(What’s Left of) Our Economy: Pro-Immigration Labor Shortage Claims Keep Going Up as Real Wages Keep Going Down

Tags

compensation, Employment Cost Index, immigrants, Immigration, inflation, inflation-adjusted wages, Labor Department, labor shortage, productivity, wages, Washington Post, workers, {What's Left of) Our Economy

It’s as if the Open Borders Lobby – both its conservative and liberal wings – has recently decided that it’s really had enough of labor market tightness that’s due to reduced immigration, and that’s also giving so many of America’s workers a long-needed pay raise. So it’s been re-upping the pressure to open the floodgates once again and solve this terrible problem. (See, e.g., here, here, and here.)

As is so often the case, the Open Borders-happy Washington Post editorial board has made the case most succinctly: “[C]ompanies are frantically trying to hire enough workers to keep up with the surge in demand for everything from waffle irons to cars. The nation has more than 11 million job openings and 6 million unemployed.

“This imbalance is giving workers and job seekers tremendous power. Pay is rising at the fastest pace in years….”

Yet this claim is not only profoundly anti-American worker. It’s completely false – at least if you look at the only measures of pay that reveal anything about whether employees are getting ahead or not. And they’re of course the compensation measures adjusted for inflation.

What do they show? Between 2020 and 2021, inflation-adjusted hourly pay for all U.S. workers in the private sector were down by 2.10 percent and for blue-collar workers by 1.52 percent. (As known by RealityChek regulars, the U.S. Labor Department that tracks pay trends for the federal government doesn’t monitor any type of compensation for public sector workers because their wages and salaries and benefits are determined largely by politicians’ decisions, not the forces of supply and demand. As a result, they’re thought to say little about the labor market’s true strengths or weaknesses.)

Do you know when such wages have fallen by that much? Try “never” for the entire workforce (where the Labor Department data go back to 2006), and for blue collar workers, several times during the 1970s, which were a terrible time for the economy overall. (For this group, the official numbers go back to 1964).

But haven’t better benefits compensated? Two Labor Department data sets do measure changes in all forms of compensation. The best known, and the one most closely followed by the Federal Reserve and leading economists everywhere, is the Employment Cost Index (ECI). It covers state and local government (though not federal) employees as well as private sector workers. But there’s no evidence of any inflation-adjusted gains for the nation’s workforce – much less outsized gains – from these statistics either.

From the fourth quarter of 2020 to the fourth quarter of 2021, this index did increase by 4.37 percent for all covered workers (breakouts for white- and blue-collar employees only go up to 2006). Yet during this period, the Labor Department’s inflation measure, the Consumer Price Index, was up 7.42 percent. That’s called “falling behind” in my book.

When business (and government on the state and local levels) starts offering pay that’s rising higher than the inflation rate, then Americans as a whole can start worrying about genuine labor shortages. (And even then, as I’ve written, it would be much better for the economy as a whole if companies responded by boosting their productivity, rather than by agitating for more mass immigation with the aim of driving wages down and of course dodging any incentives to operate more efficiently.) For now, though, it’s obvious that what U.S. business is “frantic” about (to use the Post‘s term) isn’t a shortage of workers. It’s a shortage of cheap workers.

Glad I Didn’t Say That! Border, Shmorder?

Tags

amnesty, Biden administration, Biden border crisis, border, Glad I Didn't Say That!, immigrants, Immigration, Kamala Harris, migrants, Open Borders

“Vice President Kamala Harris pushes back on criticism for not

visiting the US-Mexico border”

– USAToday, June 8, 2021

“Kamala Harris to make first trip to the border as vice president this

week”

– CNN, June 23, 2021

 

(Sources: “Vice President Kamala Harris pushes back on criticism for not visiting the US-Mexico border,” by Rebecca Morin, USAToday, June 8, 2021, https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2021/06/08/kamala-harris-lester-holt-interview-pushes-back-border-criticism/7600802002/ and “Kamala Harris to make first trip to border as vice president this week,” by Jasmine Wright and Priscilla Alvarez, CNN, June 23, 2021, https://edition.cnn.com/2021/06/23/politics/kamala-harris-going-to-the-order/index.html)

 

Im-Politic: Biden’s Latest Americans Last Immigration Policy

Tags

America First, Biden, Border Crisis, border security, Central America, Chobani, cities, corruption, crime, El Salvador, foreign aid, gang violence, governance, Guatemala, Honduras, Im-Politic, immigrants, Immigration, inequality, Kamala Harris, Mastercard, Microsoft, migrants, Northern Triangle, racial economic justice, urban poverty

As known by RealityChek regulars, I’m deeply skeptical that the Biden administration can bring migrant flows from Central America (or similar regions) under control by adequately improving the miserable local conditions that (understandably) drive so much flight northward to begin with. But the first detailed description of this policy that I’ve seen not only ignores all of the intertwined institutional, governance, and cultural obstacles to turning regions like Central America’s Northern Triangle (El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras) into even approximations of success stories. It also casts real doubt on the seriousness of the vaunted domestic social justice and inequality commitments made both by President Biden and by at least some of the U.S. corporate sector.

As argued by a White House Fact Sheet released yesterday, support for economic development in these long-impoverished, abusively ruled countries will “require more than just the resources of the U.S. government.” Also essential “to support inclusive economic growth in the Northern Triangle” will be the “unique resources and expertise” of the private sector.”

It’s true that only three completely private, profit-seeking American companies have responded so far to the “Call to Action” for business involvement issued by Vice President Kamala Harris, who’s the administration’s designated czarina for dealing immigration-wise with the Northern Triangle. But let’s say lots more get involved.

Why would anyone capable of adult thinking believe that their efforts will succeed? After all, the administration acknowledges that economic success in the region depends on overcoming its “long-standing impediments to investment-led growth.” And it specifies that these obstacles include governments that simultaneously either can’t or won’t carry out their duties in corruption-free ways, and are unable to provide minimal levels of security for their populations against criminal gangs.

Meaning that private businesses will be keen even on setting up the kinds of training and business incubator and internet connectivity programs that predominate in their Northern Triangle plans while threats of violence and extortion remain omnipresent? Maybe they’re planning to cope by hiring massive  private security forces – but such precautions were never mentioned in the Call to Action announcement.

Just as important, here’s another major head-scratcher, especially given the flood of promises over the last year or so from U.S. business circles about promoting racial economic and financial equality. If companies are willing to wade into dangerous environments to educate populations, build or strengthen the infrastructure needed for significant economic progress, and foster new businesses in Central America, why aren’t they focusing their efforts on America’s own inner cities, or at least focusing more tightly on these efforts first? It’s not like their needs aren’t pressing. And although the Northern Triangle countries have actually made some noteworthy progress in fighting violent crime lately, they’re still much more dangerous places than even most of America’s homicide capitals.

Consequently, for companies concerned overall with actual results, it would make far more sense to take an America First approach. Not that Microsoft, Chobani, and Mastercard have ignored their disadvantaged compatriots in practice. But even as their U.S. efforts remain pretty modest (Microsoft, e.g., to date has only launched its digital skills and access improvement program in Atlanta and Texas, and Chobani’s incubator program still seems pretty small scale), they’ve decided to head south of the border(s).

Incidentally, the entire Biden Central America and overall immigration policies are vulnerable to a similar criticism. Since however difficult it’s going to be to spur racial and other economic and social progress at home, the challenge will be far more difficult in foreign countries, a President truly committed both to these vital domestic goals and to staunching migrant flows would focus focus his economic development programs on his own country, and deal with the migrants as an immigration issue – by securing the border. Unfortunately for Americans, Joe Biden has been anything but that President.

(What’s Left of) Our Economy: Is More Immigration Really the Key to America’s Tech Future?

Tags

Cato Institute, China, education, entrepreneurs, Germany, H-1B visa, immigrants, Immigration, India, innovation, Israel, Japan, skills, South Korea, start-ups, Taiwan, technology, Washington Post, Worldometers.info, {What's Left of) Our Economy

One of the most compelling – and most often made – arguments in favor of higher U.S. legal immigration levels has to do with innovation. Supposedly, without encouraging ever more foreign workers to move to America, the nation will never be able to maintain its global technology leadership, and ultimately an acceptable, much less improved, degree of prosperity. (See, e.g., here and here.)

Part of the rationale for a welcoming posture, as indicated above, has to do with policies toward highly skilled and educated immigrants in particular (like those admitted under the H-1B program), and the special visa quotas allotted to them. But as the Washington Post editorial board recently made clear, there’s a more general view that immigration is especially good at providing America with “a steady supply of working-age strivers” and that “This nation’s prosperity, pluck, ambition and effervescent character are the products of more than 100 million immigrants who have sought better lives in the United States since its founding.” In other words, immigrants are far more likely than the native-born population to possess the risk-taking and general entrepreneurial traits that lead to so much technological progress.

I’ve already debunked one aspect of these claims here, but because they keep popping up, I keep thinking more about them, and have come across more data that not only casts further doubt on the technology-related need for more immigrants, but that indicate that the immigration cheerleaders are putting the cart before the horse.

For instance, it’s widely agreed that the U.S. tech sector is considerably healthier than Germany’s. In this vein, a widely followed global innovation index issued each year by a United Nations agency ranks the former third in the world and the latter ninth. Ninth isn’t so bad, but it’s at the least curious in this regard that for decades at least, Germany has admitted many more immigrants as a share of total population than has the United States.

Indeed, in 1990 (a good starting point, since current Germany came into being with the reunification that year of the former Federal Republic that comprised the nation’s western part and the former Communist run east), Germany’s immigrant inflow of 1.256 million represented 1.59 percent of the new country’s 79.054 million inhabitants. The 1.536 million green cards awarded by the United States that year accounted for only 0.60 percent of its 252.120 million people. (My official sources for German and U.S. annual immigration totals are here and here, respectively. For population, I used the reliable Worldometers.info website.)

But maybe Germany has made up some ground on the United States during this nearly three-decade period? Not according to this study last year from the Cato Institute – one of America’s foremost supporters of much more lenient U.S. immigration policies. If you look at Figure 2, you see that in 2018, Germany was lagging the United States just about as badly in the number of patents it received in the United States (still the world’s most important market for technology) as it was in 1990.

There doesn’t seem to be much evidence that its relatively large immigration inflows have given Germany much of an edge in entrepreneurship, either. As of 2019, according to this source, Germany’s business start-up rate was less than half that of the United States.

This chart, moreover, makes clear that it’s not just the U.S.-Germany comparison that mucks up the ostensible relationship between tech prowess and entrepreneurship on the one hand, and immigration levels on the other. After all, in 2019, India’s start-up rate was also much higher than Germany’s – even though India is much better known for sending folks abroad than for attracting them. Foreigners aren’t exactly flocking to live in China, either, yet its start-up rate matches Germany’s.

That Cato Institute study provides more complicating international comparisons. That Figure 2 shows that as of 2018, Israel has forged into the lead as the country receiving the largest number of U.S. patents. And its performance started taking off in the mid-1990s. Yet in 1995, when Germany and Israel were roughly on a par in their ability to receive American patents, the 76,361 immigrants Israel admitted in 1995 equalled 1.36 percent of its population of 5.619 million – not far from relatively un-innovative Germany’s figures. By the time it became the international leader, Israel’s immigration rate had fallen to 0.32 percent of its 8.972 million population – much lower than that of Germany, which had become a clear als-ran on the U.S. patent scene – and roughly the same as the recent U.S. rate which has been decried as so woefully inadequate.

And look at the other top performers in Figure 2 other than the United States and Israel. Taiwan hasn’t been anything close to an immigration magnet, either, and ditto for South Korea. As for Japan, it’s long been known as one of the most xenophobic countries in the world (as noted in that Washington Post editorial).

What do the non-U.S. “patent tigers” identified by Cato have in common? As author Jonathan M. Barnett puts it:

“Short on consumers, resources, and labor (and saddled with geographic separation from key consumer markets), the patent tigers (especially Israel and Taiwan) were compelled to specialize in innovation-intensive segments of the global supply chain in which ingenuity, rather than labor or natural resources, conferred a competitive advantage.”

As a result, as widely agreed, they’ve worked hard to create top-notch educational systems for their own populations. German education is highly regarded, too, but it’s often observed that its history and culture in particular have discouraged self-starters.

The lessons for the United States seem pretty clear here.  On the one hand, it’s got lots of the overall population, raw materials and domestic markets that the patent tigers lack.  On the other, unlike Germany, it still enjoys an entrepreneur- and innovation-friendly culture.  If Americans did a much better job of educating their own people, especially in the math, science, and technology fields, they should be able to keep its global technology edge even while controlling immigration more tightly. 

If, however, the nation continues to coddle underperforming school systems, especially at the primary and secondary levels, the argument for relying on immigration to fill the tech gap will look all the stronger.  And in a supreme irony, the ready availability of highly skilled and educated immigrants will keep reducing national incentives to get the national education act together.      

Those Stubborn Facts: Immigration Excuse-Making for California

Tags

Associated Press, Barack Obama, California, Donald Trump, green card holders, green cards, immigrants, Immigration, legal immigration, Mainstream Media, MSM, Those Stubborn Facts

California’s “immigration decline has been particularly fast in the past half decade as President Donald Trump’s administration sharply reduced the number of people legally entering the United States.”

– Associated Press, April 24, 2021

 

Average annual grants of legal permanent U.S. resident status to

immigrants, Trump years: 1,085,181

 

Average annual grants of legal permanent U.S. resident status to

immigrants, second Obama term: 1,060,402

 

(Sources: “Awaiting census count, California ponders slow growth future,” by Kathleen Ronayne, Associated Press, April 24, 2021, Awaiting census count, California ponders slow growth future (apnews.com) & “Table 1. Persons Obtaining Lawful Permanent Resident Status: Fiscal Years 1820 to 2019,” Yearbook 2019, Yearbook of Immigration Statistics, Immigration Data and Statistics, Department of Homeland Security, Table 1. Persons Obtaining Lawful Permanent Resident Status: Fiscal Years 1820 to 2019 | Homeland Security (dhs.gov))

Im-Politic: Can Biden Really Solve the “Root Causes” Behind His Border Crisis?

Tags

Biden, Border Crisis, border security, CAFTA, Central America, Central America Free Trade Agreement, Colbert I. King, Cold War, Donald Trump, El Salvador, foreign aid, George W. Bush, globalism, Guatemala, Honduras, Im-Politic, immigrants, Immigration, Jorge Castaneda, Kamala Harris, Lawence E. Harrison, migrants, Northern Triangle, race to the bottom, Trade, Washington Post

One of the time-honored practices – and myths – behind globalist U.S. foreign policies has been its faith that turmoil in various parts of the world that allegedly threatens American interests can be either eliminated or reduced to manageable levels with enough foreign aid. The idea is that such assistance will address the social and economic problems thought to be mainly to blame for the instability. So it’s no surprise that the globalist Biden administration has decided that aid programs are the keys to bringing immigration from Central America under control – though not of course right away.

As stated by Vice President Kamala Harris upon being tasked by President Biden to oversee U.S. effort to turn the counties of the region’s “Northern Triangle” into places whose populations won’t be determined to leave, the United States “must address the root causes that cause people to make the trek” northward.

That’s why I sure hope she reads Colbert I. King’s column in Tuesday’s Washington Post before she rolls up her sleeves too far. For as the author notes, the Biden administration plan to turn the Northern Triangle countries (El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras) from clearly failed states into (reasonable) success stories isn’t exactly new in its essentials.

And especially in recent years, when conditions in the region ostensibly worsened dramatically, and therefore fueled especially big migrants flows, there’s been no shortage of U.S. aid, especially considering the tiny size of the three economies.

As King details,

“Congress appropriated more than $3.6 billion to fund a Strategy for Engagement in Central America program between 2016 and 2021. The money was supposed to strengthen rule of law, improve the administration of justice, promote economic prosperity, prevent violence and combat gangs, and empower youth and women.

“>In fiscal 2021 alone, U.S. funding amounted to $505.9 million.

“>Between 2013 and 2018, The U.S. Agriculture Department allocated $407 million to Central America to provide school meals, nutritional programs for women, infants and children, and to train and provide technical assistance to improve agricultural productivity.

“>The Obama administration asked for money to help the region in fiscal 2016, and Congress appropriated $750 million, requiring the countries to improve border security, combat corruption and address human rights concerns.”

Then the author – properly – proceeds to ask “What happened to it all?” And what can the Biden administration do to make sure that the $4 billion it plans to spend in the region will work any better if Congress approves this sum?

Moreover, the case against more Central America aid as a Border Crisis game changer is actually stronger than King describes. Because Washington has not only been pouring money into the region for decades. It’s also granted these three Central American countries (and their regional neighbors) tariff cuts and other trade-related assistance aimed at enabling them to export their way to prosperity.

Indeed, as then President George W. Bush declared while lobbying for passage of the Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) – which was eventually expanded to include the Dominican Republic,

“People have got to understand that by promoting policy that will help generate wealth in Central America, we’re promoting policy that will mean someone is less–more likely to stay at home to find a job. If you’re concerned about immigration to this country, then you must understand that CAFTA and the benefits of CAFTA will help create new opportunity in Central American countries, which will mean someone will be able to find good work at home, somebody will be able to provide for their family at home, as opposed to having to make the long trip to the United States. CAFTA is good immigration policy as well as good trade policy.”

Critics can reasonably argue that these U.S. programs failed to achieve their immigration aims because they were poorly designed. On the aid front, it’s true that too much of the assistance provided by the United States during the Cold War was military or other security assistance that largely helped corrupt governments repress their own people – and fight rebels labeled as tools of the Soviet Union and Cuba.

When it comes to trade, globalist U.S. Presidents did Central America no favors, either. For CAFTA simply plunged the region into a frantic race to the bottom in wages and worker safety that had been sparked by the decision to free up trade indiscriminately with all the very low-income countries (including China, India, and Bangladesh) that also produced the apparel products that have represented Central America’s best hope for prospering via globalization.

At the same time, significant U.S. assistance for Central America continued after the Cold War’s end, and more was targeted at economic development. And the Biden administration has said nothing about U.S. trade policy reforms that actually would give the Northern Triangle – or the rest of Central America for that matter, or Mexico – major legs up on non-Western Hemisphere competitors.

All of which could support the conclusion that no amount of aid or trade breaks can make Central America successful. A globalist administration will be particularly loathe to accept this admittedly depressing proposition, but there’s abundant evidence in its favor. The work of development economist Lawrence E. Harrison, to cite one leading example, has compellingly argued that some counties – and entire regions – simply don’t have what it takes to achieve economic success because of the cultures they’ve evolved.

At the same time, as my friend – and noted political scientist and former Mexican Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda – has argued, the Central American economies are so small that enough smartly spent U.S. money might be able to overcome even these deep-rooted obstacles.

I can’t say that I know the answer. But the analyses of King, Harrison, and Castaneda all point to the overarching conclusion that the kind of business-as-usual version of the address-the-root-causes of Central America’s failings being contemplated by the Biden administration can’t possibly stem the migrant flow. Moreover, until genuinely promising plans are developed, there will be no substitute for re-securing the border by reinstating the type of Trump-ian controls that minimize the strength of the U.S. magnets that influence migrant flows as surely as the problems of sending countries.

 

Im-Politic: An Open Borders Mainstay Shoots His Cause in the Foot

Tags

Biden administration, Border Crisis, Central America, Donald Trump, drug cartels, Emma Lazarus, human trafficking, Im-Politic, immigrants, Immigration, Jorge Ramos, Latin America, Mexico, migrants, Open Borders, sovereignty, Statue of Liberty, The New York Times, Univision

The current crisis on the U.S.’ southern border is President Biden’s fault. His predecessors’ immigration policies were working. The new administration’s reliance on stemming the migrants’ tide by Building Back Better in Central America won’t work for the foreseeable future, if at all. When folks like Mr. Biden talk about “fixing a broken system,” they really mean reorienting that system to maximize immigration. And – most damning of all – bolstering America’s well-being and security shouldn’t be the main aims of U.S. immigration policy.

Don’t take my word for it. Take that of Jorge Ramos. Because these dangerously radical and indeed – in one instance, un-American – points were exactly what the Univision anchor and long-time supporter of Open Borders by Any Other Name just admitted openly in a column in last Friday’s New York Times.

On responsibility for the current border crisis? According to Ramos:

“‘The border is not open,’ the U.S. secretary of homeland security, Alejandro Mayorkas, told me in an interview. ‘What we have discontinued,’ Mr. Mayorkas promised, ‘is the cruelty of the previous administration.’”

“Well, apparently, in Central America, people only heard the bit about ‘cruelty’ being over, which is why so many migrants are heading north toward the border. Tens of thousands of asylum seekers, mostly from Central America, have waited for over a year in Mexican border towns and they will not waste this opportunity.”

Don’t think for a minute, incidentally, that the small Central American countries will be the only sending countries – even in the Western Hemisphere. The polling organization Gallup has recently determined that no fewer than 42 million Latin Americans want to move to the United States permanently. And as Ramos makes clear, no one should be startled in the least:

“It should come as no surprise that this [migration flow] is happening along a border that divides one of the richest and most powerful countries in the world from one of its most economically unequal regions. Latin America’s poor and vulnerable — struggling amid a pandemic, the devastation of climate change and the violence of their homelands — are moving north to a safer, more prosperous place. It’s that simple. And this will keep happening for a long time.”

On the effectiveness of President Trump’s policies, Ramos writes that they “reduced annual net immigration to its lowest levels since the 1980s.” It’s true that he denounces them as “racist,” “anti-immigrant,” “inhuman,” and “repressive.”

But as long as he’s being so candid, he and others of his ilk need to ask “compared to what?” As Ramos himself reports,

“According to the head of the U.S. Northern Command, 30 percent to 35 percent of [Mexico] is under the control of ‘transnational criminal organizations.’ This means that any migrants traveling north through Mexico are in immediate danger.”

Indeed, the present U.S. immigration system is now “a dangerous system that encourages human trafficking controlled by drug cartels and other organized crime networks.”

What should U.S. immigration policy aim for? What could be clearer than Ramos’ answer that it “must involve accepting many more authorized immigrants”?

Or than Washington must “create a system that can legally, efficiently and safely absorb more of these immigrants and refugees. They will keep coming; there is no other solution”?

Or than “[T]he United States should start accepting between one and a half and two million authorized immigrants every year. Entry into the United States must be legalized and optimized….”? (At the same time, given the powerful forces Ramos describes as fueling continuing hemispheric migration to the United States, what makes him think that such a U.S. quota would prevent much greater migrant flows from continuing to come to America’s doorstep?)

Nor does Ramos evidently think much of the near-term potential of turning Central America into the kind of place people wouldn’t seek to flee in the first place:

“The $4 billion investment in Central America that President Biden has promised is a good starting point for tackling the origins of migration in the region: poverty and a lack of opportunity. That project, however, will take years to yield results.”

But the key to understanding Ramos’ position, and possibly those of many other supporters of more lenient U.S. immigration policies, is recognizing that U.S. interests – safeguarding the nation’s security and prosperity – isn’t his top priority.

Thus the author’s argument that “It’s clear that America’s immigration system is broken and outdated” because “it doesn’t reflect the new needs of the United States or its southern neighbors.” And why else would he emphasize that “all along the U.S.-Mexico border, the aspirations of new immigrants are colliding with a country reluctant to revamp its way of welcoming and absorbing newcomers.”

Ramos doesn’t neglect the case that ramping up immigration is in America’s interests, too, focusing in particular on familiar arguments that many more newcomers are needed “to support the nation’s beleaguered economy, replace its growing population of retired workers and make up for the country’s low birthrate.”

Although I and others have repeatedly debunked these claims (see, e.g., here and here), they’re entirely legitimate to debate. So is the insistence that America has a moral duty to accept more of the world’s tired, poor, and huddled masses yearning to breathe free – to paraphrase the (justly) famous Emma Lazarus poem at the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty.

But the judgment about the economic impact of greater immigration flows, and about the country’s moral obligations, must be made by Americans alone. Otherwise, kiss goodbye the country’s sovereignty and independence. Ramos’ suggestion to the contrary should go far toward intellectually (though not legally!) disqualifying him from the American immigration policy debate.

Except he’s did such a great job in this Times column of unwittingly confirming some of the strongest indictments of lax immigration policies and the worst fears of border realists about the agendas of their backers. In fact, to paraphrase a classical Greek general’s reported lament after a costly victory, another such column (or a couple), and the Open Borders cause may be undone.

(What’s Left of) Our Economy: An Open Borders Mainstay Gets (Kind of) Woke on Immigration

Tags

amnesty, automation, illegal aliens, immigrants, Immigration, Open Borders, productivity, technology, The Economist, wages, {What's Left of) Our Economy

I’ve always felt that one of the most convincing ways to win an argument is to  spotlight instances of sources that normally oppose one’s positions actually agreeing with them. And I just stumbled onto an especially startling example that appeared about a year ago in the The Economist.

It’s often valid to view such dated material as old and therefore irrelevant news. But in this case, The Economist‘s February, 2020 feature titled “Immigration to America is down. Wages are up. Are the two related?” really is a landmark still worth examining, and for at least three reasons.

First, if there’s a single set of policies identified with this British magazine it’s staunch support for free trade. In fact, The Economist was founded in the mid-19^th century precisely to convince the United Kingdom to dismantle its longstanding tariffs. Not surprisingly, the magazine has also always backed the freest possible immigration flows.

Second, February, 2020 was just before the CCP Virus and the massive economic shutdowns it triggered swept over the United States. So The Economist was commenting on trends when the economy was normal by most definitions, and after three years of Donald Trump’s presidency.

And third, of course, even though a substantial return to a pre-virus normal economic normality is now widely expected sometime this year (whether or not President Biden’s virus relief bill and other “Build Back Better” programs are fully enacted or not), the new U.S. administration clearly is determined to turn the immigration spigots back on.

So it really was pretty startling to come across an Economist article leading off with this paragraph:

“In both 2018 and 2019 [U.S.] nominal wages rose by more than 3%, the fastest growth since before the recession a decade ago. Americans at the bottom of the labour market are doing especially well. In the past year the wages of those without a high-school diploma have risen by nearly 10%. Intriguingly, this has come as America has turned considerably less friendly to immigrants, who are assumed by many to steal jobs from natives and lower the wages of less-educated folk. The two phenomena may be connected….”

Moreover, in recent years, “It appears instead that the overall decline in the foreign-born population is a result of falling numbers of low-skilled migrants…. That is probably a consequence of policies implemented by President Donald Trump, as well as the off-putting effects of his rhetoric on foreigners.”

Not that The Economist endorsed this proposition wholeheartedly. The article correctly notes that “many factors” lie behind these wage increases. Indeed, that’s true for most trends in the economy and elsewhere in our big, complicated world. But it turns out that most of the reasons for skepticism about immigration policy’s decisive role cited in the piece are pretty flimsy when examined closely.

For example, minimum wage increases – and their benefits – have by definition been enjoyed exclusively by lower-income workers overall in the United States. But the magazine also has found that average wages in occupations that are especially low-skill-immigrant-heavy (e.g., construction and landscaping work) “are rising considerably faster than wages in other low-paid jobs.”

In addition, The Economist cites findings from the Brookings Institution (hardly a restrictionist organization itself) that “five big metro areas saw absolute declines in their foreign-born populations in 2010-18” and its own research showing that “wages in those areas are now rising by 5% a year….”

Perhaps most important, the magazine’s initial conclusion about the connection between fewer low-skilled immigrants and higher wages for the established national low-skill workforce is qualified with the phrase “but only for a while.”

In this vein, The Economist points to research allegedly demonstrating that during and after past “occasions when America has clamped down on immigration,” the results “ultimately [offered] little benefit to native workers—and may even harm them.” Yet some of these historical episodes – e.g., the freeze and follow-on restrictions on immigration from China that began in the late-19^th century, and expulsions of Mexican workers during the Great Depression of the 1930s – seem  marginally relevant at best to the U.S. economy today.

Even odder, the overarching lesson drawn by The Economist from this and related studies supports a claim made by current-day restrictionists (like me) that wide-open immigration policies retard productivity growth by enabling many industries to use cheap labor as an earnings- and profit-making or boosting crutch, rather than innovate their way to greater success.

According to The Economist, “In the short term, native workers may well see a wage boost as labour supply falls. But businesses then reorient production towards less labour-intensive products; natives take jobs previously occupied by foreign-born folk, which may be worse paid; and bosses invest in labour-saving machinery, which can reduce the pay of remaining workers.”

Yet logically, anyone supporting this position logically must also think that improving productivity and promoting technological progress doesn’t ultimately benefit entire economies – including workers initially displaced. Is The Economist really supporting such stick-in-the-mud-ism?

The answer, strangely, as readers learn in the very next paragraph, is “Of course not.” Because the article proceeds to claim that “Both low- and high-skilled migration are linked with higher productivity.” In other words, higher productivity is a long-run economic blessing after all, and it’s improved both by reducing and increasing low-skill immigration. Got that?

Of course, change at a single magazine, no matter how influential, is no guarantee of policy change.  But such publications aren’t often called opinion leaders for nothing.  And although rhetorically, the Biden administration seems as set as ever to supercharge U.S. immigration flows, maybe it’s no coincidence that its recent  stance on the southern border looks every bit as confused as this Economist take on immigration.       

Im-Politic: For Biden, It’s Americans Last on Migrants and the Virus

Tags

asylum seekers, Biden, CBP, CCP Virus, coronavirus, COVID 19, detention, Donald Trump, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, ICE, Im-Politic, immigrants, Immigration, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Journal of the American Medical Association, lockdowns, Mexico, migrants, Remain in Mexico, stay-at-home, testing, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol, Worldometers.info, Wuhan virus

Some of you might have heard and been concerned about reports that President Biden’s new policies will result in migrants caught by U.S. border authorities being released into the United States without being tested for the CCP Virus. If you knew how much potential for superspread these policies hold, you’d be even more concerned.

Under President Trump, the problem appeared under control because Washington ended the policy of processing migrants who crossed the southern border illegally and then releasing them into the United States to await future hearings on their requests for permanent residency. Instead, apprehended migrants claiming to be asylum seekers, were returned to Mexico (whatever their nationality) until their cases could be brought up. And last March, these policies were extended to all would-be border crossers due to pandemic concerns.

Yet due at least partly to the Biden administration’s immigration-welcoming statements and actions (including during the campaign), migrant flows northward have surged, and current U.S. detention centers have been filling to overflowing despite American court orders preventing them from holding detainees for more than 72 hours in certain facilities in Texas. Worsening the situation has been Mexico’s new refusal in some instances to accept migrants expelled from U.S. territory. (See here for details.) And the new U.S. President seems determined to facilitate immigration inflows generally.

Therefore, the U.S. Customs and Border Enforcement (CBP) agency publicly acknowledged last week that “some migrants will be processed for removal, provided a Notice to Appear, and released into the U.S. to await a future immigration hearing.” Crucially, this practice is proceeding even though CBP doesn’t test arrivals for the CCP Virus unless symptoms are visible. (See the previously linked article for the statement.) 

Which is where the public health threat comes in. Because data from the virus has seemed to be unusually prevalent among these migrants. To begin with, although figures only go through August, a paper published by the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) found that the monthly rate of cases in detention centers was more than 13 times that for the U.S. population as a whole.

Although the JAMA authors wrote that increased testing at the centers only partly explains these high numbers, it also points out that they may also stem from “challenges faced implementing the Pandemic Response Requirements” – like overcrowding. At the same time, they confirm that because asymptomatic detainee testing has been “limited,” even these case numbers could be underestimates. And since migrants tend to be relatively young, asymptomatic cases are surely more common than among legal U.S. residents generally.

The total number of virus cases found among migrants in the detention centers since February has been small – just over 9,300. But the real measure of the danger comes from the incidence of the CCP Virus in the migrants’ main native countries – which look to be sources of large and ever greater greater supply going forward.

Yes, their overall case rates are much lower than their U.S. counterparts, as these data from the Worldometers.info website show:

cases per million

U.S.:                  83,687

Mexico:            14,920

Guatemala:         9,052

Honduras:         15,573

El Salvador:        8,708

One big reason, however, is that they’ve done so little testing, as these numbers from the same source make clear:

tests per million

U.S.:               984,900

Mexico:            37,781

Guatemala:      45,624

Honduras:        39,569

El Salvador:   110,338

Given the immense virus-related uncertainties revealed by these statistics, any measures that increase the numbers of untested migrants in the United States are simply incomprehensible for any government taking seriously the obligation to protect its own population. And given the tight controls already restricting individual, group, and business activities in the United States, these Biden decisions seem even less defensible.

It’s one thing for the new President to reject an America First framework for public policy. It’s quite another to adopt positions that merit the bizarre and perverse label “Americans Last.”

Glad I Didn’t Say That! Mass Medical Immigration Urged on Eve of Glutted Medical Job Market

Tags

CCP Virus, coronavirus, COVID 19, doctors, emergency rooms, Glad I Didn't Say That!, healthcare, immigrants, Immigration, Jobs, labor market, physicians, residents, Wuhan virus

“Removing Barriers for Immigrant Medical Professionals Is Critical

To Help Fight Coronavirus”

– Center for American Progress, April 2, 2020

 

Many “emergency medicine physicians — young doctors, called

residents, who are training in this specialty — are struggling to find

full-time employment, even while they work on the front lines

treating covid-19 patients.”

– The Washington Post, January 4, 2021

 

(Sources: “Removing Barriers for Immigrant Medical Professionals Is Critical To Help Fight Coronavirus,” by Silva Mathema, Center for American Progress, April 2, 2020, https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/immigration/news/2020/04/02/482574/removing-barriers-immigrant-medical-professionals-critical-help-fight-coronavirus/ & “Young ER doctors risk their lives on the pandemic’s front lines. But they struggle to find jobs,” by Ben Guarino, The Washington Post, January 4, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/01/04/er-doctors-covid-jobs/)