stagnation??

Basic supply&demand??

Increasing labor supply without a commensurate increase in economic output means no wage growth.

No wage growth + rising costs of living → less savings. And no more middle class. Less savings → less investment, ergo ↓ economic growth.

Consider that there'd have never been a Renaissance without the Black Death. Because rising wages in the aftermath of the plague allowed for the emergence of a middle class and greatly disrupted the wealthy feudal hierarchies who'd been riding high on a mass of cheap labor prior.

With socioeconomic mobility from large numbers of people who can actually save, invest, and own assets… culture tends to follow. Same dynamics can be observed in civilizations of antiquity.

Hey, change the channel if you don't like what's on TV. You have the freedom to live in a gated community / safe space and censor the presence of Mexicans (and presumably Black people).

Where I live is fine. But resent being forced to take out a $500,000+ mortgage just to live in a decent area because the govt opened the floodgates to let all this in.

[xerx]

Basic supply&demand??

Increasing labor supply without a commensurate increase in economic output means no wage growth.

No wage growth + rising costs of living → less savings. And no more middle class. Less savings → less investment, ergo ↓ economic growth.

Consider that there'd have never been a Renaissance without the Black Death. Because rising wages in the aftermath of the plague allowed for the emergence of a middle class and greatly disrupted the wealthy feudal hierarchies who'd been riding high on a mass of cheap labor prior.

With socioeconomic mobility from large numbers of people who can actually save, invest, and own assets… culture tends to follow. Same dynamics can be observed in civilizations of antiquity.

But there is a commensurate increase in economic output. GDP per capita has grown substantially over the past forty years.

Where I live is fine. But resent being forced to take out a $500,000+ mortgage just to live in a decent area because the govt opened the floodgates to let all this in.

Hey, you have the right to feel whatever you like.

An overlooked fact of women entering the workforce is that doubling labor supply means that wage value was halved. Over time, you needed two incomes to be able to afford a mortgage and bills when one used to be sufficient. I am all for women's rights and freedom to work, but our salaries having half the value they used to have has been devastating to families. Also, a good portion of women (not all of course) resent being forced to work a career to raise a family and would of preferred to be stay at home mom's.

The price we pay for this is women being forced to work a career and raise a family or have your standard of living cut in half. Mass immigration is similar in this regard. We became so fixated in chasing meaningless statistics like GDP growth that we didn't realize how it impacted our quality of life and salaries not growing enough relative to ever increasing living costs.


Very low skilled individuals may lose their jobs to immigration and automation and end up on the streets. While high skilled working class and middle class individuals with careers find their standard of living slowly decrease as salaries cannot keep up to rising costs of living due to inflation. All mass immigration is doing is fueling an ever increasing wage gap difference as wealthy people fill their coffers and reap the benefits and everyday citizens pay the price.

That sounds pretty dramatic; how are you backing it up?

I looked at a meta-study which concludes that a 1% increase in immigration depresses wages by a "quantitatively small" 0.1% (source = https://researchcommons.waikato.ac.n.../PSC-dp-47.pdf). A blog post by the economist Noah Smith goes on to suggest that the wage dip to immigration might even be nonexistent over the long term due to markets returning to equilibrium (source = http://noahpinionblog.blogspot.com/2016/01/101ism.html).


As for women, this study here suggests that wages actually rise due to their increased participation in the workforce (source = https://hbr.org/2018/01/when-more-wo...luding-for-men).