Immigrant Realities

WSJ ^ | January 9, 2004

[FredTownWard]

What I meant by "nothing new" is the idea of changing or repealing a law that is being violated by too many people to have any hope for ever enforcing it. The argument that we have never rewarded lawbreakers before is thus incorrect.

[FredTownWard]

Okay, but it's my limited understanding that money launderers will charge subSTANtially more than 3%.

That depends on how badly they want the business. It's like the smuggling of cigarettes. As the tax gets higher, you get more smuggling. Besides, I have serious doubts whether a tax on transfers to a particular nation would work. It strikes me as being too easy to transfer through a third country to defeat this.

[Vigilanteman]

(a) go out of business (b) move overseas or (c) if it is the kind of business that cannot be replaced by overseas competitors (restaurants), raise their prices enormously and thus shrink their business.

The other posters have addressed your (a) and (b) concerns. Let me address your (c) concern. I spent 14 years in Japan whose illegal alien problem is miniscule, compared to our. I worked about half that time in Tokyo's ritzy Ginza District, equivalent to Park or Madison Avenue of New York.

During a 45 minute lunch-break, I could go (in the most expensive real estate of the most expensive city in the world) to at least a dozen places which served a fairly decent sit-down meal for about $8.

Try doing that in New York and you'll be lucky to buy a stand-up hot dog, soda and chips from a street vendor. What's more, the manager of one of the restaurants lived in my very middle-class neighborhood about 50 minutes away by train. In addition, tipping was neither expected nor wanted. Service ranged from excellent to fairly good. So the food was not only reasonable, but the "help" was paid a living wage.

So what was Tokyo's advantage over New York? Everything from the food to the labor was more expensive, but the meals were cheaper . . . as were the taxes . . . and the regulations. Go figure.

[Be active]

Very well put!

[bam]

As long as the per capita income differential between the U.S. (nearly $32,000) and Mexico ($3,679) continues to be so wide, we can't stop immigrants short of means that will violate our traditions, our conscience, and our national interest.

So, the WSJ will consider letting us regulate immigration once U.S. per capita income falls to around $3,500? Oh, no! They will discover the discrepancy between Bangladesh and the U.S. and tell us we can't stop immigration until all the Bangladesh folks are here too. Thanks to the WSJ, I can look forward to living in a cardboard box on the side of a polluted river along with my 4 billion fellow citizens. Of course, I am looking forward to a healthy diet of burnt rat just like the overpopulated Chinese eat. Wonder if the WSJ is recommending going long on rat belly futures?

Seriously, after reading thousands of posts over on Yahoo message boards my (admittedly, not necessarily correct) conclusion is that a whole great bunch of middle class Americans -- not just some conservatives -- are mad as hell at corporate America, the Republicans, and most of all George Bush. I don't blame them.

[FredTownWard]

Well, Vigilanteman, your Tokyo anecdotes are interesting, but you haven't really addressed my point. Since the restaurant business in THIS country DOES depend heavily on illegal immigrant workers, any attempt to force them to pay higher wages, either through raising the minimum wage or drying up the available pool of workers, will certainly cause prices to go up.

[FredTownWard]

You are missing a couple of important points, bam. First, the special problem with Mexico is due to the fact that we have a long land border with them. It is and has been for many years the only example of a land border between a first world and a third world country. Second, the goal here of course is to get Mexico's per capita income to go up, not to get ours to go down. Mexico is rich in natural resources and Mexican people (as they've proved in America and elsewhere) are good, hard workers, lacking only in education not intelligence. The problem is there are few nations in the history of the world that have had a longer streak of incompetent governments. I'm not sure they've had a really good one (however you choose to define good) in the nation's history, including the current one!

[bam]

Of course, I agree that if the standard of living in Mexico were raised that would alleviate much of the future problems with illegal immigration to the U.S. and it would just generally be great for the Mexicans themselves. I do question, however, that it is really the U.S. that should take responsibility for it (you mentioned Mexico was rich in natural resources) or more importantly are we just allowing the situation to continue and maybe exacerbating it by accepting a large number of Mexican immigrants -- illegally or otherwise. Basically, the problem in Mexico is that they have more people than they can or are willing to provide economic opportunities for. So, the solution used by the Mexican rich and elite for the last 30 years or so is to more or less force what they consider to be a problem, i.e. the poor Mexicans, across the border into U.S. rather than find a solution in their own country. So, IMO, what we are really doing is sacrificing the economic opportunities of our own lower class citizens (and it's starting to look like middle class too) for the benefit of the Mexican elite. I doubt that is the way to solve the problem. It is kind of like if you want an alcholic to quit drinking, then don't be an enabler for the drinking. Another problem that somebody has to face is that the birth rate has been tremendously high -- too high to be sustained and also a cause of the critical need to get Mexicans out of Mexico. I can't remember officially what it is, maybe something like 5.7 - 6.6 compared to around 2.1 for the U.S. Whatever it is, the Mexican government distorts it by not including births to citizens outside the country which are substantial -- I read someplace today that 1/5 of the Mexican population is in the U.S., but I don't know if that is accurate. I have read a couple of "human interest" newspaper articles where a total of about 10 Mexican illegal immigrants were interviewed and every one of those interviewed came from a family of 12-20 siblings. No country can sustain that type of population growth without eventually busting its borders and Mexico has busted her borders. But is it our problem? -- it was their behavior.

You mentioned that Mexico has had a very long streak of incompetent governments. Why would an intelligent people tolerate that? And again, aren't we enabling that incompetency to continue by providing a continuous ongoing temporary relief valve for them? At any rate, I'm afraid that I see a similar situation developing in the U.S. where the elite in government put their own interests above those of the governed. Our politicians are becoming "Mexicanized" rather than the Mexican politicians becoming "U.S.ized". Maybe that explains the Fox/Bush team. As I inferred earlier, the people to at least some extent get the government they deserve and, IMO, we shouldn't allow ours to become more Mexicanized (meaning non-responsive to the people).

I do realize that it is an unique situation to have a 1st world country bordering a 3rd world country. I just question the wisdom of bringing so much of the 3rd world country into the 1st world country. I think we are taking a big risk both politically and environmentally. (okay, I admit it -- I'm a politically conservative tree-hugger).

BTW, I don't think this is all that special of a situation for the WSJ editorial writer. He is a don't tread on immigration type of guy.

[bam]

I meant to hit "Spell" on the prior reply and hit "post". I'm about 500% over my caffeine limit and can barely focus on the screen. I hope there was not too much rambling in it. I usually try to delete the rambling stuff before posting. Sorry.

[lainde]

bttt

[dennisw]

We won't lose our language if we just teach their kids English, and what exactly is wrong with Spanish-descended, Roman Catholic culture anyway?

Take a good look at Latin America and you will have your answer. So many dysfunctional nations. Many of them want to live here. Which American wants to live there?