Thanks Isabel. You made a key comment that I wish I'd emphasized. "Fresh eyes keep the dream alive for all of us."
It's so true. As an example, things that had lost their luster for me suddenly regained and exceeded their hold on me when I experienced them through my children's experience of them.
Great piece, David. I think it's clear we have a broken capitalist system. I am pro-immigration because that's just what makes who we are as a country and I love the diversity. I can't imagine the alternative. There is so much more happening than immigration ... it's just one piece of the puzzle. I am also about compassion so I'll always choose the leader who shows compassion.
New immigrants are not. But we are loyal and happy customers of many immigrant businesses. Not because they are immigrants, but because they are really great at what they do.
Well that's commendable, although not sure what this means. Did you rent to them? Offer a free room? I also have many immigrants in my (working) neighborhood. Contrary to what you might have heard, most are fine with it. My point was that immigrants are not moving to wealthy enclaves, with their rainbow flags and All Are Welcome Here signs. All Are Welcome Here? I don't think so. What they should read is All are Welcome There : )
Oh I don't know. My neighborhood is devoid of that sort of thing. We're pretty apolitical. BTW my kid married a UK gal. But it's okay she's half Irish : )
“Members of the working class, according to Batya, are far less politically polarized because they believe both parties ignore their priority.”
Given how much of Trump’s support is non-college educated and how much they seem to buy off on certain beliefs about immigrants, I’m questioning this assessment that the working class is “far less politically polarized.”
Trump gets lots of support from blue-collar craftsman and owners of over-regulated small businesses. Low-income working-class service workers are less political.
Fair point. A lot of the Jan 6 morons were non college educated but flush enough to afford the time and expense to go to Washington to try and stop the certification. Some even took private jets.
I wondered about that as well. I think we be may drawing inferences from Trump's super-fans who wait all day to see him speak live.
Clearly, though, working class whites voted overwhelmingly for Trump, but Batra's assertion was that politics was not as important to the working class as it is to the elite class. And she further is clear that neither party has focused on helping the Working class, except rhetorically.
It will be interesting to see if those who can make a difference read her book. Imagine if one of the parties takes it to heart and becomes concerned with the 60%.
As the daughter of immigrants, I feel personally invested in this issue. Both of my parents were college educated and worked skilled jobs. My dad was a mechanical engineer and my mom a medical lab technician. My mom worked at two different hospitals, morning and night shifts. I don’t know how she did it, but she retired with no fear of being able to support herself. My father worked very hard as well. He commuted from Boston to Groton, CT to work on the Seawolf Project. He was a continual “job shopper” as he called it—meaning he was a contractor with no benefits—from when he lost his full time job when I was in high school till he died at 59 from pancreatic cancer. He just went from contractor to contract, mostly renewing his government work. He’d live in poverty conditions from Monday to Friday and come home on the weekends. I don’t know an American born working class person my age who works the way my parents worked. And mind you, my parents never got rich. They lived in the same 3 bedroom house in suburban Boston from 1978 till now where my mom still lives as a long time widow. The work ethic that many immigrants bring to the US is extreme. I have all sorts of conversations with Lyft/Uber drivers. Many of them take driving jobs after working full days. I think that if working class white people actually heard the stories of these immigrants and what drives them we could have a better debate. So much of immigration is motivated by love of family and faith in hard-work. This mindset is something we should be importing and is another fruit of immigration.
Imagine how the country they emigrated from would benefit from their work ethic and skills. I understand people emigrate for many different reasons, including and maybe especially because of oppressive regimes, but at some point, in a world of 8 billion people, it is well past time when people should not be forced to emigrate to live decent lives. Emigration to a handful of countries in the North is not sustainable for all kinds of reasons.
Mass emigration from a hellhole means the hellhole must be changed, in whatever ways necessary, so people can live decent lives in their native countries.
One of my cousins is a pediatric surgeon who could have come to the US and made a nice life for himself. However, his medical school was paid for by family that came to the US so... I think perhaps we have to talk about the complexity of this situation a bit more. And to the point that the US is losing people to sustain the economy, immigration is actually a good thing. You get the work ethic and working age people. The Philippines is greatly helped by people moving away and having money sent back by successful emigrants. I don't have time to go into the problem of corruption right now but I have to say... it's a big deal and people need to get themselves out or else. It's really not as simple as you may think of just changing the "hell hole" -- not even sure that is the right term or frame of mind there.
I think I understand the problem from both sides of the question. I mentioned a colleague who was one of a handful of specialty doctors in a country where millions of women have little access to health care. He was a prominent physician who was also the physician to the president for life and was in a unique position to influence the man. Who else could fill his position?
I also have a colleague who was the only neurosurgeon in a small Caribbean country where life is so grim and brutal that anyone who can, leaves. He didn’t, and was recently appointed prime minister because no one else stepped up, and he thought he could make things better in a country that defines hellhole, where natural disasters, including hurricanes and earthquakes, are compounded by two centuries of catastrophic leadership. A few days after he was appointed prime minister, he was sworn in as interim president when the president was assassinated. What happens when there are no honest leaders if someone like him takes his expensive and rare skills where he could easily live a comfortable life in France, in his case, because he was educated in France?
As for getting immigrant workers who are highly motivated and skilled to “do the jobs Americans won’t do,” who will do those jobs back home? It really is a poor tradeoff for people back home.
I actually lived and worked for three years in a country, which at that time was rated by Transparency International as the second most corrupt country in the world. I watched as skilled and ethical people left only to give the corrupt an easier task of exercising their power.
Zimbabwe, a country I know well, lost a third of its population because of the vicious misrule of Robert Mugabe, many of whom were met with hostility in neighboring countries who resented the vast inflow of migrants. How was that a good thing?
I believe more effort should be made to make life better in hellhole countries where life is short, brutish, and cruel. I spent my life working on this problem and I have no dog in the fight, as we say, because I won the life lottery by being born in wonderful country, but I know there are local patriots who are committed to making changes for the better in countries that are not wonderful. Why aren’t we doing more to help them achieve a better homeland?
My comments were not made to criticize your family’s experience. I’m only pointing out the problem of a rich country gaining at a poor country’s expense.
To make it clear... my cousin stayed in the Philippines, so yes people can stay in their home country, but his skills came from family money in the US.
A data point to add to what you already highlighted— In 2022, an MIT study found that immigrants are 80% more likely to start businesses and create jobs than native-born Americans.
There are thousands of Joses and Marias who have immigrated here, as well as the boat people from Viet Nam and Cuba, and others, who have worked hard, many going on to college and becoming successful and productive citizens. You are spot on with immigration, along with several other systems and policies, that are not working in the best interests of the country as a whole. And who is going to change these for the better? There was another great immigration took place in the U.S. "The Warmth of Other Suns" details the 70 year silent migration of Blacks from the Jim Crow South to the northern and western states. Six million people made the move, far outpacing any other migration within this country. The prejudice encountered was out of fear of losing jobs, especially in places like Detroit. Fascinating story when we recognize that the U.S. was built by immigrants, including our own families. Thanks, David, for you insights and commentary, much appreciated.
David, Thanks for the quick view of Second Class, which I haven’t read yet. Do you know when the research was conducted? I can’t say for sure, but I have a hunch that negative perceptions of higher education and the liberal arts are related to the problems and perceptions you point to here. Students from working families go to state universities to get better jobs, suspicious of why they are burdened with Gen Ed core requirements, and wary that the system may be rigged against them. They’re told that college will get them a better job but aren’t confident that it’s true. From my angle, working students are very stressed and distrustful of institutions; I think they don’t see that either government or education has their back. If they felt more economic confidence, perceptions of both immigration and higher education could improve together. This is, of course, very rough speculation.
Batya covered the issues with education, both the divide and the contention that we need more vocational education and fewer BA's. She also covered housing and advocated for YIMBY zoning. As a reader it was the immigration issue that jumped out at me as being most salient. And I really was surprised that in the poll I cited that for all registered voters it beat out inflation as the number one issue. I'd have taken the other side of that bet.
I think the interviews were conducted recently as the book came out this year.
This sounds like a book that deserves a wide audience, especially among policy-makers. Thanks for the preview. Your time and care with data make this very thought-provoking.
I see these issues everyday and over the last few years especially with the impact covid had in my small city of Battle Creek. Spending time working in a school that had less funding and more blue collar working families in contrast with a well funded sports intense community of schools.
More on your point of focusing on vocational education/curriculum it costs a lot and takes a lot of maintenance and diligence to have the kind of resources to do that. It takes whole teams of counselors and teachers who actually put new curriculums together and learn how to teach better and better every year.
I don't see every problem either but one thing that would at least ease things would be some financially security and safe and easily accessible transportation, both for kids and adults. The next thing would have to be funding extra curricular activities.
Extra curricular activities breathe life into everything. They move money, they move people, they move families, and they move our inner selves. The schools with more choices in vocational/extra curricular classes have more events to make and go to.
Yes, and there are two issues I've experienced with EC activities. One is funding and one is logistics. I'm involved with a school in West Philly. They have many organizations that are willing to help with extra programming and services. The key for them is to have a person devoted to making those programs actually work. He's a head of partnerships. A principal doesn't have the time to organize the logistics of selecting partners and then putting the program into action. Upon need a full time person for that.
As someone who worked as a server for a major corporate chain for years I can say it’s pretty amusing to hear out loud what we all used to joke about. We understood that the company overlords were strip mining our communities of their labor and paying rock bottom wages to a class of people who actually used to be able to support themselves waiting tables within living memory. We used to imagine the rich guys sitting around a table somewhere laughing at the thought of being seen in the kind of places that made them rich.
The modern era of mass immigration so neatly overlaps the era of wage stagnation that at this point arguing that immigrants don’t suppress the value of labor is like arguing viruses don’t suppress the immune system. Everyone knows they do, which is why the people who profit from it encourage it and the people who suffer from it vote, pointlessly, to end it. The rationalization is always something like “when my great grandfather came…”. When he got here there was no welfare state and in any case his descendants were only really able to capitalize because of a strong labor movement and the end of mass immigration in the 1920s. The golden age of the American worker lasted from there until it was undone by the same corporate overlords who crushed unions, outsourced manufacturing, and turned the economy into a financialized casino.
You breeze past the fact that Jose is abusing the asylum system to enrich himself. He’s taking advantage of something set up for people fleeing actual persecution and in the aggregate it’s behavior like that that hardens peoples hearts against even legitimate claims.
I’ve known a lot of immigrants personally and I don’t think they’re any better or worse than most. But there will be no improvement for workers in this country unless the endless flow of cheap competition is shut down and those responsible for encouraging it are held to account politically, economically, and where it’s abetted illegally, through prosecution.
They mention a generic "globalization policies" as item number five in their list, which is as far as their Democrat leadership will go in commenting on immigration. And of course, immigration is not the only factor in wage stagnation.
Ok, but “globalization policies” would also include the policies that resulted in the loss of domestic manufacturing jobs, which has to be factored as a major impact on working class wages.
Based on what I’ve read, I’m skeptical that immigration is the major cause of wage stagnation that people are intuiting.
It's all part of the same overall neoliberal plan. The jobs are outsourced where labor is cheap and for those jobs that can't be outsourced the labor is imported. Immigration is just the domestic side of it. I mentioned all this in my original comment.
I don't agree with that logic flow. Economies are always going to change. And some will benefit and some will lose from that change. It's the same for both people and for businesses. Creative destruction is inevitable if you want to have a free market.
America today is three times more productive as measured by real GDP per capita than it was in 1966. I think the distribution of our wealth needs to be fixed through the tax system. Our economy has grown through higher tax regimes and we've so far been able to absorb many new entitlements.
A shrinking population will not be good for anyone.
As for abuse, I believe the rule is that an unaccompanied minor who is in the US gets to stay if a relative will take responsibility for them. You may not like that rule, you may want to change it, but that's as abusive as my taking tax deductions for charitable contributions.
And I'd argue that a teenager who takes great risk to come here is all other things being equal a more motivated person than a similarly aged native.
It is entirely true that economies always change. The political end of that is to ensure the widest possible benefit in the interest of the public good. We have the opposite. I think it’s impossible at this point to argue we have a free market, not after 2008. When executives are given millions of dollars in comp for wrecking not only their own businesses but also the economy as a whole you have some species of corporatism. People protested this and the result was ‘woke,’ the corporate co-opting of leftist and even rightist reform energy into culture war and kickbacks to university educated influencers. The central feature of not merely the economy but our culture as a whole is stagnation and repetition, not creative destruction.
Our economy is based on rent seeking, our entitlements are funded by unplayable debt ($33 trillion and counting), and we are now fighting proxy wars on three continents to force foreigners to keep using dollars. It isn’t working out, which doesn’t bode well since our greatest rival owns most of our debt.
The reasons for a low native birth rate are complex but certainly due in some part to a sense of poverty, cultural impoverishment, and hopelessness felt by the working class. When their social and economic superiors treat them like economic widgets easily relaxed by a cheaper foreign model it’s easy to lose faith in the system.
It is true that the law allows for unaccompanied minors to claim asylum, and that should absolutely be changed, but the abuse I referred to is the basic dishonesty in pretending to be persecuted to enter a country to get a job. The whole issue of immigration is so saturated in lies and propaganda already that the further impression that people are gaming the system will only make the public hostile to people who actually need the help.
A country belongs to itself and its posterity. It’s not an open-air labor market to enrich a class of globalist elites. I certainly think there is room for genuine refugees and people who deeply wish to join America as citizens. But the existing system of pretending that the replacement of the American working class represents the best interest of the country as a whole, I dispute.
I’m not hostile to the point of view you represent; I believe it comes from a good place. We Americans are raised on ideas like the ones you mention. But I tend to be far more critical of them.
I support higher wages. The federal minimum wage is a disgrace. And profits are elevated for a number of reasons including wages not growing as fast as productivity.
The thing nobody expects is another 50% decline in the stock market. No one expected it in the very late 1990s or in 2008 but it happened. Some painful shock to the system is what's probably needed to recalibrate our economy in terms of greater equality.
As for 2008, it was awful that nobody was prosecuted criminally.
I appreciate reading your POV. I think we agree on a lot but perhaps not on immigration. Which is good because it's much more interesting to have different POVs!
Take away the immigrants, and you will still have company overloads strip mining communities of their labor and paying rock bottom wages. The oligarch class wants us mad at immigrants so we don’t notice their union busting, wage theft and abuse of the tax code to enrich themselves.
That was a key turning point in my regard for Bernie, an accusatory question from Ezra Klein and some tweetstorms prompting him to suddenly change views he'd been espousing for decades.
Declining population is a major economic concern around the world—China, Russia, Italy, Japan, and many other countries. Somehow in the U.S. we’re concerned about increasing population. If increased population was due to high birth rates, I don’t think we’d be seeing this concern.
How many green cards and paperless people work in meat packing and work as field workers. It is quite a few. 38% of meat packing workers are foreign born (WFYI-PBR/PBS) and foreign born field workers compromise almost 68% of the workforce according to National Agriculture Workers Survey (we wouldn’t be eating very well without immigrants).You sure don’t see a lot middle class teenagers working in the fields and meat packing plants. Makes me wonder how corporate farms and the meat packing industries take advantage of this especially hiring paperless people.
You have to work 10 years (40 credits) to qualify. So what happens to FICA taxes if a green card works 5 years but never comes back after that? What happens to a paperless persons FICA if am employer takes it out even if this person doesn’t have a SSN?
Over 90% of people 65 or older receive Social Security. So we better do something.
In my 2022 study of older Americans, I found that those who immigrated at some point were much more likely to be upper middle class today than the average native born American. If it’s not mentioned in Second Chance…the oldest source of immigrant resentment among all Americans is seeing immigrants come in and become wealthier or much better off than yourself. This ‘relative deprivation’ is a known trigger to jingoism, xenophobia, etc. The working class perception of wage depression caused by immigration may or may not be real…but wage stagnation is…and the solution is unionization and tighter pay regulation in all fifty states. If the white working class had decent wage growth, union protections, etc. They would not care if immigrants flooded in and some became wealthier than themselves. Note: the union labor movement in the U.S. was heavily driven by immigrants in the 1890s-1920s. Irony.
Maybe the key to reconciling your views with the “flawed logic” of the working class is to differentiate between immigrant types. It sounds like Batya’s interviewees wouldn’t object to immigrants who enter legally under a functioning system, and who make some nominal commitment to assimilating with the culture built by their predecessors. But they may object to the fact that we cannot now articulate anything that we owe our citizens that we don’t owe to non-citizens.
It is important to understand that those who are considered anti-immigration are almost exclusively anti-illegal immigration. This cohort varies widely on what legal immigration should look like, from "admit only those with skills we need" "to deny only those with criminal or anti-social histories." Ultimately, true open borders cannot work since billions of people across the world would like to live in the US. Moreover, such a policy would be incompatible with the fairly robust welfare state that we now have, unlike the similarly huge influx in the late 19th and early 20th century.
Personally, I favor a fairly wide immigration gate. The immigrants who come here are mostly wonderful, unlike the fifth generation trustafarians reliably engaging in whatever the protests de jure might be. Wish we could deport that crowd.
“It is important to understand that those who are considered anti-immigration are almost exclusively anti-illegal immigration.”
Disagree. The widespread approval of Trump’s significant decrease in refugee admissions and the resistance to immigration reform that would open up more legal immigration opportunities indicate a more general antipathy towards immigration, legal or illegal.
Both parties resist true immigration reform, and the decrease in refugee admissions under the Trump administration was a proper application of the law which does not consider those fleeing poverty refugees. The Trumpers, whom I bet you know very few, do not have any animus toward more legal immigration as such. But they insist that the border be controlled, and laws enforced first.
I’m not talking about the asylum seekers at the border. I’m talking about Trump’s reduction of admissions under the U.S. Refugee Program.
And my statement about widespread resistance to legal immigration (which would include those refugees that Trump kept out) stands, regardless of how many Trumpists you think I know.
I think most people would be against anything that is illegal. Right now, the legal system is pretty restrictive. It's not enough. If we can't get our act together to have a legal system that works for the country then if someone gets through and establishes a life, I'm against deporting them. I understand there's an inherent contradiction there. But that's how i feel.
I agree. I think the debate centers on sequencing. The Left favors fixing the system before we fix the border, whereas the Right favors the reverse. Deporting millions of people is impractical and, in many cases, inhumane, but that makes controlling the border all the more urgent. Amnesty before border control was tried in the 1980s, and the promised border control never really happened. The Right is correct on sequencing. A negotiated amnesty/path to citizenship coupled with a re-negotiated understanding of legal immigration criteria can happen only after we have a social and therefore political consensus that our borders are truly secure.
I agree with that position. I think there is consensus around that type of solution from most Americans but the politics from both parties get in the way.
Yes, each party is focused on its base in two corrosive ways. Not only do they feel they must appeal to them first and foremost, but even worse they feel they benefit by keeping the issue alive and their bases animated.
I agree with your takes, and think that we need and can assimilate a certain number of Americans a year. I live in a relatively well off city in one of the most diverse counties in the US so have a slightly unusual take. I like everyone around me and what they bring to the table, and I've found some things interesting, like those from
post communist countries seem to be the biggest proponents of American values. I like the way our immigrants see America. But I also remember the year when my daughter was the token white girl in her elementary school class (best public scores around). We didn't complain, because how do you complain, and my daughter made a close friend, but it just didn't feel good being a token white family at class parties either. My town is full of skilled expats who are rightly rewarded for a job well done. My wonder, knowing that yes, schools and the government can't fix families, and Americans are sincere at trying to improve their education system. All that being true, if we didn't import all the doctors, lawyers, engineers, and executives in my town--would we have found a way to raise up some of our own citizens? My kids are old enough that I am humbled as a parent and all kids are not bright enough to do all jobs--but surely there are lots more bright kids with potential that we are not reaching because theres a LOT of visa's being given out. I know legal immigration isn't a pressing issue at the moment--but I think as more towns look like mine it will should be worthy of a serious conversation: how do we bring in everyone we need while providing opportunities to those already here? I include all the expat kids I've seen grow up here in that.
Thanks for the comment, Lynn, as well as your perspective. You ask, "how do we bring in everyone we need while providing opportunities to those already here? I include all the expat kids I've seen grow up here in that."
I think the answer is in timeframe. In the short run, an influx of immigrants may stress our systems both of infrastructure and crowding out opportunity. But in the longer run, immigrants will grow our economy and have a multiplier effect.
Well thought out and researched, David. Having been a Contractor in Texas for forty years I share most of your logic - there wouldn't be a construction industry here if it weren't for immigrants. They work long and hard, most with great attitudes, often living ten to twelve to a room, and usually sending something like 80% of their paychecks home.
One aspect not covered in your piece however, is this issue of "vetting." Legal immigration, and legitimate requests for asylum should be America's aspiration. Period. Currently we have NO IDEA who's in this country, and you're hearing more and more about violence attributable to illegals. People like FBI Chief Christopher Wray are warning that we need to prepare for a terrorist attacks generated by "cells" of illegals who have flooded into the U.S. for the sole purpose of doing us harm. I fear this is going to get ugly!
So, I'm with you all the way on allowing immigrants in to the country, PROVIDED A FORTIFIED SYSTEM OF CAREFUL VETTING is enacted, and "bad actors" are deported. Sounds ambitious, doesn't it? America is filled with great minds - surely we should be able to identify greatness and harness the brain power to solve this crisis!
Repeating my comment from above and agreeing with that aspiration. But we can't seem to figure it out.
I think most people would be against anything that is illegal. Right now, the legal system is pretty restrictive. It's not enough. If we can't get our act together to have a legal system that works for the country then if someone gets through and establishes a life, I'm against deporting them. I understand there's an inherent contradiction there. But that's how i feel.
Perhaps I'm delusional, but I cling to hope that we can figure this immigration thing out (probably can't, too many political hands in the pie!) and seal the border! Certainly we can quite doing stupid stuff like flying 30,000 people in on a wish and a promise, or threatening to allow 100,000 Gazan's in on humanitarian visas. I'm for immigration if it's done in such a way that it doesn't pose a threat to the fabric of our country.
i love the piece. this week I was invited to Hampton Bays High School to attend a special ESL program. As a project to learn and write in English they paired up and wrote "My Story".
Like Samuel they were saddened to leave their family. Their trips required great courage. They all shared in the American Dream. One of the kids, like Jose, came alone. He has started a lanscaping business, does carpentry and supports himself. He dreams of college and he is one of our scholarship applicants. Like Samuel they share the dream of a good life and are willing to work hard to attain it.
I have always welcomed immigrants and taken pride in my immigrant ancestors' (including my father's) contributions to building this country and making it so culturally rich and diverse. But I honestly have no idea how an immigrant coming without resources can make it here in this day and age. So many of us who were born here are barely hanging on, even with expensive educations and good credit holding us up. I know a lot of people who are making the reverse move--to Mexico or Bali or Thailand--where one can actually afford to live with a higher standard of living. People fly to Thailand for dental work, for heaven's sake. The catch though is that to live there, you have to be earning in dollars from clients or a remote job back in the US. There is so much that I've always loved and appreciated about being an American, but I feel like our nation is going down the tubes. It's become a place where billionaires seem to care only about keeping the rest of us as destitute and struggling as possible. Like so many people I know, I'm looking for an out.
I guess everything is relative. People come here from places that make America look like a wonderland even if they are without resources.
Then you have the movement to relocate for people who are comparing how they could live in Thailand or Italy to here. I'm guessing you're read Kirsten Powers who has written about her move to Italy and its advantages. She makes a very strong case.
it's interesting to compare these two "migrations." Even if they are in opposite directions, they both make sense.
The problem is, it *looks* like a wonderland--until they get here and try to make a living on minimum wage. These days, you can't do that without a lot of support--meaning other people to split your living expenses with. At $800/month for just a room in a house, the situation is pretty bleak. This is why I'm a full-time, nomadic housesitter. I can't afford rent.
I do see people talking about living in Italy, not sure if Kirsten Powers was one of them. I have considered it myself, but it's a hard transition if you don't speak Italian or have an EU passport.
If they're coming from a place where there is no rule of law, NYC can seem like at least a haven. And I know there are supportive communities in NYC that make life easier. Everything is relative. I remember being in Cambodia many years ago and talking to men who grew up during the Khmer Rouge. I asked them about government corruption and they said we're just happy that wen we wake up, there are no dead bodies lying in the street.
BTW there are lots of videos on YouTube by immigrants about why they are leaving the US and Canada and how the US and Canada compare to countries with developing economies.
This is all..well, mostly...true at far as it goes. Fertility rates, for example, while declining among white Europeans, especially in Germany, are exploding among non-white races, for example, in the Middle East. That population growth in, say, Syria, increases demand for resources that, without commensurate in supply, become increasingly scarce and puts increasing strain on the population, leading to conflict and immigration. Gaza is another perfect example. Already one of the most densely populated places on Earth, with a birthrate that would make it only more so, how long, even without Hamas, before they tried to expand their borders? Europe and the United States are faced with enormous numbers of people fleeing the repression that is a direct result of scarcity, too many for the more mature regimes to absorb. And don't believe for one second that there is not a significant racial aspect to the resistance among the worker class. They just don't want to admit it, which is why the argument of "they're destroying our culture and our history," has been heard throughout Europe and in the United States. Compress any substance and it gets hotter--cram more and more people into smaller spaces and the same thing will happen. And this doesn't even take in the pressure that an increasing human population puts on the environment, which means food and water supply, and areas of the world that are fast becoming uninhabitable. So the question of whether America has too many people is too limited--the real question is how the planet can absorb the increasing dominance of a single species that may growing too fast to survive.
I suppose no one is going to admit to an author that they're racist! But at least that was the claim. And the author interviewed a racially diverse group of people. I just thought of the movie Crash, which certainly shows people at their worst.
Crash was terrific. Yeah, I'm always skeptical of surveys. Not only are replies often untrustworthy, but the questions are often phrased...or delivered...to provoke a response that may be misleading. But the question of how legitimate is a society's desire to maintain its culture and traditions is a good one, with complexities that neither side generally acknowledges. I had a long talk about that a few years with a Middle East former ambassador and she eventually admitted that the right wing in, say, France had a point. Even if you disagree, it's a mistake, as it usually is, to simply sneer at views you don't agree with.
Notwithstanding the racial hell-scape of Crash, I have the impression that American cities have done a better job than most countries in terms of integration. But my perspective may be widely askew on this.
Most other white countries or most other non-white countries? Just came back from Europe and Paris, Vienna, and Munich seemed pretty much the same as cities in the US. Not certain about, say, Tokyo, Beijing, and Mumbai. The issue here, as with some many problems, is tribalism, the need for people to clump into like groups. I've been writing about that for two decades and notion is finally coming into some favor as an explanatory vehicle.
Thanks Isabel. You made a key comment that I wish I'd emphasized. "Fresh eyes keep the dream alive for all of us."
It's so true. As an example, things that had lost their luster for me suddenly regained and exceeded their hold on me when I experienced them through my children's experience of them.
Fresh eyes.
Great piece, David. I think it's clear we have a broken capitalist system. I am pro-immigration because that's just what makes who we are as a country and I love the diversity. I can't imagine the alternative. There is so much more happening than immigration ... it's just one piece of the puzzle. I am also about compassion so I'll always choose the leader who shows compassion.
Are they moving to your neighborhood? Are they competing for your apartment and job? Being pro-immigration is admirable. Or not so admirable. Depends.
New immigrants are not. But we are loyal and happy customers of many immigrant businesses. Not because they are immigrants, but because they are really great at what they do.
Heck, one moved right into my house. :)
Well that's commendable, although not sure what this means. Did you rent to them? Offer a free room? I also have many immigrants in my (working) neighborhood. Contrary to what you might have heard, most are fine with it. My point was that immigrants are not moving to wealthy enclaves, with their rainbow flags and All Are Welcome Here signs. All Are Welcome Here? I don't think so. What they should read is All are Welcome There : )
It means I married a European. :)
Your supposition that only wealthy neighborhoods have rainbow flags and welcoming signs is false, btw.
Oh I don't know. My neighborhood is devoid of that sort of thing. We're pretty apolitical. BTW my kid married a UK gal. But it's okay she's half Irish : )
There are Trumper flags and pride flags alike in my neighborhood, which is mostly working class.
“Members of the working class, according to Batya, are far less politically polarized because they believe both parties ignore their priority.”
Given how much of Trump’s support is non-college educated and how much they seem to buy off on certain beliefs about immigrants, I’m questioning this assessment that the working class is “far less politically polarized.”
Trump gets lots of support from blue-collar craftsman and owners of over-regulated small businesses. Low-income working-class service workers are less political.
Fair point. A lot of the Jan 6 morons were non college educated but flush enough to afford the time and expense to go to Washington to try and stop the certification. Some even took private jets.
I wondered about that as well. I think we be may drawing inferences from Trump's super-fans who wait all day to see him speak live.
Clearly, though, working class whites voted overwhelmingly for Trump, but Batra's assertion was that politics was not as important to the working class as it is to the elite class. And she further is clear that neither party has focused on helping the Working class, except rhetorically.
It will be interesting to see if those who can make a difference read her book. Imagine if one of the parties takes it to heart and becomes concerned with the 60%.
As the daughter of immigrants, I feel personally invested in this issue. Both of my parents were college educated and worked skilled jobs. My dad was a mechanical engineer and my mom a medical lab technician. My mom worked at two different hospitals, morning and night shifts. I don’t know how she did it, but she retired with no fear of being able to support herself. My father worked very hard as well. He commuted from Boston to Groton, CT to work on the Seawolf Project. He was a continual “job shopper” as he called it—meaning he was a contractor with no benefits—from when he lost his full time job when I was in high school till he died at 59 from pancreatic cancer. He just went from contractor to contract, mostly renewing his government work. He’d live in poverty conditions from Monday to Friday and come home on the weekends. I don’t know an American born working class person my age who works the way my parents worked. And mind you, my parents never got rich. They lived in the same 3 bedroom house in suburban Boston from 1978 till now where my mom still lives as a long time widow. The work ethic that many immigrants bring to the US is extreme. I have all sorts of conversations with Lyft/Uber drivers. Many of them take driving jobs after working full days. I think that if working class white people actually heard the stories of these immigrants and what drives them we could have a better debate. So much of immigration is motivated by love of family and faith in hard-work. This mindset is something we should be importing and is another fruit of immigration.
Imagine how the country they emigrated from would benefit from their work ethic and skills. I understand people emigrate for many different reasons, including and maybe especially because of oppressive regimes, but at some point, in a world of 8 billion people, it is well past time when people should not be forced to emigrate to live decent lives. Emigration to a handful of countries in the North is not sustainable for all kinds of reasons.
Mass emigration from a hellhole means the hellhole must be changed, in whatever ways necessary, so people can live decent lives in their native countries.
One of my cousins is a pediatric surgeon who could have come to the US and made a nice life for himself. However, his medical school was paid for by family that came to the US so... I think perhaps we have to talk about the complexity of this situation a bit more. And to the point that the US is losing people to sustain the economy, immigration is actually a good thing. You get the work ethic and working age people. The Philippines is greatly helped by people moving away and having money sent back by successful emigrants. I don't have time to go into the problem of corruption right now but I have to say... it's a big deal and people need to get themselves out or else. It's really not as simple as you may think of just changing the "hell hole" -- not even sure that is the right term or frame of mind there.
I think I understand the problem from both sides of the question. I mentioned a colleague who was one of a handful of specialty doctors in a country where millions of women have little access to health care. He was a prominent physician who was also the physician to the president for life and was in a unique position to influence the man. Who else could fill his position?
I also have a colleague who was the only neurosurgeon in a small Caribbean country where life is so grim and brutal that anyone who can, leaves. He didn’t, and was recently appointed prime minister because no one else stepped up, and he thought he could make things better in a country that defines hellhole, where natural disasters, including hurricanes and earthquakes, are compounded by two centuries of catastrophic leadership. A few days after he was appointed prime minister, he was sworn in as interim president when the president was assassinated. What happens when there are no honest leaders if someone like him takes his expensive and rare skills where he could easily live a comfortable life in France, in his case, because he was educated in France?
As for getting immigrant workers who are highly motivated and skilled to “do the jobs Americans won’t do,” who will do those jobs back home? It really is a poor tradeoff for people back home.
I actually lived and worked for three years in a country, which at that time was rated by Transparency International as the second most corrupt country in the world. I watched as skilled and ethical people left only to give the corrupt an easier task of exercising their power.
Zimbabwe, a country I know well, lost a third of its population because of the vicious misrule of Robert Mugabe, many of whom were met with hostility in neighboring countries who resented the vast inflow of migrants. How was that a good thing?
I believe more effort should be made to make life better in hellhole countries where life is short, brutish, and cruel. I spent my life working on this problem and I have no dog in the fight, as we say, because I won the life lottery by being born in wonderful country, but I know there are local patriots who are committed to making changes for the better in countries that are not wonderful. Why aren’t we doing more to help them achieve a better homeland?
My comments were not made to criticize your family’s experience. I’m only pointing out the problem of a rich country gaining at a poor country’s expense.
To make it clear... my cousin stayed in the Philippines, so yes people can stay in their home country, but his skills came from family money in the US.
A data point to add to what you already highlighted— In 2022, an MIT study found that immigrants are 80% more likely to start businesses and create jobs than native-born Americans.
Yes, small business entrepreneurship has been the chief economic strategy of most immigrant ethnic cohorts, and the most successful.
There are thousands of Joses and Marias who have immigrated here, as well as the boat people from Viet Nam and Cuba, and others, who have worked hard, many going on to college and becoming successful and productive citizens. You are spot on with immigration, along with several other systems and policies, that are not working in the best interests of the country as a whole. And who is going to change these for the better? There was another great immigration took place in the U.S. "The Warmth of Other Suns" details the 70 year silent migration of Blacks from the Jim Crow South to the northern and western states. Six million people made the move, far outpacing any other migration within this country. The prejudice encountered was out of fear of losing jobs, especially in places like Detroit. Fascinating story when we recognize that the U.S. was built by immigrants, including our own families. Thanks, David, for you insights and commentary, much appreciated.
Great plug for a book everyone should read. I second the recommendation!
I'd like to read that book, having enjoyed Caste.
David, Thanks for the quick view of Second Class, which I haven’t read yet. Do you know when the research was conducted? I can’t say for sure, but I have a hunch that negative perceptions of higher education and the liberal arts are related to the problems and perceptions you point to here. Students from working families go to state universities to get better jobs, suspicious of why they are burdened with Gen Ed core requirements, and wary that the system may be rigged against them. They’re told that college will get them a better job but aren’t confident that it’s true. From my angle, working students are very stressed and distrustful of institutions; I think they don’t see that either government or education has their back. If they felt more economic confidence, perceptions of both immigration and higher education could improve together. This is, of course, very rough speculation.
Batya covered the issues with education, both the divide and the contention that we need more vocational education and fewer BA's. She also covered housing and advocated for YIMBY zoning. As a reader it was the immigration issue that jumped out at me as being most salient. And I really was surprised that in the poll I cited that for all registered voters it beat out inflation as the number one issue. I'd have taken the other side of that bet.
I think the interviews were conducted recently as the book came out this year.
This sounds like a book that deserves a wide audience, especially among policy-makers. Thanks for the preview. Your time and care with data make this very thought-provoking.
I see these issues everyday and over the last few years especially with the impact covid had in my small city of Battle Creek. Spending time working in a school that had less funding and more blue collar working families in contrast with a well funded sports intense community of schools.
More on your point of focusing on vocational education/curriculum it costs a lot and takes a lot of maintenance and diligence to have the kind of resources to do that. It takes whole teams of counselors and teachers who actually put new curriculums together and learn how to teach better and better every year.
I don't see every problem either but one thing that would at least ease things would be some financially security and safe and easily accessible transportation, both for kids and adults. The next thing would have to be funding extra curricular activities.
Extra curricular activities breathe life into everything. They move money, they move people, they move families, and they move our inner selves. The schools with more choices in vocational/extra curricular classes have more events to make and go to.
Yes, and there are two issues I've experienced with EC activities. One is funding and one is logistics. I'm involved with a school in West Philly. They have many organizations that are willing to help with extra programming and services. The key for them is to have a person devoted to making those programs actually work. He's a head of partnerships. A principal doesn't have the time to organize the logistics of selecting partners and then putting the program into action. Upon need a full time person for that.
As someone who worked as a server for a major corporate chain for years I can say it’s pretty amusing to hear out loud what we all used to joke about. We understood that the company overlords were strip mining our communities of their labor and paying rock bottom wages to a class of people who actually used to be able to support themselves waiting tables within living memory. We used to imagine the rich guys sitting around a table somewhere laughing at the thought of being seen in the kind of places that made them rich.
The modern era of mass immigration so neatly overlaps the era of wage stagnation that at this point arguing that immigrants don’t suppress the value of labor is like arguing viruses don’t suppress the immune system. Everyone knows they do, which is why the people who profit from it encourage it and the people who suffer from it vote, pointlessly, to end it. The rationalization is always something like “when my great grandfather came…”. When he got here there was no welfare state and in any case his descendants were only really able to capitalize because of a strong labor movement and the end of mass immigration in the 1920s. The golden age of the American worker lasted from there until it was undone by the same corporate overlords who crushed unions, outsourced manufacturing, and turned the economy into a financialized casino.
You breeze past the fact that Jose is abusing the asylum system to enrich himself. He’s taking advantage of something set up for people fleeing actual persecution and in the aggregate it’s behavior like that that hardens peoples hearts against even legitimate claims.
I’ve known a lot of immigrants personally and I don’t think they’re any better or worse than most. But there will be no improvement for workers in this country unless the endless flow of cheap competition is shut down and those responsible for encouraging it are held to account politically, economically, and where it’s abetted illegally, through prosecution.
Why did we see real wage growth in the late 60s after the 1965 Immigration Reform Act?
The immigrants hadn't arrived in force yet. The big spike came around 1970 and that's right when you start to see the wage stagnation start to set in.
https://www.prb.org/resources/trends-in-migration-to-the-u-s/#:~:text=The%20United%20States%20admitted%20an,States%20on%20a%20typical%20day.
https://aflcio.org/2015/1/15/five-causes-wage-stagnation-united-states
That AFL-CIO article seems to undercut your thesis that increased immigration is a primary driver of wage stagnation.
They mention a generic "globalization policies" as item number five in their list, which is as far as their Democrat leadership will go in commenting on immigration. And of course, immigration is not the only factor in wage stagnation.
Ok, but “globalization policies” would also include the policies that resulted in the loss of domestic manufacturing jobs, which has to be factored as a major impact on working class wages.
Based on what I’ve read, I’m skeptical that immigration is the major cause of wage stagnation that people are intuiting.
It's all part of the same overall neoliberal plan. The jobs are outsourced where labor is cheap and for those jobs that can't be outsourced the labor is imported. Immigration is just the domestic side of it. I mentioned all this in my original comment.
I don't agree with that logic flow. Economies are always going to change. And some will benefit and some will lose from that change. It's the same for both people and for businesses. Creative destruction is inevitable if you want to have a free market.
America today is three times more productive as measured by real GDP per capita than it was in 1966. I think the distribution of our wealth needs to be fixed through the tax system. Our economy has grown through higher tax regimes and we've so far been able to absorb many new entitlements.
A shrinking population will not be good for anyone.
As for abuse, I believe the rule is that an unaccompanied minor who is in the US gets to stay if a relative will take responsibility for them. You may not like that rule, you may want to change it, but that's as abusive as my taking tax deductions for charitable contributions.
And I'd argue that a teenager who takes great risk to come here is all other things being equal a more motivated person than a similarly aged native.
It is entirely true that economies always change. The political end of that is to ensure the widest possible benefit in the interest of the public good. We have the opposite. I think it’s impossible at this point to argue we have a free market, not after 2008. When executives are given millions of dollars in comp for wrecking not only their own businesses but also the economy as a whole you have some species of corporatism. People protested this and the result was ‘woke,’ the corporate co-opting of leftist and even rightist reform energy into culture war and kickbacks to university educated influencers. The central feature of not merely the economy but our culture as a whole is stagnation and repetition, not creative destruction.
Our economy is based on rent seeking, our entitlements are funded by unplayable debt ($33 trillion and counting), and we are now fighting proxy wars on three continents to force foreigners to keep using dollars. It isn’t working out, which doesn’t bode well since our greatest rival owns most of our debt.
The reasons for a low native birth rate are complex but certainly due in some part to a sense of poverty, cultural impoverishment, and hopelessness felt by the working class. When their social and economic superiors treat them like economic widgets easily relaxed by a cheaper foreign model it’s easy to lose faith in the system.
It is true that the law allows for unaccompanied minors to claim asylum, and that should absolutely be changed, but the abuse I referred to is the basic dishonesty in pretending to be persecuted to enter a country to get a job. The whole issue of immigration is so saturated in lies and propaganda already that the further impression that people are gaming the system will only make the public hostile to people who actually need the help.
A country belongs to itself and its posterity. It’s not an open-air labor market to enrich a class of globalist elites. I certainly think there is room for genuine refugees and people who deeply wish to join America as citizens. But the existing system of pretending that the replacement of the American working class represents the best interest of the country as a whole, I dispute.
I’m not hostile to the point of view you represent; I believe it comes from a good place. We Americans are raised on ideas like the ones you mention. But I tend to be far more critical of them.
I support higher wages. The federal minimum wage is a disgrace. And profits are elevated for a number of reasons including wages not growing as fast as productivity.
The thing nobody expects is another 50% decline in the stock market. No one expected it in the very late 1990s or in 2008 but it happened. Some painful shock to the system is what's probably needed to recalibrate our economy in terms of greater equality.
As for 2008, it was awful that nobody was prosecuted criminally.
I appreciate reading your POV. I think we agree on a lot but perhaps not on immigration. Which is good because it's much more interesting to have different POVs!
Well stated.
My cousin had to train an outsourced cheaper hire as part of her being fired. There are thousands of similar stories.
Take away the immigrants, and you will still have company overloads strip mining communities of their labor and paying rock bottom wages. The oligarch class wants us mad at immigrants so we don’t notice their union busting, wage theft and abuse of the tax code to enrich themselves.
Mass immigration IS union busting. Ask Cesar Chavez and Bernie Sanders (before he was forced to pretend otherwise).
That was a key turning point in my regard for Bernie, an accusatory question from Ezra Klein and some tweetstorms prompting him to suddenly change views he'd been espousing for decades.
Declining population is a major economic concern around the world—China, Russia, Italy, Japan, and many other countries. Somehow in the U.S. we’re concerned about increasing population. If increased population was due to high birth rates, I don’t think we’d be seeing this concern.
I agree. But the fertility rate shows no sign of bouncing back.
South Korea is under 1!
How many green cards and paperless people work in meat packing and work as field workers. It is quite a few. 38% of meat packing workers are foreign born (WFYI-PBR/PBS) and foreign born field workers compromise almost 68% of the workforce according to National Agriculture Workers Survey (we wouldn’t be eating very well without immigrants).You sure don’t see a lot middle class teenagers working in the fields and meat packing plants. Makes me wonder how corporate farms and the meat packing industries take advantage of this especially hiring paperless people.
You have to work 10 years (40 credits) to qualify. So what happens to FICA taxes if a green card works 5 years but never comes back after that? What happens to a paperless persons FICA if am employer takes it out even if this person doesn’t have a SSN?
Over 90% of people 65 or older receive Social Security. So we better do something.
In my 2022 study of older Americans, I found that those who immigrated at some point were much more likely to be upper middle class today than the average native born American. If it’s not mentioned in Second Chance…the oldest source of immigrant resentment among all Americans is seeing immigrants come in and become wealthier or much better off than yourself. This ‘relative deprivation’ is a known trigger to jingoism, xenophobia, etc. The working class perception of wage depression caused by immigration may or may not be real…but wage stagnation is…and the solution is unionization and tighter pay regulation in all fifty states. If the white working class had decent wage growth, union protections, etc. They would not care if immigrants flooded in and some became wealthier than themselves. Note: the union labor movement in the U.S. was heavily driven by immigrants in the 1890s-1920s. Irony.
You're right that prosperity is always measured relatively as well as absolutely. It's a good point to keep in mind.
Maybe the key to reconciling your views with the “flawed logic” of the working class is to differentiate between immigrant types. It sounds like Batya’s interviewees wouldn’t object to immigrants who enter legally under a functioning system, and who make some nominal commitment to assimilating with the culture built by their predecessors. But they may object to the fact that we cannot now articulate anything that we owe our citizens that we don’t owe to non-citizens.
There are a lot of benefits that the undocumented cannot access. Most of the Covid assistance, for example.
It is important to understand that those who are considered anti-immigration are almost exclusively anti-illegal immigration. This cohort varies widely on what legal immigration should look like, from "admit only those with skills we need" "to deny only those with criminal or anti-social histories." Ultimately, true open borders cannot work since billions of people across the world would like to live in the US. Moreover, such a policy would be incompatible with the fairly robust welfare state that we now have, unlike the similarly huge influx in the late 19th and early 20th century.
Personally, I favor a fairly wide immigration gate. The immigrants who come here are mostly wonderful, unlike the fifth generation trustafarians reliably engaging in whatever the protests de jure might be. Wish we could deport that crowd.
“It is important to understand that those who are considered anti-immigration are almost exclusively anti-illegal immigration.”
Disagree. The widespread approval of Trump’s significant decrease in refugee admissions and the resistance to immigration reform that would open up more legal immigration opportunities indicate a more general antipathy towards immigration, legal or illegal.
Both parties resist true immigration reform, and the decrease in refugee admissions under the Trump administration was a proper application of the law which does not consider those fleeing poverty refugees. The Trumpers, whom I bet you know very few, do not have any animus toward more legal immigration as such. But they insist that the border be controlled, and laws enforced first.
I’m not talking about the asylum seekers at the border. I’m talking about Trump’s reduction of admissions under the U.S. Refugee Program.
And my statement about widespread resistance to legal immigration (which would include those refugees that Trump kept out) stands, regardless of how many Trumpists you think I know.
I think most people would be against anything that is illegal. Right now, the legal system is pretty restrictive. It's not enough. If we can't get our act together to have a legal system that works for the country then if someone gets through and establishes a life, I'm against deporting them. I understand there's an inherent contradiction there. But that's how i feel.
I agree. I think the debate centers on sequencing. The Left favors fixing the system before we fix the border, whereas the Right favors the reverse. Deporting millions of people is impractical and, in many cases, inhumane, but that makes controlling the border all the more urgent. Amnesty before border control was tried in the 1980s, and the promised border control never really happened. The Right is correct on sequencing. A negotiated amnesty/path to citizenship coupled with a re-negotiated understanding of legal immigration criteria can happen only after we have a social and therefore political consensus that our borders are truly secure.
I agree with that position. I think there is consensus around that type of solution from most Americans but the politics from both parties get in the way.
Yes, each party is focused on its base in two corrosive ways. Not only do they feel they must appeal to them first and foremost, but even worse they feel they benefit by keeping the issue alive and their bases animated.
I agree with your takes, and think that we need and can assimilate a certain number of Americans a year. I live in a relatively well off city in one of the most diverse counties in the US so have a slightly unusual take. I like everyone around me and what they bring to the table, and I've found some things interesting, like those from
post communist countries seem to be the biggest proponents of American values. I like the way our immigrants see America. But I also remember the year when my daughter was the token white girl in her elementary school class (best public scores around). We didn't complain, because how do you complain, and my daughter made a close friend, but it just didn't feel good being a token white family at class parties either. My town is full of skilled expats who are rightly rewarded for a job well done. My wonder, knowing that yes, schools and the government can't fix families, and Americans are sincere at trying to improve their education system. All that being true, if we didn't import all the doctors, lawyers, engineers, and executives in my town--would we have found a way to raise up some of our own citizens? My kids are old enough that I am humbled as a parent and all kids are not bright enough to do all jobs--but surely there are lots more bright kids with potential that we are not reaching because theres a LOT of visa's being given out. I know legal immigration isn't a pressing issue at the moment--but I think as more towns look like mine it will should be worthy of a serious conversation: how do we bring in everyone we need while providing opportunities to those already here? I include all the expat kids I've seen grow up here in that.
Thanks for the comment, Lynn, as well as your perspective. You ask, "how do we bring in everyone we need while providing opportunities to those already here? I include all the expat kids I've seen grow up here in that."
I think the answer is in timeframe. In the short run, an influx of immigrants may stress our systems both of infrastructure and crowding out opportunity. But in the longer run, immigrants will grow our economy and have a multiplier effect.
Well thought out and researched, David. Having been a Contractor in Texas for forty years I share most of your logic - there wouldn't be a construction industry here if it weren't for immigrants. They work long and hard, most with great attitudes, often living ten to twelve to a room, and usually sending something like 80% of their paychecks home.
One aspect not covered in your piece however, is this issue of "vetting." Legal immigration, and legitimate requests for asylum should be America's aspiration. Period. Currently we have NO IDEA who's in this country, and you're hearing more and more about violence attributable to illegals. People like FBI Chief Christopher Wray are warning that we need to prepare for a terrorist attacks generated by "cells" of illegals who have flooded into the U.S. for the sole purpose of doing us harm. I fear this is going to get ugly!
So, I'm with you all the way on allowing immigrants in to the country, PROVIDED A FORTIFIED SYSTEM OF CAREFUL VETTING is enacted, and "bad actors" are deported. Sounds ambitious, doesn't it? America is filled with great minds - surely we should be able to identify greatness and harness the brain power to solve this crisis!
Repeating my comment from above and agreeing with that aspiration. But we can't seem to figure it out.
I think most people would be against anything that is illegal. Right now, the legal system is pretty restrictive. It's not enough. If we can't get our act together to have a legal system that works for the country then if someone gets through and establishes a life, I'm against deporting them. I understand there's an inherent contradiction there. But that's how i feel.
Perhaps I'm delusional, but I cling to hope that we can figure this immigration thing out (probably can't, too many political hands in the pie!) and seal the border! Certainly we can quite doing stupid stuff like flying 30,000 people in on a wish and a promise, or threatening to allow 100,000 Gazan's in on humanitarian visas. I'm for immigration if it's done in such a way that it doesn't pose a threat to the fabric of our country.
i love the piece. this week I was invited to Hampton Bays High School to attend a special ESL program. As a project to learn and write in English they paired up and wrote "My Story".
Like Samuel they were saddened to leave their family. Their trips required great courage. They all shared in the American Dream. One of the kids, like Jose, came alone. He has started a lanscaping business, does carpentry and supports himself. He dreams of college and he is one of our scholarship applicants. Like Samuel they share the dream of a good life and are willing to work hard to attain it.
I have always welcomed immigrants and taken pride in my immigrant ancestors' (including my father's) contributions to building this country and making it so culturally rich and diverse. But I honestly have no idea how an immigrant coming without resources can make it here in this day and age. So many of us who were born here are barely hanging on, even with expensive educations and good credit holding us up. I know a lot of people who are making the reverse move--to Mexico or Bali or Thailand--where one can actually afford to live with a higher standard of living. People fly to Thailand for dental work, for heaven's sake. The catch though is that to live there, you have to be earning in dollars from clients or a remote job back in the US. There is so much that I've always loved and appreciated about being an American, but I feel like our nation is going down the tubes. It's become a place where billionaires seem to care only about keeping the rest of us as destitute and struggling as possible. Like so many people I know, I'm looking for an out.
I guess everything is relative. People come here from places that make America look like a wonderland even if they are without resources.
Then you have the movement to relocate for people who are comparing how they could live in Thailand or Italy to here. I'm guessing you're read Kirsten Powers who has written about her move to Italy and its advantages. She makes a very strong case.
it's interesting to compare these two "migrations." Even if they are in opposite directions, they both make sense.
The problem is, it *looks* like a wonderland--until they get here and try to make a living on minimum wage. These days, you can't do that without a lot of support--meaning other people to split your living expenses with. At $800/month for just a room in a house, the situation is pretty bleak. This is why I'm a full-time, nomadic housesitter. I can't afford rent.
I do see people talking about living in Italy, not sure if Kirsten Powers was one of them. I have considered it myself, but it's a hard transition if you don't speak Italian or have an EU passport.
If they're coming from a place where there is no rule of law, NYC can seem like at least a haven. And I know there are supportive communities in NYC that make life easier. Everything is relative. I remember being in Cambodia many years ago and talking to men who grew up during the Khmer Rouge. I asked them about government corruption and they said we're just happy that wen we wake up, there are no dead bodies lying in the street.
I thought we were just talking about people who migrate because of poverty, not political oppression. Physical danger is a whole other category.
BTW there are lots of videos on YouTube by immigrants about why they are leaving the US and Canada and how the US and Canada compare to countries with developing economies.
I wasn't differentiating, but i assume the majority are coming to America for economic opportunity reasons.
This is all..well, mostly...true at far as it goes. Fertility rates, for example, while declining among white Europeans, especially in Germany, are exploding among non-white races, for example, in the Middle East. That population growth in, say, Syria, increases demand for resources that, without commensurate in supply, become increasingly scarce and puts increasing strain on the population, leading to conflict and immigration. Gaza is another perfect example. Already one of the most densely populated places on Earth, with a birthrate that would make it only more so, how long, even without Hamas, before they tried to expand their borders? Europe and the United States are faced with enormous numbers of people fleeing the repression that is a direct result of scarcity, too many for the more mature regimes to absorb. And don't believe for one second that there is not a significant racial aspect to the resistance among the worker class. They just don't want to admit it, which is why the argument of "they're destroying our culture and our history," has been heard throughout Europe and in the United States. Compress any substance and it gets hotter--cram more and more people into smaller spaces and the same thing will happen. And this doesn't even take in the pressure that an increasing human population puts on the environment, which means food and water supply, and areas of the world that are fast becoming uninhabitable. So the question of whether America has too many people is too limited--the real question is how the planet can absorb the increasing dominance of a single species that may growing too fast to survive.
I suppose no one is going to admit to an author that they're racist! But at least that was the claim. And the author interviewed a racially diverse group of people. I just thought of the movie Crash, which certainly shows people at their worst.
Crash was terrific. Yeah, I'm always skeptical of surveys. Not only are replies often untrustworthy, but the questions are often phrased...or delivered...to provoke a response that may be misleading. But the question of how legitimate is a society's desire to maintain its culture and traditions is a good one, with complexities that neither side generally acknowledges. I had a long talk about that a few years with a Middle East former ambassador and she eventually admitted that the right wing in, say, France had a point. Even if you disagree, it's a mistake, as it usually is, to simply sneer at views you don't agree with.
Notwithstanding the racial hell-scape of Crash, I have the impression that American cities have done a better job than most countries in terms of integration. But my perspective may be widely askew on this.
Most other white countries or most other non-white countries? Just came back from Europe and Paris, Vienna, and Munich seemed pretty much the same as cities in the US. Not certain about, say, Tokyo, Beijing, and Mumbai. The issue here, as with some many problems, is tribalism, the need for people to clump into like groups. I've been writing about that for two decades and notion is finally coming into some favor as an explanatory vehicle.