Immigration is a benefit, but illegal immigration is pretty much just a sink for the economy. None of the illegal immigrants pay taxes, a lot of their money goes back to Mexico in order to support their families so nobody in America ever sees it again, and, if they're jobless, they receive welfare payments which is just another huge cost for a country that technically isn't theirs. I think there should at least be a law that gives immigrants temporary citizenship for 8 years until they are able to be naturalized where they must pay extra tax that they would otherwise be able to avoid if they were legal.
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Alabama's new immigration laws
- Thread starter FlareBlitz
- Start date
What America needs is a fence. 20 feet high. With barbed wire.
Electrified.
Electrified.
Well if their parents get deported for being found to be illegal immigrants, it's not like the kids can live on their own and keep studying in the US, no?
The cartel runs tunnels under the border. They'd probably help immigrants get to America for a fee.
They already do that, except the price is for the immigrants to basically run drugs to their suppliers in the states. Restrict immigration even more and the "price" just goes higher, and the immigrants who do manage to get in will have been heavily involved with criminal elements. That's not something we really want...
i think it's far too invasive for what it's worth, the consequences speak for themselves; children having to drop out for the sake of their parents, amongst other things.
also this: http://reason.org/news/show/122411.html
was a very interesting read! the fact that they're being withheld from receiving any sort of aid even acts of charity is ridiculous (even more ridiculous is that people are being penalized for doing so; a charitable act being penalized under non-morally discriminatory parameters!)
anyway, i think these laws are a breach of basic privacy rights that should be afforded to all people, not just citizens of the U.S, and i'm really not surprised it's alabama.
also this: http://reason.org/news/show/122411.html
was a very interesting read! the fact that they're being withheld from receiving any sort of aid even acts of charity is ridiculous (even more ridiculous is that people are being penalized for doing so; a charitable act being penalized under non-morally discriminatory parameters!)
anyway, i think these laws are a breach of basic privacy rights that should be afforded to all people, not just citizens of the U.S, and i'm really not surprised it's alabama.
THE_IRON_...KENYAN?
Banned deucer.
he said immigrate not inbreed
There are probably a few homeless people hoping for such great a deal. They might sometimes gladly do your dishes for a place to sleep and food to eat. Surely, this might end up costing a few pennies but I'm certain you couldn't care less and open your doors wide at every sign of poverty you encounter.
Allow me to dream of a world made only of people like you.
Homeless people can get such a great deal at their local homeless shelters and from the government, both of which are much better equipped to serve them than I am.
My inability to financially support every homeless person is irrelevant when Deck's analogy revolved around whether I would be opposed to the principle of someone in need unlawfully trespassing on my property, and I modified the analogy to point out that I wouldn't. The idea is that if there were a person who was legitimately in fear of their life and found themselves on my property, my first inclination would not be to say "damn trespasser", and I don't think any decent person's would be either.
That would be cool, but then no one would have any incorrect views for me to argue with, and that would be pretty tragic.
Thankfully we have at least you as a beacon of reason. The rest we can rightfully simply accuse of moral incompetence.
I'll just say that I dislike the way this thread was presented. Obviously you took a strong standpoint regarding the issue right off the bat but you also presented it as if there was no real debate to have here. 'Here's whats happening', 'here's 10 reasons why this is terrible', 'do you still somehow believe it a good idea'.
Then, later comes an argument supported by a source claiming to be from 'most economists' when all it looked like to me was an article that said 'most economists believe' in it. Besides, that they believe immigration to have a positive effect on this country doesn't necessarily translate in a belief than an open border immigration policy is a good thing. 'Immigration is a good thing' isn't in contradiction with measures to counter illegal immigration.
Quite a few occidental countries need to rely on immigration now to make up for their low birth rare and maintain their economical might but they all seem to have the luxury to hand pick them. Those that come already highly educated, those deemed easily socially adaptable get the nod and the rest simply doesn't because quite frankly, the demand is a lot higher than the offer. There is, I believe, something such as opening the valves too much to the detriment of a country. That is the problem with illegal immigration and some laxing towards it might result in opening quite a huge can of worms. As it becomes easier, it is less a deterrant to bypass the natural immigration process.
I think it's great that you see this as 'poor people seeking a better life, who are we to close our doors on their nose' but I think it's important to wonder if an occidental country would actually be capable to support a massive flow of newcomers through open borders and if it wouldn't end up creating an endless amount of huge ghettos eventually necessarily leading to even more tension between ethnic groups.
You could probably give some guys labotomies and put them in cages in the Colloseum and have debate battles.
Eh, it's almost impossible to accurately assign cause, effect, and intentions in such a detailed fashion. Each case is different, and in real life forces, you can't so easily predict the outcome-- it's hard to be sure whether limiting or freeing immigration better controls drug traffic, and it's not even so simple, since the type of immigrants you get will also be affected by what kind of restrictions you enforce.
essentially, irl is a lot more complicated.
That's because I wanted to avoid having this discussion become susceptible to the overton window. The legislation this topic was about is in fact objectively ridiculous and harmful, but the discussion of immigration reform as a whole is less so. I'm sorry if I conveyed a different impression.
I'm not seeing why those are different. I guess I could have simply linked to an in-depth article on why economists believe this, but the question I was responding to seemed to be more concerned with whether they did so or not.
I don't recall advocating an open border immigration policy, just stating that immigration as a whole is a net benefit, and the immigrants coming here illegally would benefit the economy even more if they were able to do legally.
I would agree that there is such a thing as allowing "too much" immigration, but I think we are very far from that point currently. My opinion is that if the natural immigration process were actually easy and rapid, the vast majority of immigrants would choose that over the substantial risks associated with emigrating here illegally. The only reason they're risking jail and deportation by coming here is because they're risking death by staying over there. We would have much more success dealing with illegal immigration if our legal immigration process were streamlined, instead of instituting draconian laws like this.
It's interesting that you bring this point up, because this was exactly what happened during the late 19th century, when there was mass emigration to this country from Irish-Catholics, Germans, and other ethnicities that really didn't play nice with the local population or with each other. While this did result in the formation of ghettos, as you mentioned, eventually the sons and daughters of these immigrants intermingled and much of those issues disappeared.
I think "social tension will exist" is a poor argument for limiting immigration, as that could be used as an argument against everything from integrating schools to allowing gays in the military. Maybe social tension will exist, but the if ultimate outcome is something we prefer, we shouldn't let that stop us.
This is what I was getting at, actually. Restrictions like the alabama law are simply more likely to result in more immigrants turning towards crime, whereas restrictions that work on incentivizing immigrants towards the legal process (such as the temporary citizenship idea) will have better results.
Given that you're not actually preventing the illegals from getting here and getting jobs in the first place, the optimal solution at first glance would be to make it easier for them to become residents simply because they're already behaving like them, and it just makes it easier to tax them. Expanded tax bases in an economy like the US' at the moment is a good thing.
The easiest way to keep illegal immigrants out is to make the US less appealing than Mexico by ruining the economy and implementing stupid racist laws
gj alabama
gj alabama
