Why Japan, China, and most of the world is in big demographic trouble (but the U.S. is not)

[Offline4Better.]

In late October, Chinese President Xi Jinping told the National Women’s Congress that “We should actively foster a new type of marriage and childbearing culture.” Such a statement is rich coming from a man, especially one who leads a party that for decades actively and sometimes brutally enforced family planning policies. It is also delusional: In all probability, China’s baby bust cannot be reversed, at least not anytime soon.
...
Yet even if China somehow does defy past trends and manages to boost its national fertility rates substantially, it will take nearly two decades to pay off as babies born today finally enter the workforce. Meanwhile, its top-heavy “constrictive” population pyramid thanks to a decades-long one-child policy—which was only abandoned in 2016—will mean increasing old age dependency and the social and economic costs that come with it.

Read More: China’s Aging Population Is a Major Concern. But Its Youth May Be an Even Bigger Problem

The U.S. has been spared a similar fate than China—all thanks to immigration. The more than 1 million immigrants who come to the U.S. every year are a key underwriter of U.S. national power, leaving aside the thorny domestic politics around immigration policy.

Like the U.S., mass immigration is the only plausible short-term fix for China’s population crisis. But China under Xi has no interest in a Western-style melting pot—like elsewhere in Asia including Japan—that brings in millions of immigrants. He has spent years promoting a Han Chinese national identity.

Can China’s Baby Bust Be Reversed? Don’t Count On It

President Xi Jinping may want to foster a "childbearing culture" but demographic trends are incredibly hard to reverse.

time.com

The planet is already near overpopulation, so this does not matter. For me, I am planning on not having any kids. Now this means we should still be pro-life as Christians, but just use common sense when it boils down to making the decision to have 0 or 10 kids.


Carrying capacity: Has Earth reached its carrying capacity?

 

[JSRG]

And I think proposing mass migration is just a band-aid, and could potentially create more problems than it solves (as you're just moving the problem of "lack of workers needed to help pay for the elderly and sick" onto other countries, many of which are in much more dire financial circumstances.

If we move 6 million working aged individuals from Country A to Country B so they can work, pay taxes, and help prop up entitlements for the elderly, now Country A has the problem of "we've got all of these elderly collecting, and not enough paying in".

Only if Country A has (in terms of birth) zero or negative population growth (based on births). But a lot of the time, the countries that immigrants are coming from are experiencing population growth, so those countries can easily afford to have a bunch of the population leave while still keeping the population stable (or increasing!).

 

[ThatRobGuy]

Only if Country A has (in terms of birth) zero or negative population growth (based on births). But a lot of the time, the countries that immigrants are coming from are experiencing population growth, so those countries can easily afford to have a bunch of the population leave while still keeping the population stable (or increasing!).

It's possible...

But it still raises a number of logistical questions/challenges.

With regards to the US situation:

And our hemispherical neighbors which we'd likely be siphoning people from

If these stats are true, Mexico's population growth rates are actually lower than ours

List of countries by population growth rate - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

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

In terms of China

There situation is much worse, but given their immense population size, they'd have to siphon off such a large amount from neighboring countries in order to make a remotely noticeable difference in their own countries situation, that it would have a huge impact on the country that's losing the people.

For instance, given China's population of 1.4 billion, even if they convinced 20% of working aged people from every neighboring country to move there, it would be a modest needle move for China, and devastating to the country the people were leaving.

I just don't see "Let's make more people" as a solution (for climate reasons) as a solution, nor do I see "Let's just move a bunch of people around" as a feasible solution either given challenges ranging from skillset to assimilation.

Right now the only countries that have a consistently increasing population and birth rate growth rates seem to be the Islamic countries, and I don't think that's a particular values system we want to export to the rest of the developed world in the name of economics.

If we get to the point where the world is just flat out overpopulated, and every country has population consisting of 60% that want to vote against liberal westernized values in favor of theocratic ones, that doesn't seem like a good tradeoff to me.

 

[Ana the Ist]

Nope:

Immigration has taken center stage in the race for the Republican Presidential nomination. The conventional wisdom says illegal immigrants take American jobs and lower American wages.

It's not "conventional wisdom" it's basic supply and demand economics.

That conventional wisdom is wrong.

Sure guy.

According to an April 2015 symposium on the effects of illegal immigrants in the Southern Economic Journal, illegal immigrants actually raise wages for documented/native workers.

Look, if you're a big market like agriculture and you want to retain your illegal workers for cheap....paying an economist to say so isn't difficult.

Anyway, the dumbest economic hack of an article states....

Why? The law of comparative advantage says we get more productive when we have more trading partners, and the arrival of undocumented workers with limited English skills frees up low-skill American workers who can then specialize in tasks that require better English. In July, I had the honor of sharing the stage with Ann Coulter, and fellow Forbes contributor Rick Ungar on Fox Business’s Stossel show, and I got to explain how unskilled immigrants make us more productive at the end of the show.

Great argument. Because a bunch of illegals can't speak English so well, you'll move up to higher paying more valuable positions that require English!

How much more valuable? Well the study cites a whopping 0.44% increase (don't spend it all in one place) across the board and a business or firm specific increase of 0.019%....that's an increase so low you won't even notice it.

Now let's look at that conventional wisdom again....

Worker shortages just forced employers to give out the biggest raises in 20 years

Employers’ compensation costs, including worker wages and benefits, hit 20-year highs last month.

www.google.com

The U.S. employment-cost index released Friday revealed that employers’ compensation costs for all civilian workers, including worker wages and benefits, jumped 4% year-over-year during the final quarter of 2021. That’s the biggest increase in over 20 years.

See above. In fact, Texas did a study about 17 years ago, showing that the state economy was boosted by about $17 billion a year from the employment of illegal aliens:

17 years ago????? Can you please find something older....something tallied up on an abacus or something. You know, back before they had calculators.

Some people might ask if you're citing 17yo studies because they're vastly outdated and nothing contemporary would dare suggest anything so stupid....but not me. I know that's why you're citing 17yo studies.

Dec 8, 2006
AUSTIN — Illegal immigrants have boosted the state's economy by $17.7 billion and haven't been a drain on state government — but they did cost local governments $929 million in 2005, the Comptroller's Office reported Thursday.

Texas tallies costs, benefits of illegal immigrants

Illegal immigrants have boosted the state's economy by $17.7 billion and haven't been a...

www.chron.com

From the exact same article....

Citing a study done by the conservative [COLOR=var(--black)]Lone Star Foundationhttps://www.chron.com/search/?actio...chindex=property&query="Lone+Star+Foundation", Berman said the total cost to the state is $4.5 billion a year to provide services to illegal immigrants, but he said they pay just $1 billion in tax collections.[/COLOR]
"This is the net loss to the taxpayers of the state," he said.

You really should read all the way to the bottom.

Nope. From a year ago...​

April, 2022​

America's labor shortage is actually an immigrant shortage​

U.S. employers say it's a hard time to find and keep talent. Workers are decamping at near-record rates, while millions of open jobs go unfilled. One reason for this labor crunch that has largely flown beneath the radar: Immigration to the U.S. is plummeting, a shift with potentially enormous long-term implications for the job market.

That's a wild assertion given that they have found record numbers of children being illegally employed.

The labor shortage is a wage shortage. Covid shutdowns combined with inflation have raised costs across the board....and CEOs don't want to take losses. That's why they're pushing for more illegals.

"This decline reflects both tougher immigration policies and the pandemic which reduced legal immigration and caused some recent immigrants to return to their native countries," David Kelly, chief global strategist at JPMorgan Funds, said in a recent report.

They're talking about years with record high illegal numbers. I've never seen a less accurate nonsense article defending child labor in my life.

After COVID-19, most travel shut down. Immigration processing stopped, and many foreign workers returned to their home countries. In 2020, immigration fell to half of its 2016 level; last year, it fell to just over a quarter.

America's labor shortage is actually an immigrant shortage

The U.S. is missing 2 million workers because of slowing immigration, one estimate shows. That's leading to unfilled jobs.

www.cbsnews.com

He's talking about legal immigration, not illegal. You can't just switch back and forth between the two to make a point.

It's unquestionable that illegals use up resources. This disgrace of an administration has left homeless US citizens on the streets while providing shelter and food to illegal aliens.

If you want to show how illegals boost wages....then you'll need to explain why a worker shortage caused the highest net increase in wages in 20 years.

It's really simple....less workers, more pay.

If we booted those here illegally and made it virtually impossible to hire illegals then overnight we'd see wages go skyrocketing because it would either be a choice of a loss in profits for businesses or going out of business. They'll take a loss over bankruptcy. Additionally, prices would fall across the board as on everything from bread to homes....and people could afford houses again. Then you'd be back to a birth rate that doesn't require a mass foreign invasion of people who will cut and run the moment it gets difficult.

 

[Ana the Ist]

Only if Country A has (in terms of birth) zero or negative population growth (based on births). But a lot of the time, the countries that immigrants are coming from are experiencing population growth, so those countries can easily afford to have a bunch of the population leave while still keeping the population stable (or increasing!).

You're underestimating the effect. If you look at the average family size in Guatemala, the levels of malnutrition, the lack of education and resources, the way they deal with poverty is by exporting it here. Once millions of poor leave...suddenly there's more for everyone else. They no longer need to improve things like infrastructure and development.

We literally hand them money to do this. It's a disgrace.

 

[Ana the Ist]

To explain how capitalism works for anyone who doesn't get it...you can only increase efficiency so much and improve profits once markets are saturated and efficiency is extremely high.

At that point, you can do a few things...

1. Find new markets...a difficult thing to do unless a certain group of people suddenly can afford what you are selling.

2. Built in failure. Create products that are actually cheap garbage prone to breaking and yet necessary for other products to work. Ever notice how long a typical USB cord lasts? Ever notice that your inkjet printer seems to constantly need ink? These are products designed to fail, not last, and since you need them to operate other products, you keep buying them.

3. Cheaper labor. Can't pay American workers less? Start replacing them with illegals, unpaid interns, volunteers. Can't find those? Use children. As long as the hiring is outsourced to some third party company...your company is in the clear.

Capitalism is the search for increasing profits. There's no regulatory superstructure beyond the nation-state....so globalization had created a seemingly unsolvable problem outside our borders. That doesn't mean we can't demand real regulation here.

 

[Ana the Ist]

The planet is already near overpopulation, so this does not matter. For me, I am planning on not having any kids. Now this means we should still be pro-life as Christians, but just use common sense when it boils down to making the decision to have 0 or 10 kids.


Carrying capacity: Has Earth reached its carrying capacity?

Some scientists say that we are well past carrying capacity and I agree. The optimistic guesses that resulted in numbers of 10 billion decades ago failed to understand the problems those numbers create. 2 billion is more reasonable.

 

[Offline4Better.]

Some scientists say that we are well past carrying capacity and I agree. The optimistic guesses that resulted in numbers of 10 billion decades ago failed to understand the problems those numbers create. 2 billion is more reasonable.

I would say around 8 billion as a compromise between 2 billion and 10 billion, but somewhat closer to 10B, with modern technology and agricultural methods. Our world is already slightly beyond 8 billion people. Most studies put the carrying capacity at around 8 billion people. So yes, we might already be overpopulated.

 

[Ana the Ist]

It's possible...

But it still raises a number of logistical questions/challenges.

With regards to the US situation:
View attachment 340042

And our hemispherical neighbors which we'd likely be siphoning people from
View attachment 340043

If these stats are true, Mexico's population growth rates are actually lower than ours

List of countries by population growth rate - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

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

In terms of China
View attachment 340044

There situation is much worse, but given their immense population size, they'd have to siphon off such a large amount from neighboring countries in order to make a remotely noticeable difference in their own countries situation, that it would have a huge impact on the country that's losing the people.

For instance, given China's population of 1.4 billion, even if they convinced 20% of working aged people from every neighboring country to move there, it would be a modest needle move for China, and devastating to the country the people were leaving.

I just don't see "Let's make more people" as a solution (for climate reasons) as a solution, nor do I see "Let's just move a bunch of people around" as a feasible solution either given challenges ranging from skillset to assimilation.

Right now the only countries that have a consistently increasing population and birth rate growth rates seem to be the Islamic countries, and I don't think that's a particular values system we want to export to the rest of the developed world in the name of economics.

If we get to the point where the world is just flat out overpopulated, and every country has population consisting of 60% that want to vote against liberal westernized values in favor of theocratic ones, that doesn't seem like a good tradeoff to me.

I don't fully understand what the problem is in China. If you're picturing a nanny state that cares about its citizens and provides them with the basics of healthcare and shelter and assistance when needed....you're wrong. If you're thinking about a place that doesn't care about it's citizens beyond their usefulness to the state and is perfectly fine with letting the elderly work till they die or just die without any assistance, you're correct.

They're the elderly after all. What will they do? Protest? It's a 1 party government with a pretend vote. If I had to guess, it will cause problems, but not serious ones that threaten the strength of the Chinese economy. They've already expanded into what is basically slave labor in Africa so....that's going to be a significant buffer to economic loss.

 

[Ana the Ist]

I would say around 8 billion as a compromise between 2 billion and 10 billion, but somewhat closer to 10B, with modern technology and agricultural methods. Our world is already slightly beyond 8 billion people. Most studies put the carrying capacity at around 8 billion people. So yes, we might already be overpopulated.

View attachment 340052

I'm not sure what modern agricultural methods you're talking about but regardless of whether or not you believe in climate change....the equatorial region is becoming uninhabitable.

At a certain temperature and humidity, the water in the air signals the human body to not perspire....so you cannot cool off and the heat leads to death from heat stroke. Temperatures are gradually increasing every summer. On the flip side, frozen taiga/tundra regions may be inhabitable but either way...there seems to be a basic problem within many species of animals at a high enough density. We have rough days ahead for the foreseeable future.

 

[Offline4Better.]

I'm not sure what modern agricultural methods you're talking about but regardless of whether or not you believe in climate change....the equatorial region is becoming uninhabitable.

At a certain temperature and humidity, the water in the air signals the human body to not perspire....so you cannot cool off and the heat leads to death from heat stroke. Temperatures are gradually increasing every summer. On the flip side, frozen taiga/tundra regions may be inhabitable but either way...there seems to be a basic problem within many species of animals at a high enough density. We have rough days ahead for the foreseeable future.

I believe in climate change, our world is getting hotter, and is caused by CO2 emissions from industry, transport and energy. By agricultural methods, I am referring to fertilizers, GMOs (don't like GMOs that much, butthis thread is not for a debate about GMOs, and am also against commercializing CRISPR for plants and other living organisms, unless that technology stays in research facilities only) and machinery.

CO2 is currently nearing 420 PPM as of October 2023

 

[Trogdor the Burninator]

Nope:

Immigration has taken center stage in the race for the Republican Presidential nomination. The conventional wisdom says illegal immigrants take American jobs and lower American wages.

That conventional wisdom is wrong.

According to an April 2015 symposium on the effects of illegal immigrants in the Southern Economic Journal, illegal immigrants actually raise wages for documented/native workers.

I‘m not entirely convinced. It’s possible that having access to a completely unskilled workforce has some unplanned effects, but generally increased competition for jobs in a particular industry lowers wages.

And that’s before we get to the moral argument of undermining decades of hard fought labour laws by allowing employers to take on workers with almost no rights in the first place.

 

[Ana the Ist]

I think the mistake that the OP makes is twofold.

1. They didn't recognize it as pro-illegal immigration corporate propaganda.

2. They described a "problem" that doesn't really exist in China. How to care for an aging population without children of their own. It's not a problem, because China isn't a democracy, and they aren't pressured by the moral views of the population. Those people won't be cared for, they'll die, and China will continue on.

 

[The Barbarian]

It's not "conventional wisdom" it's basic supply and demand economics.

Sorry, no. Turns out that immigrants add billions annually to state economies.

Data from 2006 Comptroller Study

Former Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn performed a study of the impact of illegal immigration in 2006. According to the Texas Tribune, The results

www.texasmonthly.com

That conventional wisdom is wrong.

Sure guy.

Comes down to evidence. You lose.

Look, if you're a big market like agriculture and you want to retain your illegal workers for cheap....paying an economist to say so isn't difficult.

Yeah, we've heard that, "they are lying; they are all LYING!" Nice try.
Dec 8, 2006
AUSTIN — Illegal immigrants have boosted the state's economy by $17.7 billion and haven't been a drain on state government — but they did cost local governments $929 million in 2005, the Comptroller's Office reported Thursday.

Texas tallies costs, benefits of illegal immigrants ​

Illegal immigrants have boosted the state's economy by $17.7 billion and haven't been a...

www.chron.com

Citing a study done by the conservative [COLOR=var(--black)]Lone Star Foundationhttps://www.chron.com/search/?actio...chindex=property&query="Lone+Star+Foundation", Berman said the total cost to the state is $4.5 billion a year to provide services to illegal immigrants, but he said they pay just $1 billion in tax collections.[/COLOR]
"This is the net loss to the taxpayers of the state," he said.

Unfortunately, he didn't provide data for his claim. I think I know why...

April, 2022​

America's labor shortage is actually an immigrant shortage​

U.S. employers say it's a hard time to find and keep talent. Workers are decamping at near-record rates, while millions of open jobs go unfilled. One reason for this labor crunch that has largely flown beneath the radar: Immigration to the U.S. is plummeting, a shift with potentially enormous long-term implications for the job market.

That's a wild assertion given that they have found record numbers of children being illegally employed.

The article offers data links. I notice you don't. I think I know why.

They're talking about years with record high illegal numbers. I've never seen a less accurate nonsense article defending child labor in my life.

I notice they don't say anything like what you claimed they do. Be more careful.

It's unquestionable that illegals use up resources.

It's unquestionable that they increased the economy of Texas by about $17 billion dollars in one year, according to a republican comptroller. No point in denying the fact. Texas keeps data like that.

He's talking about legal immigration, not illegal. You can't just switch back and forth between the two to make a point.

He's talking about immigrants, period. You need to read more carefully.

....then you'll need to explain why a worker shortage caused the highest net increase in wages in 20 years.

Supply and demand. This could help you:
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskEconomics/comments/pdt5nh

It's really simple....less workers, more pay.

Nope. You're assuming that a bigger economy means lower wages. Which is false. Would you like to learn why?

If we booted those here illegally and made it virtually impossible to hire illegals then overnight we'd see wages go skyrocketing because it would either be a choice of a loss in profits for businesses or going out of business.

You'd see lower pay for most workers. Learn about it here:
Model results suggested that wages would rise for U.S.-born and other permanent resident workers, relative to the base forecast, in some lower paying occupations where unauthorized workers are common, decrease slightly in many higher paying occupations, and decrease on average. Several factors accounted for the slight decrease in earnings. First, the decrease in the supply of unauthorized labor lead to a long-run relative decrease in production, not just in agriculture but in all sectors of the economy. This, in turn, reduced incomes to many complementary factors of production, including U.S.-born and foreign-born, permanent resident workers in higher paying occupations. Second, with the departure of so many unauthorized workers, the occupational distribution of U.S.-born and other permanent resident workers necessarily shifted in the direction of more hired farm work and other lower paying occupations, such as food service, child care, and housekeeping, and away from higher paying occupations which is a much larger category. The effect of this compositional change was to reduce the average real wage for U.S.-born and foreign-born, permanent resident workers in all sectors of the economy, even as real wages in many lower paying occupations rose.

What if all illegal immigrants were deported?

www.econ.iastate.edu

Do a little reading, and this won't be such a difficult thing for you to understand.

 

[The Barbarian]

I‘m not entirely convinced. It’s possible that having access to a completely unskilled workforce has some unplanned effects, but generally increased competition for jobs in a particular industry lowers wages.

Comes down to data. And that's pretty much it. As more illegal workers come in, the lowest pay grades may suffer, but nothing else.

 

[The Barbarian]

I don't fully understand what the problem is in China. If you're picturing a nanny state that cares about its citizens and provides them with the basics of healthcare and shelter and assistance when needed....you're wrong. If you're thinking about a place that doesn't care about it's citizens beyond their usefulness to the state and is perfectly fine with letting the elderly work till they die or just die without any assistance, you're correct.

Actually, it's more interesting than that...

China law forces adult children to visit and care for their elderly parents​

China law forces adult children to visit and care for their elderly

New law has already been criticised for being too vague

www.independent.co.uk

 

[Trogdor the Burninator]

People aren't having babies in the US because of ever rising costs, and flat wages……

People do want to have children, but see it unaffordable if they can't own a house in their 30s. They can't own a house, because their wages are depressed……

The idea, that "oh no! We'll run out if workers!" Let's import some more...quick!" Is so stupid it's hard to fathom anyone believing it.

We won't run out of workers, we'll run out of low paying jobs, corporations will have to cut into profits and offer benefits. That's what they're trying to avoid. If construction work paid 50$ an hour with medical and dental, then you'd suddenly have plenty of workers.

Describing the pressure on the middle and lower classes due to deliberate wage depression, rising cost of housing, plus the push from profit-focussed corporations for access to cheap labour pools and reduce worker benefits.

Apart from the focus solely on illegal immigrants, as opposed to immigration and growth in general, that might be the most left wing post of yours I’ve ever read.

 

[Trogdor the Burninator]

Comes down to data. And that's pretty much it. As more illegal workers come in, the lowest pay grades may suffer, but nothing else.

On that we can agree. Having access to cheap maids and gardeners is great if you’re wealthy, not so great if you’re a maid or a gardener.

 

[Ana the Ist]

I‘m not entirely convinced. It’s possible that having access to a completely unskilled workforce has some unplanned effects, but generally increased competition for jobs in a particular industry lowers wages.

And that’s before we get to the moral argument of undermining decades of hard fought labour laws by allowing employers to take on workers with almost no rights in the first place.

The idea that the people who exported factories overseas to cheap labor pools are any different from the people who donate to both parties to allow mass immigration is silly. It's the same issue, the same problem from the corporate view, and the same solution.

To describe the effects of illegal immigration on economics is a bit too complex to encapsulate in one phrase....but if you did need one phrase....it's more workers, lower wages.

Labor isn't immune to the laws of supply and demand. If supply outstrips demand....pay decreases. If demand outstrips supply, pay increases.

It is that simple. People always talk about the effects of introducing crack cocaine into the black community to describe the creation of violent street gangs....but they rarely talk about corporate greed in the issue. Businesses moved factories overseas....closing off the possibilities for many high school graduates to make a decent living. This had a huge impact on the black community. At the same time, mainly due to economic reasons in Central America, poor migrants were moving into California both legally and illegally and taking up all the service industry jobs. The black community of California saw no real possibility of a future in college like white people did (for obvious reasons) and had no service industry jobs to fall back on.....then along came crack cocaine and the rest is a very violent history that many places never fully recovered from.

The lie that illegal immigrants improve the economy only holds up if we only view corporate gains. At every other level...it's a preposterous idea. The same people saying it are those complaining about how difficult it is to support yourself as a college graduate who speaks English and lives with their parents. If they genuinely believe someone who got here yesterday, is maybe literate in their language, speaks no English, and boasts a 6th grade education is somehow, someway, a boon to the economy is just repeating the propaganda he learned to repeat.

Obama agrees with me.

https://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2011/05/10/136183061/obama-makes-economic-argument-to-americans-for-immigration-overhaul

Bernie Sanders agrees with the basic premise....

Why Conservatives Praise Bernie Sanders on Immigration

He's gotten support from some unlikely quarters.

www.google.com

Though you'll see that both disagree with me on the solution. They wanted to legalize illegals here....and keep new ones out. Obama deported a record number of illegals.

They think that by making them legal, and harder to exploit for cheap labor, their taxes are redistributed to the services they draw from.

Well, when's the last time you saw the federal government wildly increase services to the public. It would minimize the impact at the local level...assuming they could still find legal jobs. The problem is it does nothing to reduce demand on goods and services. Those prices continue to increase. It doesn't improve wages...legalizing illegals simply drives demand for more illegal labor....and you have the same problem in 5 years.

 

[Ana the Ist]

Sorry, no. Turns out that immigrants add billions annually to state economies.

Then how come cities like New York, currently flush with illegals, are desperate for aid?

Just tell the mayor that the people sleeping in the shelters he built, in the airports and police stations, will add billions of dollars to his economy any day now. After all, they don't have much education and can't speak English but nobody needs those to get ahead.

Who do you imagine you're kidding?

Data from 2006 Comptroller Study

Former Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn performed a study of the impact of illegal immigration in 2006. According to the Texas Tribune, The results

www.texasmonthly.com

That conventional wisdom is wrong.

Uh...your article didn't cite any research.

Comes down to evidence. You lose.

Your evidence didn't cite any evidence. It cited some cherry picked study that claimed illegals in Georgia drove up wages less than half a percent. Nobody but you thinks that applies to everywhere, across the board, at all times. It also failed to account for the increase in price of goods and services...focusing only on wages.

Yeah, we've heard that, "they are lying; they are all LYING!" Nice try.
Dec 8, 2006
AUSTIN — Illegal immigrants have boosted the state's economy by $17.7 billion and haven't been a drain on state government — but they did cost local governments $929 million in 2005, the Comptroller's Office reported Thursday.

Texas tallies costs, benefits of illegal immigrants​

Illegal immigrants have boosted the state's economy by $17.7 billion and haven't been a...

www.chron.com


Unfortunately, he didn't provide data for his claim. I think I know why...

Your comptroller didn't provide any evidence either....and your article made contradicting claims.

You've yet to provide even a stitch of evidence for your beliefs.

And let's be honest. If you believed that people just needed was a strong work ethic to pull yourself up by the bootstraps in this country....you'd be a conservative. You don't believe that.

That's why you aren't fooling me or anyone else. Your own beliefs contradict each other.

I pointed this out in another thread on what's pulling the nation apart. The left believes people need help frequently, a good education, and often new opportunities and unions to thrive in this nation.

However, this logic goes out the window for the barely educated people who can't speak or read English flooding across the border by the millions. Net negative? No...net positive. They're basically cash machines.

Well since anyone, literally anyone can make it despite not having any skills or education I guess we don't need to forgive those student loans, right? We don't need to increase food stamps and other welfare benefits. We can just drop those entirely, right?

Just stop...it's embarrassing to watch.

The article offers data links. I notice you don't. I think I know why.

I clicked on the link...it doesn't link to research. Just a page of articles about that comptroller lol. Read your own article next time.

It's unquestionable that they increased the economy of Texas by about $17 billion dollars in one year, according to a republican comptroller. No point in denying the fact. Texas keeps data like that.

Again, no data. Are you embarrassed? I'm starting to feel bad for you. Nobody ever goes to such repeated lengths to prove they didn't even glance at the "evidence" they cited.

Try and remember in the future, I actually look. I know many people don't...but I do. If it doesn't say what you think it does...I'll point it out. If it doesn't actually provide evidence, I'll let you know.

If you continue to insist it does...I'll post the link here in the thread so everyone knows not to trust you.

He's talking about immigrants, period. You need to read more carefully.

Well that's different from illegals and entirely invalid. Nobody is arguing about legal immigration.

Supply and demand. This could help you:
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskEconomics/comments/pdt5nh

Thanks for admitting the point I've been making. Increase the supply of labor, and wages decrease. Increase the demand of goods and services, prices increase.

Are we done now?

You'd see lower pay for most workers. Learn about it here:
Model results suggested that wages would rise for U.S.-born and other permanent resident workers, relative to the base forecast, in some lower paying occupations where unauthorized workers are common, decrease slightly in many higher paying occupations, and decrease on average. Several factors accounted for the slight decrease in earnings. First, the decrease in the supply of unauthorized labor lead to a long-run relative decrease in production, not just in agriculture but in all sectors of the economy. This, in turn, reduced incomes to many complementary factors of production, including U.S.-born and foreign-born, permanent resident workers in higher paying occupations. Second, with the departure of so many unauthorized workers, the occupational distribution of U.S.-born and other permanent resident workers necessarily shifted in the direction of more hired farm work and other lower paying occupations, such as food service, child care, and housekeeping, and away from higher paying occupations which is a much larger category. The effect of this compositional change was to reduce the average real wage for U.S.-born and foreign-born, permanent resident workers in all sectors of the economy, even as real wages in many lower paying occupations rose.

What if all illegal immigrants were deported?

www.econ.iastate.edu

I have no doubt that when companies lose illegal labor...production decreases. After all....any market that loses labor loses production. The result of this over any significant length of time....is an increase in pay and benefits for workers in order to draw them back into the labor pool.

Do a little reading, and this won't be such a difficult thing for you to understand.

I'm the only one here doing any reading. You've proven it twice in this post alone.