Immigration Is The Solution
One of my favorite Wall Street economists called me up after the close today (after the market plunged in disappointment over the Fed's $400 billion "twist."), and exclaimed, "We could fix most of our problems by doubling or tripling legal immigration quotas." My response was "Amen." It would provide an instant boost of demand for housing and other durables, and it would bring in more skilled workers. Yes, it would bring in more workers at a time of record unemployment, but the skills mismatch in our economy has got to be overcome somehow, and this would do it. We're a nation of immigrants. It's only a question of how far back you have to go to find them. When he asked whether Congress would pass immigration reform in the foreseeable future, I had to admit, the answer is "No."
Skills Missmatch?
"but the skills mismatch in our economy has got to be overcome somehow, and this would do it."
If I read Krugman correctly, he says that if there is a skills mismatch, there should be sectors that are seeing wage increases as employers try to find those with the right skills. Is there some data Krugman missed?
Maybe you mean that the new skills demanded are not available as they were not needed in the past? The new skills requirement came on suddenly with no forewarning.
MMMMM? Very Interesting.
Skills Mismatch
Check out this Economist article, this speech by Minneapolis Fed President Narayana Kocherlakota, and this article on the substitution of foreign registered nurses for American nurses in U.S. hospitals.
Skills mismatch? (Also)
I'd like to hear your reasoning for why you say we have a skills mismatch. As YABW says, if there is a skills mismatch wouldn't there be skills that are in such demand that their wages are increasing?
Interesting topic
A couple of things. I think your economist friend is overstating the net result of increased immigration. From most of the economic reports that I've glanced at in the past which I'd consider non partisan the net economic result could be positive I definitely wouldn't consider it a boon especially in these troubled times we are in now. ( Not saying it wouldn't help I just don't believe it would help it would even come fractionally close to solving our problems )
But it is real interesting because my girlfriend's mother just became a US citizen 2 months ago and her brother ( a computer tech guy ) is in the process of trying to come here.
BUT to raise quotas ( I'm not against it and am actually for it under certain conditions ) I would only say yet to it under the following conditions. Must be skilled labor with college education. Must have let's say 50-75k deposited in a US bank before hand to show they can support themselves for a period of time. Also I want an age cap restriction unless that person is a direct relative ( parent,brother sister ) of someone already living here. No offense to the over 65 crowd but we have enough of you ( I say that jokingly ) but seriously we don't need more.
We need people who can directly contribute to the economy. Now if someone has a few million dollars and they are over 65 I'm willing to make exceptions to my rule.
Work on getting all the illegal people here legal ( deportation is ridiculous at this point ) before we let any more unskilled workers into the country.
So the end result while I'm for increased quotas under conditions I don't think it will solve our problems.
Nice topic though Pete
What skills mismatch?
Yes, it would bring in more workers at a time of record unemployment, but the skills mismatch in our economy has got to be overcome somehow, and this would do it.
Leaving aside the blindingly obvious solution of training or re-training our own damn citizens, there's very little evidence that there's some kind of huge skills mismatch out there. Sure, some employers are complaining they can't get the employees they want. But what they're really complaining about is that they can't get pre-trained employees at the price they want. And a lot of employers are making things worse by insisting on hiring only people who currently have jobs.
And you two want to "solve" our problems by increasing immigration? Cripes.
But this time let the
But this time let the physicians immigrate and the lawyers. The manual laborers have experienced enough competition.
Doctors
We need a large influx of doctors to drive up competition and drive down medical care costs.
We have enough doctors
More doctors means more medical costs, not less. We have enough doctors. What we need is less sickness.
H1B Cap Not Even Met Yet
http://www.h1bvisa101.com/h1b-visa-2012-cap-count
In years past the cap was met on the first day of eligibility, but in the last two years it took 9-10 months. It has not yet been met this year. One could argue that the cap is not necessary as employers have reduced their demand due to the economic conditions. But to argue that quotas should be eliminated when the H1B cap has not even been met doesn't make any sense.
Skilled workers are going to
Skilled workers are going to immigrate in large numbers for low-paying jobs to buy housing they won't be able to afford? As others have pointed out, the "skills mismatch" is illusory; it's all about keeping wages low. Employers (and Wall Street economists--when one of those guys refers to "our" problems he doesn't mean you or me) want surplus labor to keep pressure on wages and corporate profits high. Even the illegals aren't sneaking over the border any more.
Wage deflation is not the path forward to prosperity.
Immigration not the solution
There is a viable solution to immigration. We can export vacant, boarded up, foreclosed or underwater homes. . . Oh, wait, the xenophobic alternative immigrastion is sub-optimal?
You guys are living in a dream world
I am in California. Full of legal and illegal so called immigrants. This state is a complete wreck. Schools, roads, housing are all a disaster. They come here and do not learn the language, nor do they melt into the American culture. They bring their homeland flags, and speak what ever their home language is. Have chicken and dog fights for fun. How about a nice goat head BBQ? They do that!
How about a nice revenge killing for dating a Jew?
You want more of the same?? Easy to think that if your not the one being over run and having to hear many different language's every day. Learn English? Why when the local hospital has 63 people on call to interpret for you?
Its bad and getting worse.
You people are the problem!
What are you all in DC
What are you all in DC smoking? You folks are completely incapable of managing current immigration policy. That's why we have tens of millions of "undocumented" -- nb even the politically correct term for them indicates that they are IGNORING federal policy/rules re immigration/employment/etc -- which further indicates that the federal govt is already completely and totally incompetent at everything remotely involved with immigration. It'd at least be cheaper to outsource "immigration policy" to a hamster. Wouldn't even have to be a living hamster.
Do we need more skilled immigrants to compete with CEO's, DC czars, tenured wonks, doctors, Wall St economists, and all the other overpaid protected kleptocrats sucking at the govt teat and drive down their salary levels? I suppose. But those immigrants don't exist. And even if they do, you DC kleptocrats will never allow them in because the last thing you want is competition among the kleptocrats. That's why the govt has created all the laws that protect those kleptocrats from competition from citizens.
Plus, those sorts of wanna-be-immigrant kleptocrats are doing very well in their own countries thank you very much. They ain't the "poor and huddled masses yearning to breathe free" and the "poor and huddled" don't become "skilled" simply by filling out paperwork for some federal bureaucrat who has already proven they are incompetent at managing even unskilled immigration. And now you want to give these incompetent DC clowns the authority to decide what skills the economy needs?
Ellis Island exhibits
I was stricken by the overlap between times when the US has been the most restrictive of immigration and the hard times of low growth.
Here we have housing doing a slow crash and burn, while median incomes are still too low to support current housing prices without an assumption that prices will at least be stable and be expected to rise. On top of this we have a demographic shift which would benefit from allowing a number of young, ambitious people to immigrate.
This could be the most important time in the past 100 years for the US to ramp up immigration, where what we're doing is shutting it down and trying to send illegals home.
More idiotic nonsense from
More idiotic nonsense from economists and political pundits who are only worried about stock prices and making sure debt is not defaulted on both for their own benefit. Let's only increase immigration for these two groups until their wages fall to $10,000 per year with no benefits and make sure prices are flat or higher. Let's see how they like a lower standard of living.
Current Policy is Backwards
In reality our current policy of Wink wink come on in we wont send you back. Attracts low skilled workers who add little but a willingness to work at jobs that inner city welfare recipients will not. To promote growth we need skilled scientists and potential owners of businesses who typically try to enter legally and who we restrict. We should free up legal immigration, with perhaps a way to "buy in" with money or marketable skills. This would help immesurably, but it conflicts with Obama's warped sense that poor people are worth more Federal Support than middle income or rich. Is this because he sees more losers to vote Democratic in his favored group?
have you ever visited a university and looked at who is there?
Or looked at any engineering department? Visit any research university or medical school and take notice of who have the PHD's and are beginning to take all the jobs- it is asians and indians? There is a glut and they are willing to work for less and are driving down the pay levels that normally would be required to keep skilled staff. These would be middle class jobs except for the stupid policy of visas for people who get MD's in China (an undergraduate degree by the way ) The best and the brightest will return to their own countries because they are more appreciated there and we get stuck with a large pool that drives down wages and discourages any americans from getting degrees in biology and chemistry because the pay is too low.
Open immigration, but they must start a business
and hire a minimum of 5 currently unemployed people, and the business has to remain open for a minimum of 5 years, then they would automatically gain citizenship. We don't need more workers; we need job creation.
No more immigration
Forgive the sarcasm here, but I wonder if in the 18th and 19th century the native Americans thought immigration was a good idea. America is, indeed, a nation of immigrants. Those people decimated the native population and consigned them to poverty and misery for generations. Immigration is great... for the immigrants?
Now, the wealthy elites are worried that they have looted America to the point that they have exhausted the masses (again!) and now want to replace the less desirable natives with a new wave of super-smart and advanced people from around the world. Yeah... No.