Hi -- New here.

[Jack]

Poor sock. Will nobody rise up like a knight in whining armor to defend the delicate "damsel?"

Uh, Legina. She has stood there and taken your inane shit for how long now? I'm surprised she's still HERE. I'm in utter disbelief that anyone would bother to spend (waste) this much time on your rhetorical verbage?

[Legion]

Uh, Legina. She has stood there and taken your inane shit for how long now? I'm surprised she's still HERE. I'm in utter disbelief that anyone would bother to spend (waste) this much time on your rhetorical verbage?

What "inane shit" is that, dear Jack?

[Legion]

I didn't miss the little dig, I will give her a chance to prove she is either being sincere or a typical hysterical liberal bending which way the wind blows.

Sock has already done so, Grumps.

Sock favors open borders unless the immigrants in question cut into "her" supposed employment opportunities.

[Legion]

Well, Legion asked the question, I responded to that without answering it, and then you responded to what I'd posted by asking why I hadn't answered your question. That appeared to indicate that you were identifying Legion's question as having come from you. I assumed your confusion was because you were two log-ins for the same user. Is that not right?

You assumed, sock.

[Legion]

I think the short- and medium-term problem is a big enough consideration that we'd do well to focus on it first. We are going to have waaaay too few working-age residents per retiree for the next quarter century. So, we should deal with that.

You have a "final solution", don't you sock? The one you advocated for lowering the infant mortality rate, wasn't it, sock?

[Oneuli]

Cite the relevant statistics that prove that during "the Clinton era immigration rates were far higher than today

https://foleyheather72.files.wordpre...14/04/fig1.jpg

and yet job creation kept pace and unemployment dropped below 4%," sock.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/UNRATE

Then identify which of BJ Clinton's specific actions improved the pace of the job creation you mentioned

It was a whole suite of policies, small and large, that boosted job creation. Clinton pushed through NAFTA ratification and the WTO round of the GATT, he pushed through Americorps and the Brady Bill, both of which helped to reverse the decline in urban economic centers that had happened during the Reagan/Bush disaster, he staffed his economic positions with highly competent economists, he won the confidence of the bond market by taking a deficit-fighting posture, he prevented us from entering into any economically ruinous Bush-style wars of choice, he bolstered labor protections and pushed for tighter enforcement of overtime rules and safety rules (obviously, it takes more jobs to do the same amount of work if you're not cutting safety corners or forcing workers to work off-book overtime). He also bolstered America's image around the world, such that we didn't suffer as big a hit to exports from a soaring dollar as you'd expect.

So naked self-interest trumps compassion in your subjective personal morality

One of the advantages of my approach is that it's more compassionate, as I'm sure you can see. It would mean that more of the people we allowed to come here would be those who'd most benefit from the change of scene -- people coming from the lower end of the labor market in poor nations, for whom the move to the US would be a move out of crushing poverty (and, for many, a move away from vicious dictatorships, etc.)

Has the famous inscription on the Statue of Liberty been altered in your favor?

No. That's part of the advantage of my preferred policy: it's consistent with our national values, as spelled out in that famous inscription. I'm calling for us to take in more the wretched refuse of teeming shores, rather than skimming the cream of foreign labor markets and leaving them more impoverished.

It appears that you do resent them....

What makes it appear that way to you. I feel no resentment at all. I just think it's better, overall, if we use immigration slots on lower-skill workers than on higher-skill ones, and then focus on up-skilling our own workforce to fill the higher slots.

[Legion]

https://foleyheather72.files.wordpre...14/04/fig1.jpg

An unsourced and unverifiable picture of a graph from a blog, sock? What does that prove, sock? I'll understand if you cannot explain, of course, sock.

It was a whole suite of policies, small and large, that boosted job creation. Clinton pushed through NAFTA ratification and the WTO round of the GATT, he pushed through Americorps and the Brady Bill, both of which helped to reverse the decline in urban economic centers that had happened during the Reagan/Bush disaster, he staffed his economic positions with highly competent economists, he won the confidence of the bond market by taking a deficit-fighting posture, he prevented us from entering into any economically ruinous Bush-style wars of choice, he bolstered labor protections and pushed for tighter enforcement of overtime rules and safety rules (obviously, it takes more jobs to do the same amount of work if you're not cutting safety corners or forcing workers to work off-book overtime). He also bolstered America's image around the world, such that we didn't suffer as big a hit to exports from a soaring dollar as you'd expect.

So you say, sock. Where is your proof? Was I too concise in my request for corroboration of your glib generalities?

One of the advantages of my approach is that it's more compassionate, as I'm sure you can see.

No, sock, I don't see that your approach is compassionate. I see that it would conveniently benefit Y O U while leaving hundreds of millions of others hurting, sock.

No. That's part of the advantage of my preferred policy: it's consistent with our national values, as spelled out in that famous inscription. I'm calling for us to take in more the wretched refuse of teeming shores, rather than skimming the cream of foreign labor markets and leaving them more impoverished.

To the detriment of untold millions of others, but not for yourself, sock.

I feel no resentment at all.

I don't believe you, sock.

I just think it's better, overall, if we use immigration slots on lower-skill workers than on higher-skill ones, and then focus on up-skilling our own workforce to fill the higher slots.

Of course you do, sock, since it's supposedly so self-serving.

[Frank Apisa]

I didn't miss the little dig, I will give her a chance to prove she is either being sincere or a typical hysterical liberal bending which way the wind blows.

There is NOTHING typical in Oneuli, Grumpy. Not in any way, shape, or form.

Get over that shit.

Oneuli is THE most impressive poster I have come across in over two decades of posting in about a dozen different fora.

BY FAR!

Mind you, I do not agree with her focus on the major issue she has dealt with so far, but the way she presents her arguments is awesome. As for her fights with you conservative echo chambers...if they were prize fights, the ref mercifully would have stepped between you and stopped it.

If there were a Nobel category developed for this crap we all love so much...my guess is she would be its first winner.

[Oneuli]

1. When was Clinton President?

Google can be your friend. January 20, 1993 to January 20, 2001.

How many years ago was that?

Your computer or smart phone have calculators that can handle that calculation if math isn't your thing. The Clinton era ended about seventeen and a half years ago.

Robotics and Automation are accelerating geometrically

Are they? Well, then, if that were a driving consideration, we ought to have expected job creation in the Clinton years to have been outpaced by job creation in the Reagan/Bush years. It didn't work out that way, though. The Clinton-era job creation was much more rapid, despite that geometric increase in robotics and automation pressure. I think the key is whether the economy adapts well to create new and better jobs as old ones become obsolete. Lots of old jobs were made obsolete in the Clinton years. Think, for example, of the huge typing pools and secretarial staffs that vanished as office workers moved to networked computers with word processors. Yet more and better jobs were created. We need to focus on how to replicate that success. Maybe some day it will no longer be possible and we'll need to move to some sort of guaranteed income system, but I think we're still not there.

2. "But, in theory, if we let in a bunch of H1B immigrants with my same skill set, who had the benefit of low-cost foreign educations and thus could afford to undercut my price, I'd have a harder time."
Jack: Wow! Congratulations. Can you carry that SAME logic to other Americans being 'replaced' by Foreign Labor?

Yes, the same applies equally to all skilled American workers whose investments in their productivity are being negated by way of importing low-cost foreign competitors with the same skills. As for those who are finding themselves displaced by unskilled foreign labor, though, I have some advice: step up your game. If you're really in a position where someone with nothing but a third-world primary education, limited language skills, and little familiarity with US culture is out-competing you for work, perhaps it's time to take a look at your choices in life. If you're in that position where the only work you can do is mowing lawns or washing dishes, but it's through no fault of your own, due to brain damage or something like that, I'm all for having a generous social safety net to make sure you're taken care of. But if you're in that position because you can't be bothered to invest in educating yourself, or because you refuse to relocate to where the jobs are, then I'm not convinced we should throttle immigration just to protect you from your own bad choices.

Hmmmmm ... odd you don't recognize your Elitist position on this.

I recognize my position on it. If you want to say it's an elitist position, that's fine by me. I subscribe to the notion of "elitism for everyone." I'm all for policies that will put the tools in citizens' hands to up-skill themselves to the point that low-end immigrant competition is simply not a threat to them. That makes the citizens the elite within the country,... or at least the citizens with a little gumption. Is that "elitist"? I suppose so. But I think it's good policy that will result in improved lives for the majority.

[Eagle_Eye]

https://foleyheather72.files.wordpre...14/04/fig1.jpg



https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/UNRATE



It was a whole suite of policies, small and large, that boosted job creation. Clinton pushed through NAFTA ratification and the WTO round of the GATT, he pushed through Americorps and the Brady Bill, both of which helped to reverse the decline in urban economic centers that had happened during the Reagan/Bush disaster, he staffed his economic positions with highly competent economists, he won the confidence of the bond market by taking a deficit-fighting posture, he prevented us from entering into any economically ruinous Bush-style wars of choice, he bolstered labor protections and pushed for tighter enforcement of overtime rules and safety rules (obviously, it takes more jobs to do the same amount of work if you're not cutting safety corners or forcing workers to work off-book overtime). He also bolstered America's image around the world, such that we didn't suffer as big a hit to exports from a soaring dollar as you'd expect.



One of the advantages of my approach is that it's more compassionate, as I'm sure you can see. It would mean that more of the people we allowed to come here would be those who'd most benefit from the change of scene -- people coming from the lower end of the labor market in poor nations, for whom the move to the US would be a move out of crushing poverty (and, for many, a move away from vicious dictatorships, etc.)



No. That's part of the advantage of my preferred policy: it's consistent with our national values, as spelled out in that famous inscription. I'm calling for us to take in more the wretched refuse of teeming shores, rather than skimming the cream of foreign labor markets and leaving them more impoverished.



What makes it appear that way to you. I feel no resentment at all. I just think it's better, overall, if we use immigration slots on lower-skill workers than on higher-skill ones, and then focus on up-skilling our own workforce to fill the higher slots.

Every one of your positions is from the liberal play book and talking papers. I really enjoyed th Reagan/Bush disaster considering I doubt you were even born during that time so all you are doing is parroting what you have heard. You were doing good but now you are starting to sound just like the close minded fools here. Just my observation.

[Legion]

Mind you, I do not agree with her focus on the major issue she has dealt with so far, but the way she presents her arguments is awesome.

You mean you like the way "she" generates glib generalities and refuses to provide any evidence to back them up?

[Oneuli]

You have a "final solution", don't you sock? The one you advocated for lowering the infant mortality rate, wasn't it, sock?

Contraception?

[Oneuli]

No, sock, I don't see that your approach is compassionate. I see that it would conveniently benefit Y O U while leaving hundreds of millions of others hurting, sock.

Which hundreds of millions, in particular, do you think my approach would leave hurting?

[Jack]

The advantage of immigrant labor is that it's flexible. If the demand is there for low end labor, then people come in to meet that demand. If the demand isn't there, then people don't come in -- they go somewhere else that there is labor. I'm not saying we should forcibly abduct people and bring them in on slave ships to do our work for us. I'm saying we should have a fairly open door for low-end immigrants who want to come here and meet existing demand.



I'd like to hear more about what you mean by that.



So long as those immigrant laborers have it better than they would had they not come here, wouldn't that still be an improvement for them? Is there suffering somehow more problematic when it's here than when it's "out of sight, out of mind?"



I hadn't thought about those two things together. Could you explain more what you mean by that question?


I think the short- and medium-term problem is a big enough consideration that we'd do well to focus on it first. We are going to have waaaay too few working-age residents per retiree for the next quarter century. So, we should deal with that. Longer-term, those immigrants we bring in will tend to integrate and can give rise to an echo generation of highly successful children of immigrants (traditionally the most productive citizens).

I just don't see much downside. Generation one comes in and pays its dues with the crap jobs (but less crap than the alternative if they hadn't been admitted), fixing our demographic balance and enhancing the quality of life of existing citizens. Then generation two gives us the combined benefit of native-born-citizen cultural fluency, and immigrant work ethic. It seems like a win-win to me.

1. "The advantage of immigrant labor is that it's flexible. If the demand is there for low end labor, then people come in to meet that demand. If the demand isn't there, then people don't come in -- they go somewhere else that there is labor. I'm not saying we should forcibly abduct people and bring them in on slave ships to do our work for us. I'm saying we should have a fairly open door for low-end immigrants who want to come here and meet existing demand."
Jack: Your view is a 'Capitalist' view, not a 'Human Labor' view. You are supporting exploitation of Third World Labor by 'bring them in to do the Labor, then shipping them out when unneeded'. Basically, you see them as 'Clogs' in the Production Process. Disposable as a 'Used Tool'.

2. "Jack: I agree with this. But I could also see the benefit in widening the 'gene pool' in highly technical jobs."
Oneuli: "I'd like to hear more about what you mean by that."
Jack: Briefly, I support 'Eugenics'. Admittedly, importing 'Smart People' is a rather slow way to the eventual goal (genetic engineering is more practical) but I could see this as a valid argument to an Immigration Plan.

3. "So long as those immigrant laborers have it better than they would had they not come here, wouldn't that still be an improvement for them? Is there suffering somehow more problematic when it's here than when it's "out of sight, out of mind?" "
Jack: That is the 'lure'. I don't want to dismiss this, but you could say the same thing about the African Slave Trade.

4. "Jack: Is the Benefit of importing cheap Foreign Labor now, offset by the cost of a UBI (Universal Basic Income) in the Future?"
Oneuli: "I hadn't thought about those two things together. Could you explain more what you mean by that question?"
Jack: As Automation and Robotis, Artificial Intelligence, ramps up, MORE human jobs will be taken over by Machines. Something will have to be done for the 'excess humans'. Capitalism in our Country is based on Consumption, so, not the Worker Drones, but the Capitalist will insist on putting 'disposable income' in the hands of the 'excess humans', the UBI.
Now a second theory is based on the 'English Experience' of 500 years ago. When it was more profitable for the Feudal Lords to raise sheep rather than crops. The Tenant Farmers were kicked off the Land they had tilled for Centuries. They migrated to Cities (having no skills other than Farming) where the men became Robbers, the women became Prostitutes and the children became Pick Pockets. As many as 20 men a day were hung for theft in London, one way to ease the 'excess people' problem. Naturally, I wouldn't expect that here ... hence the dramatic rise of Prisons-for-Profit. Another solution for the 'excess people' problem going forward.

Oneuli: "I think the short- and medium-term problem is a big enough consideration that we'd do well to focus on it first."
Jack: I'm good with that. How much do you think it would take to have an American pick the Vegetable Crop? Then THAT should be the Market price of the Vegetable.

Oneuli: "I just don't see much downside."
Jack: Like Jesse Jackson once said, 'We all view the apple from a different perspective.'

[Legion]

Which hundreds of millions, in particular, do you think my approach would leave hurting?

Anyone on the planet who would not enjoy your gratuitous personal exemption from open borders, sock.

Under your selfish "solution", skilled workers would not be able to obtain entry to the US in order to escape grinding poverty, abusive and oppressive governments, famine, disease, war, and persecution, sock.

American citizens would likely suffer from a glut of low-skilled immigrants who would compete with them for non-technical jobs, sock.

The immigrant's countries would suffer the loss of the cultural and economic enrichment that open border advocates say they carry with them, sock.

Of course, if you don't believe that hordes of low-skilled and undereducated immigrants flooding the USA are actually a boon to our country, say so, sock.