Immigration and desired peak population (money, America, states, business)
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It makes no sense that we have exported millions of jobs to cheap labor nations like Mexico and China yet we keep importing millions of people with high fertility rates while the jobs are gone.
The elites want unlimited numbers of low wage peons, they want the kind of worker content to sleep 14 men to a crowded apartment floor, they want factory workers happy to make $6 an hour even in cold regions of the country where they can't afford heat in the winter.
Legal immigration needs to be reformed so that having one relative living here gets one in very easily while capable, self-reliant, educated types are kept out.
As it stands now, someone can be elderly, infirm, incapable of working for a living and a relative here can easily sponsor them to come in and in just 5 years have them on SSI, food stamps and Medicaid. Yet people who are hard working and capable are not allowed to come.
Lol- most of Western Europe thinks the USA should polute and consume And BTW I don't think you should have unlimited immigration but the current system stinks and does not support diversity.
Maybe people are getting sick and tired of having "Diversity" shoved down their throats..just maybe.
Quote:
Originally Posted by malamute
It makes no sense that we have exported millions of jobs to cheap labor nations like Mexico and China yet we keep importing millions of people with high fertility rates while the jobs are gone.
The elites want unlimited numbers of low wage peons, they want the kind of worker content to sleep 14 men to a crowded apartment floor, they want factory workers happy to make $6 an hour even in cold regions of the country where they can't afford heat in the winter.
Legal immigration needs to be reformed so that having one relative living here gets one in very easily while capable, self-reliant, educated types are kept out.
As it stands now, someone can be elderly, infirm, incapable of working for a living and a relative here can easily sponsor them to come in and in just 5 years have them on SSI, food stamps and Medicaid. Yet people who are hard working and capable are not allowed to come.
Brilliant post. Spot on.
I would add to the part in bold...years ago we went through HELL with the INS to get my British husband here from England. He was a brilliant computer programmer. It seems that if you're a white immigrant-wannbe, you can forget it. They gave us SO much crap and misinformation, wrong forms, wrong line filled out on a form etc etc...after telling us over the phone to do exactly the above.
My husband died suddenly one day still awaiting his work authorization. I remember getting yet another idiotic form letter from those moronic a-holes at the INS saying that we had filled something out wrong yet again.
I was in fresh grief at the time and not exactly feeling generous towards those people. I seriously had to hold myself back from sending them a letter that likely would have landed me in prison.
And BTW I don't think you should have unlimited immigration but the current system stinks and does not support diversity.
No it does not. BY FAR most legal (and of course illegal) immigrants come from Mexico.
That's because family chain migration is what's encouraged. Someone in Norway without a close family member already here has little chance of coming in.
We get some good immigrants coming on work visa, and there is some diversity in the work-visa immigrants but that's all. The family sponsorship kind of immigration is not about diversity whatsoever.
So of course any lame brain knows that massive immigration = massive population growth.
My experience has been that people
do NOT make the connection between
immigration and subsequent crowding.. Go
out an ask them and you'll see
(as I did when I did interviews for a
local access cable show).
Half the people you talk to will say
they've flown over Montana, driven
through country sections of Maine, etc.
and see plenty of land available for
hordes of people. The other half will
say they don't care if America becomes
as crowded as Indian and Chine--evidently
they assume all that will mean is that the suburbs
will become just a bit more crowded at rush hour.
Until we change these attitudes, wanton overcrowding
of America will be perceived as healthy
and an inviolable American right.
Nail on the head. I suppose they think that all these people will pile into everywhere, except where they live. Then they do and the people just move on to someplace less crowded and the cycle goes on. And that is how population growth patterns happen in America. Unless this pattern is stopped, immigration should stop.
P.S.; NO WAY, THEN WE WOULD BE INFRINGING ON PEOPLES RIGHTS!! All I can say is, then what?
I would add to the part in bold...years ago we went through HELL with the INS to get my British husband here from England. He was a brilliant computer programmer. It seems that if you're a white immigrant-wannbe, you can forget it. .[/quote]
You didn't by any chance live in California at the time? I was out
there at about the time of the Reagan Amnesty and watched
how a white Canadian with a skill faced all sorts of immigration
problems that I get the feeling ( a deep feeling to be sure) a lot of no-skills Third Worlders were not facing.
I don't profess to know the inner-workings of the U.S Immigration Service
in the U.S.(perhaps Mexicans with no skills are hounded, too)) but especially in a P.C. age, this would not be the first time a bureaucracy seized on safe, easy prey (in this case educated whites, playing by at least some of the First World's rules, as opposed to harder-to-track, more wily Third Worlders) to cover their abject failures in general and to make themselves look good.
As you say, the birth rate is around replacement. I would guess it will fall below replacement as it has in much of Europe, in Canada, in Japan ... so modest immigration will maybe be needed one day to keep us at the same level. That's probably after 2050 though ...
I'm also thinking with the improvement in economies around the world, and the falling birth rates in much of the developing world (Mexico, Brazil, etc.), immigration will decrease and we'll also see more immigration both ways - I have friends who have moved to Japan, Australia, Argentina, etc. I think we'll always have some immigration as the world becomes more open-minded.
I myself enjoy a cosmopolitan atmosphere and think of all the great "imports" we've had since my parents' day - healthier food choices, sushi, yoga, acupuncture, salsa dancing, new ways of thinking, whatever.
I'm not sure the government can set an ideal target for population as its dependent on so many variables. This recession has slowed family formation, birth rates and immigration rates, for example.
Anyway, didn't the census bureau estimate we would hit 400 million by 2050, but I think this will have to be revised downwards given the trends I mention. I'm OK with 400 million, that's a 30% increase, sure. IMO we need to think about allowing for less sprawl and more compact cities that people want to live in - with transit instead of more highways. I think my generation (30s) and the younger folks even more so, are often more comfortable with living within our means than in demanding a McMansion and 2 SUV's
While certainly we should think about this issue, I know some people who said we should've never grown beyond 120 million - which I guess means neither you nor I should be here!
As for the environment, people will still be here on the earth whether they live in the U.S. or elsewhere.
You didn't by any chance live in California at the time? I was out
there at about the time of the Reagan Amnesty and watched
how a white Canadian with a skill faced all sorts of immigration
problems that I get the feeling ( a deep feeling to be sure) a lot of no-skills Third Worlders were not facing.
I don't profess to know the inner-workings of the U.S Immigration Service
in the U.S.(perhaps Mexicans with no skills are hounded, too)) but especially in a P.C. age, this would not be the first time a bureaucracy seized on safe, easy prey (in this case educated whites, playing by at least some of the First World's rules, as opposed to harder-to-track, more wily Third Worlders) to cover their abject failures in general and to make themselves look good.
>>>I'm also thinking with the improvement in economies around the world, and the falling birth rates in much of the developing world (Mexico, Brazil, etc.), immigration will decrease and we'll also see more immigration both ways - I have friends who have moved to Japan, Australia, Argentina, etc. I think we'll always have some immigration as the world becomes more open-minded.<<<<
Is it a realistic view to think impoverished people from the breeding pots of the world will still not want to come to what is, in the future, (it is hoped) First World America?
>>>I'm not sure the government can set an ideal target for population as its dependent on so many variables. This recession has slowed family formation, birth rates and immigration rates, for example.
My feeling is Who else but the government can set the very clear numerical rates of immigration which very directly affect the level of population in the U.S.? I’d like to see an non-govenrmental agency of Enraged Citizens do it but how likely is that in the near future?
>>>>Anyway, didn't the census bureau estimate we would hit 400 million by 2050, but I think this will have to be revised downwards given the trends I mention.<<<<<
IMO we’ll be lucky to keep it to 400 million by 2050. Our current guiding principle for immigration appears to be: Futz around at trying to solve the illegal problem, and if we should accomplish that, let’s for the next thirty years let in a high number of people to prove, in spite of our "harsh" treatment of illegals, that we love immigrants and are not prejudiced. By that time, children used to the crowding of 2012 will be running things--their view being that all new immigrants flock to the open fields of Montana and that India-like crowding, found in such an exotic land, can’t be that bad here-- along with ethnic groups who have grown up with the post-1965 America immigration ethic of Either you let more of our breeding pot numbers in or we vote you out of office on the grounds of prejudice (my readings indicate–please correct me if I’m wrong- that virtually no European ethnic groups in the past acted in a similar manner).
>>> I'm OK with 400 million, that's a 30% increase, sure. IMO we need to think about allowing for less sprawl and more compact cities that people want to live in - with transit instead of more highways. I think my generation (30s) and the younger folks even more so, are often more comfortable with living within our means than in demanding a McMansion and 2 SUV's<<<
I think 300 million is enough Americans. Some scientists are telling us we are heading toward a crisis regarding water and arable land. Even if, as is so often hoped by people living in a Fool’s Paradise, we are able to pull a rabbit out of a hat regarding this matter, how smelly
must be the rabbit we do pull out. Why get close to such a crisis in a land thought to be beautiful —i.e., filled with natural beauty and not crapped up by over-population? To me one reason the American Dream is dying is
because we can no longer think of America as a country that considers
quality of life when dealing with population issues. We seem determined
to over-populate the country, because either by default,philosophical sloppiness, political neglect, or because of a poorly informed populace (or by a combination of these things)we imagine it's un-American to limit immigration.
Is it a realistic view to think impoverished people from the breeding pots of the world will still not want to come to what is, in the future, (it is hoped) First World America?
One big source of immigration, Mexico, is a middle-income country with an improving economy and a declining fertility rate, now around 2.3 per woman. Brazil, as an example, is below replacement rate on births, I believe, and also has a growing economy. With our current recession, immigration to America has really declined - particularly for illegals as there are so few jobs.
Will we see more immigration from other parts of the world? Perhaps.
No it does not. BY FAR most legal (and of course illegal) immigrants come from Mexico.
That's because family chain migration is what's encouraged. Someone in Norway without a close family member already here has little chance of coming in.
We get some good immigrants coming on work visa, and there is some diversity in the work-visa immigrants but that's all. The family sponsorship kind of immigration is not about diversity whatsoever.
The quota by country of origin is exactly the same for all countries. Why more Mexicans than Scandinavians apply is not a matter of the system, but of basic living conditions. Scandinavian countries score better than the US in every living conditions category, while Mexico scores way lower. Guess which of these people will max out their quota. Bingo!
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