We're answering different questions. I'm talking about human motivations more than the economy itself. There are still millions of dirt poor people in Mexico and Central and South America. The U. S. still provides far and away the best opportunity for these people. They'll keep coming until that changes.
Physical barriers will slow them; the more effective the barriers, the more it will slow them. But they will keep coming, as long as the opportunity is better here.
Some will come for legitimate jobs, some for drug-related activities, some for the welfare state, and some will come for terrorism. I didn't quantify any of those factors, though.
But to respond to your question abvout the unemployment rate, I'd remind you that it's not a universal, equal-across-the-country thing. And it doesn't measure everyone with a job, nor does it measure everyone without a job.
When low-bidders enter the work force in a given geographical area, they tend to displace other workers. The displaced workers either find other jobs, accept unemployment benefits (for a period of time), become self-employed, or move to a different area to find work.
Once they move off the unemployment roles or become self-employed, they are not counted in the guvmint's unemployment figures.
But we need to return to the title of the thread to see the balance in this issue. The Senate bill would ALLOW up to 100 million new immigrants during the next 20 years. It doesn't say we would HAVE 100 million new immigrants, only that the bill would allow that many, based on calculations derived from the language of the bill.
The article itself is filled with lots of conditional phrases. "If demand for workers is high", "If demand remains high."
So, I think the thread has jumped the tracks a bit, but the title is still true, as stated.
There is some evidence that unskilled and semi skilled wages have stagnated due in part, and only in part (cheap imports is a more important factor in many industries) to low skilled and semi-skilled immigration. There is no evidence that it has increased the unemployment rate. Immgrants who come in and work hard, do not increase the overall unemployment rate, among those already here. The economy does not work that way. The economy is a supple and dynamic thing, and productivity feeds off productivity. Trust me.
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When low-bidders enter the work force in a given geographical area, they tend to displace other workers. The displaced workers either find other jobs, accept unemployment benefits (for a period of time), become self-employed, or move to a different area to find work.
Once they move off the unemployment roles or become self-employed, they are not counted in the guvmint's unemployment figures. "
One need only look at more specific numbers, like falling male labor participation rate, like 50% plus unemployment among blacks aged 18-25 without post-HS education, or the falling wage levels of the least skilled Americans ... to see the devastating impact on the lowest rungs in our society of excessive immigration.
The fact that our economy is strong enough to absorb these levels in aggregate does NOT imply that at the personal level or community level, these are absorbable levels. Nor does it mean these levels are good for our country.
We are generating about 1.5 million jobs a year, and have inflows of 1.5 million people a year. The Heritage study is telling us that legal inflows can be estimated to be 3-4 million a year under the radical Senate Hagel-Martinez bill (even with amendments that cut the original proposals back), qunituplying legal immigration. This is 'open borders' immigration.
The term 'race to the bottom' comes to mind.