One problem that Israel will is that the ones doing a lot of kids are the super-religious Jews. Those people are less economically productive ( and very often a drain). We will have too see what happens when there are too much of them.
Possibly. I think this future is escapable if we choose to build economic focal points in the north and south. It's not really that there isn't enough space, we are just highly concentrated into Tel Aviv and its satellite towns.
You also need to have a nice and secure water supply for the Negev Desert in the south, no?
Anyway, I'd enjoy seeing my birth city of Beersheba massively increase its population, even though I myself no longer live in Israel and haven't for the last 23 years.
Off-topic, but what are your thoughts on the Grandchild Clause of Israel's Law of Return? AFAIK, Israel gets a lot of its new immigrants through this clause. This is especially true for its ex-USSR immigrants. With widespread intermarriage in the USSR, it's unsurprising that nowadays only 30% or less of all ex-USSR olim are actually halakhically Jewish. But in a substantive sense, there isn't all that much difference between ex-USSR olim who are products of 2+ generations of intermarriage and who are halakhic Jews or children of halakhic Jews vs. grandchildren of halakhic Jews. In all of these cases, they would have probably generally considered themselves (and possibly both of their parents as well) to be Russians/Ukrainians/Belarusians in their birth countries and Jews or at least quasi-Jews in Israel. (AFAIK, a lot of the "Others" in Israel do identify as Jewish even though Israeli law does not recognize them as such.)
BTW, do you think that it was a mistake on Israel’s part not to prolong its war of independence and not to at least conquer the southern West Bank in 1949?
In regards to Californication, why not simply push to elect more rational Democrats in place of either loony Democrats or Republicans? Rick Caruso in Los Angeles, for instance. You are correct that California still works OK because it still attracts a lot of foreign cognitive elites, which is good.
In regards to banlieuefication, Yes, there aren't really any benefits to natives from this. A lot for migrants themselves, but good luck selling it to natives when they themselves don't benefit. In addition to the crime, chaos, and disorder, there is also sometimes terrorism from these places, which can be especially nasty if people are murdered for engaging in "Islamophobic" speech. Some Islamic doctrines badly need reform, and whenever people who attempt to nudge Islam in the right direction get murdered, it becomes even harder to reform the Muslim faith in a more positive direction. It's an argument in favor of having the West admit liberal reformist Muslims but not generic, more fundamentalist Muslims.
In regards to housing specifically, you can loosen zoning regulations and build much more high-density housing. Apartment buildings with dozens of floors, for instance. You could even make the various apartments there large and luxurious. You could also try passing legislation that would restrict the number of tenants that are allowed to live in a single apartment or house based on its size, though it might be politically and/or legally/constitutionally difficult. But it's quite interesting that even a country such as Israel, with New Jersey's size and also with a lot of desert, will be able to sustain over 20 million people by the late 21st century.
As for economic dead weights, how about either incentivizing (with money) them not to breed or at least making it easy and cheap for them to breed eugenically?
Well, in regards to the last part, a lot of prominent voices (intellectuals and pundits) appear to be talking about problematic zoning and arguing in favor of the reform of restrictive zoning laws.
I've never seen the people in my towns zoning meetings discuss Matty Yglesias or any of his ideas.
I think the biggest obstacle to getting rid of zoning is that who your neighbors are matters. The more shitty neighbors, the more you're going to rely on zoning to keep them out. Immigration increases the number of shitty neighbors.
Also, the single biggest aid to zoning reform is school choice. School choice means you no longer have to care who lives in your kids school zone, which is a lot wider than your neighborhood. Immigrants vote left and therefore oppose school choice.
As long as the left opposes things that make it easier for people to live together and self segregate, I do not expect them to achieve any meaningful zoning reform because property owners will eventually rally to protect core interests.
You have not given reasons as to why those immigrants vote left a lot. Maybe it could be because of hostility by nationalists/nativists and right wing of the host country.
In mechanism 2, you say - "[...] immigrant might contribute to the economy by working, or he might decide to just get money by robbing people, either on his own, or by using the benefits system as his proxy. Since crime has a very bad effect on the economy, not only directly, but by imposing limitless quantities of security costs and deterring investment, even a minority of immigrants who live by crime could potentially outweigh the economic benefits of those that work."
but you don't cite a good empirical study here and you should cite some empirical data about mild to moderate increase in crime rate outweighing the economic benefits of those immigrants that work because Mexico which has enormously high crime rate than Russia was actually (before the Russia-Ukraine war) had nominal GDP per capita near to Russia - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Mexico
Further, you are not thinking about the reasons why those migrants are committing crimes and you are not looking at the incentives they have. For example, Alex Nowrasteh talks about how to reduce migrant and refugee crimes here - https://youtu.be/Vm9LJFRRw74?t=844
Some governments have had strong restrictive policies on migrants with respect to jobs and employment (see the video for evidence for this claim).
Note also that denying refugees is not as easy as you think just based on short term fiscal burden. You need to show that those refugees would decrease the total utility in the world by more amount relative to the counterfactual scenario in which refugees just stay in their country in misery and suffer and die there (and you cannot just discount the suffering of those human beings you consider low IQ). Refugees are fleeing from their countries because of horrors in their own nations happening. Even if they are a burden for short term, denying them seem to require stronger justification precisely because denying them would mean a near death sentence to them. Denying refugees from modern day Haiti seems like an obvious human rights violation. Alex Nowrasteh has also talked about decreasing refugee crimes in the host country in the video I mentioned.
In mechanism 3, you cite a cultural critic and a doctor/psychiatrist instead of an economist or economists who are researching economic effects of immigration for years and/or decades. This is not good.
Housing crisis is government regulation issue. Bryan Caplan's new book talks about this in detail. YIMBY movement by left liberal capitalists is there to spread awareness of the harmfulness of government regulations(which they consider excess regulations) - https://www.cato.org/books/build-baby-build
I have read Emil Kirkegaard, Noah Carl, and your criticism of open borders or near open borders and I just find these criticisms to be very bad. Also, Alex Nowrasteh also just released a paper examining crime rates of illegal migrants in USA - https://www.cato.org/policy-analysis/illegal-immigrant-murderers-texas-2013-2022
Bryan Caplan and many open borders advocates are totally cool with a few or even some restrictions when you have good reasons, for example, I would agree with a few or some restrictions of immigration to Israel from its neighboring countries that are hostile to it. Israel should still allow much easier immigration from Japan, South Korea, Ukraine, India, and all the allied states. Now, open borders with a few restrictions is still nearly-open borders or 98% open borders. Open borders with some heavy restrictions from hostile countries would be like at least 85% open borders. See Bryan Caplan's 'Open Borders' book chapter "Keyhole Solutions" for evidence for my above claim about open borders advocates being pretty pragmatic rather than dogmatic. Ilya Somin has a very similar chapter in his own book 'free to move'.
Note also that open borders advocates are not just Bryan Caplan (a very respected economist and professor at George Mason University), Matthew Adelstein(Bentham's Bulldog, a philosophy undergrad at University of Michigan), but open borders supporters include Ilya Somin (law professor), Jason Brennan (political philosopher), Alex Nowrasteh(economic analyst with Masters in economic history and bachelor's in economics), Benjamin Powell (PhD in economics and professor of economics at Texas Tech University), Chandran Kuthakas (Dphil in politics from Oxford University and Kukathas holds a chair in Political Theory in the Department of Government at the London School of Economics.), John Cochrane (economist, Stanford University), Jason Furman (economist, Harvard University). See my book collection substack post for evidence for above claims.
(also see my book collection on my substack that I linked to you above). Proving majority of economists wrong is going to be a massively hard task. You need to do Albert Einstein level stuff in economics field to do that. If most economists support 80% of open borders, then that is a significant improvement compared to the status quo.
1) I don't find the argument from vicarious narcissism to be very persuasive. Either Jews benefitted the countries they immigrated to, or they didn't. If they did, it's no argument to bring in groups who don't; if they didn't, it's an argument to be extra precautious.
2) You 'keyhole solutions' never actually happen because policy elites could not care less what libertarians think and only use you to promote open borders.
3) It doesn't matter why immigrants vote Left. If you are arguing that immigration can work as long as we find some magic way not to make people have nativist sentiments, that just means it doesn't work.
Also, you are hastily generalizing the groups here. Many Germans in the 1930s were not cool with the Jews. Some Germans did elect Hitler and then Nazi Germany happened and holocaust happened. Denying the Germans with those Nazi attitudes from immigrating to friendly Jewish states or even a majority Jewish state like Israel would be understandable (Chill or cool Germans if they supported Jews and were cool with them at that time should be allowed to immigrate). But now, the modern day Germans are not equivalent to 1930s Germans. So, denying the modern day Germans from immigrating to Israel who are chill with Israel is bad. Similarly, the other groups that have caused some problems (and note that - minority of them do) might be causing problems contingently or temporarily. Even now, most of Islamic refugees are not mass rapists and/or murderers. Most people in Morocco, Kuwait, etc. are not murderers. Most Muslim people are neither murderers nor rapists. So, if minority of them cause some problems, then you should also see the benefits that majority provide. And then carefully check the results after doing meticulous cost-benefit analysis based on both the goods that migrants do and the bads that migrants do.
If the majority are not providing benefits or unable to provide them because of horrible government policy (that Alex Nowrasteh talks about in the video that I linked to you in my first comment), then Jews would fare no better than Muslims because it not their fault that the government is treating them extremely poorly.
I also want other people to see the comment of the author here. Notice that the author replied to me within 15 minutes after my first, in-depth, critical comment, and note again that my comment is filled with many many sources, links, and evidence that experts from multiple different fields produced and researched for years. Notice that the author does not carefully and patiently read, engage, and/or evaluate the evidence/links/sources that I showed to him. He quickly replies with three half-baked (or even less than half-baked) points. I also wrote a quick response to him. But even that quick response by me to this author has at least 1 important link or source for my claim that legal immigration to USA is nearly impossible.
Here's some further info on immigration history (to the author and to his/her/their readers who care about truth) -
I'll be honest, I only responded because more comments makes the blog look better. You obviously are well-read and intelligent, but you would benefit from a writing course to present your arguments clearly, and also probably Adderall.
I do have anxiety and OCD issues but I am able to control them quite well and function normally. Note that the adderall is for ADHD and narcolepsy. I apologize for not presenting my arguments clearly. I believe that the book and article collection I have would give you much clearer arguments than me. So, I just recommend reading those. I believe that you don't have bad intentions and you genuinely care about other sentient beings and want to reduce suffering and promote happiness in the world. I hope I am right about you that you are a good person under the mask of anonymity. Please read those books and articles. Have a good day! God bless you!
People like you are being used here. Not me. Status-quo bias, in-group bias, and scope neglect are straight forward issues with nativists and nationalists. They are more likely to be affected by cognitive biases than open borders advocates.
3) If you read the books, articles, papers I mentioned, then you would understand that I support immigration even if there are nativist sentiments. I am not looking for a magic cure for nativism. My point was that if immigrants vote left and the reason is nationalists, then the main problem is nationalism and not immigration.
1) The idea that I should view the issue of immigration through the prism of past Jewish immigration. I assumed you brought this up because I am Jewish.
2) The reality is that the people who want more immigration (the Left) do not want any of your keyhole solutions to the problems cause by immigration. They do not like you, they do not respect you, they would be happy to throw you in prison.
3) Which is the 'main problem' is a metaphysical question. More relevant is which problem is easier to solve. I don't know of any way of making people less nativist other than relentless totalitarian indoctrination, but I do know of a very easy way of not having immigrants - don't let them in!
You are correct that generally leftists want not only easier immigration but even more generous welfare system that would create bad incentives(we know this but leftists are ignorant about this somewhat).
Some leftists are genuine and do change their views once you talk about the incentive issues and educate them about economics.
4 or 5 years ago, I was a pretty sincere socialist but I changed my views when I encountered good arguments made by people in good faith. I also found that those leftists had no good plan of socialism and it just felt like they were just there for vibes and not genuinely making the world a happier place. The leftists were not properly addressing the arguments of Friedrich Hayek, Milton Friedman. I also read a little bit of public choice economics and that made a lot of sense. Then I encountered Michael Huemer, David Friedman, Jason Brennan, and other libertarian capitalists who are not dogmatic absolute deontologists and they made fantastic case for capitalism.
I am also pretty pro-israel based on what I read and watched so far.
I am pretty right wing but I dislike nationalism based on reading history, Ilya Somin, and Alex Nowrasteh.
Hanania’s main point is that “more diversity will increase social tensions, enough to continue making new expansions of the welfare state impossible.” Seems plausible enough, though, admittedly, California looks like a counterexample.
Indeed! Hanania's position is even more reasonable, since the "social tension" isn't actual tension between individuals (I think Hanania chose his words poorly there), but rather a decrease in feelings of kinship on a national level. Immigration to a country, and the diversity that it brings, can make people in the country feel less sympathetic towards fellow citizens of their country in the abstract, leading to lower support for a welfare state.
That's definitely not the same thing as a decrease in social cohesion, as people probably think of the term, generally.
People can still maintain relatively segregated social circles and maintain higher levels of trust and cohesion within those circles than outside those circles. They aren't going to stop hanging out with their friends, just because Juan moves in down the road.
They can even potentially maintain the same levels of trust when they interact with individual outsiders (he seems like a like a fine one). They might just feel less positive abut government programs supporting generic 'others,' since they feel less connected to those others.
Furthermore, Hananaia didn't say that increasing immigration or diversity necessarily decreases social cohesion. Rather he said the opposite - that it isn't trivially true that increasing immigration leads to anti-market policies, as is often asserted.
The above is one explanation for why the former might not imply the latter, but it's not the only one presented in the article. The article also points out that public sentiment is already very widely anti-market, without that translating into policy, suggesting the relationship between the two hardly matches what one would assume intuitively.
The article also discusses why the US is uniquely pro-market, which is an interesting question in and of itself to which that article makes a valuable contribution.
Related to my other comment discussing issues with the post, in this Note: https://substack.com/@mascilbinah/note/c-92394573, you promote an article on immigration that seems to contain a number of issues:
First, it ignores the compositional issue.
Second, it conflates economic level, with economic growth. Specifically, the key diagram comparing Canadian and American growth states that it's indexed to 1995, but doesn't state that different indices are used for the US and Canada, since the US was already far richer in 1995 (it sort of alludes to that, by referencing Canada previously being America’s slightly less prosperous cousin, but that doesn’t specify the time frame, and understates the difference. By 1995, the difference in GDPs per capita was already over $9,000, about the same size as the difference between Canada and Spain).
This distinction becomes important, as the article attributes workers in each Canadian province now earning less than workers in each US state to Canada's recent economic slowdown, while in reality, that was likely the case before, as well.
Third, if we're just looking at single benchmarks of particular countries, while eschewing broader and more sophisticated economic analyses, we could compare the supposedly wealthy low immigration countries to the US, and see that they, too, are (far) poorer than all US states, as I note here: https://nonzionism.com/p/why-the-economic-benefits-of-immigration/comment/92441398.
Similarly, that article emphasizes Canada's high IQ and lackluster growth, while ignoring the even higher IQ in low immigration countries like Japan and South Korea which are not only quite poor compared to the US (or even Canada) but are growing much slower than the US.
Fourth, the article somewhat contradicts itself. It states that immigration to Canada was higher than the US for decades (from the 1980s until Trudeau) while also implying that growth was identical between the countries during that period. If immigration is so bad, why was growth between the countries so similar for so long, with very different levels of immigration.
Furthermore, the article seems to assume that the economic effects of immigration showed up nearly immediately in Canada, with relative growth dropping immediately in 2015, with the immigration increase, and again after COVID, with the further increase.
But the dates don’t strictly line up. Why did growth slow down in 2015, if, per the graph there, net migration that year was the lowest it had been in over a decade. And why did growth improve prepandemic, while immigration ramped up? Growth was significantly higher in 2017-2019 than it was in 2015 or 2016, in spite of the graph showing that migration in those years was far more than double what it was in 2015. And while like most of the rest of the world, Canada’s post-pandemic recovery has lagged that of the US, growth remains higher than it was in 2015, in spite of immigration being over 6 times as high as it was, then.
Fifth, as other pointed out, the article’s basic presentation of the facts of immigration to Canada and the US respectively seems false for a number of reasons.
For example, it uses a graph of net migration, rather than of immigration, and repeatedly conflates the two, leading it to make major errors about the magnitude and timing of Canadian immigration. Even proponents of immigration can think that on average, immigrants are less economically productive than natives, such that if they come, while natives leave, the net effect could be negative.
Looking at a graph of immigration: https://www.statista.com/statistics/443063/number-of-immigrants-in-canada/, rather than net migration seems to undermine the whole narrative, as it shows immigration peaking in 2015-2016, and then dropping until 2021, the period in which Canada’s immigration was supposedly hampering growth.
Sixth, it states that “The effect on standard of living is even worse.” But what it really means is housing inflation. “standard of living” can be measured with real GDP per capita, which was already addressed. Indeed, if the cost of housing (people’s largest expenditure) is spiking, while real GDP per capita continues to increase, that means that income and productivity – the factors that immigration could potentially increase, are increasing significantly, to overcome that.
(1) It does, but it's not that simple. If a country becomes poorer for purely compositional reasons, it is still poorer, and this may have negative effects. To take an extreme example. If a thousand derelicts turned up in your street tomorrow, then strictly speaking the average net worth has only fallen for compositional reasons, but it is very likely that your standard of living will suffer. In any case, I do not believe that if the compositional element were isolated then the trend of stagnation since 2015 would disappear.
(2) The graph is set up in a way to make the divergence in 2015 clear true, but let's say we move the Canada line down, how is that better? It now shows that Canada was lagging consistently behind the US until it diverted completely. The fact that Canada was already poorer than the US makes it worse because (a) Canada is actually a lot poorer than the graph implies and (b) all things being equal its easier to get growth in less developed economies.
(3) - (6) My position is not that high immigration reliably leads to economic stagnation, it's that it does not reliably lead to economic growth. Indeed, it usually doesn't. You may ask why I dubbed the article 'excellent' when it makes a claim I didn't make (and don't actually believe), and probably I shouldn't, though he is a good writer.
The description of points 1-3 oversimplifies Caplan. He openly acknowledges in his book that the net impact of immigrants is a function of various factors, including the degree of welfare provided by the host country. He acknowledges that it’s trivially true that if it’s high enough, then immigrants are a net negative (even independent of externalities).
Similarly, it’s trivially true that labor conditions in the host country affect the economic impact of immigrants. The major advantage of lower skilled immigrants – their willingness to work for less can only be realized in a labor environment that’s capable of paying them less – legally, or not.
Next, as far as national economics and immigration, there’s obviously the compositional issue. If the GDP per capita of a country of only natives is 100, then 20 immigrants come with a GDP per capita of 20, and double their GDP per capita to 40, then even if the GDP per capita of the 100 natives also increases, but by less than 12%, then the overall GDP per capita of the country will fall, even though both the immigrants and the natives got richer.
This may or many not explain a given country’s economic growth, and similar back of the envelope estimates can be applied.
Of course, while compositional changes may not account for much of a country’s economic picture, immigration might not either! Similar calculations – even rough rudimentary ones – would have to be done to yield a value for expected economic growth, to compare to actual growth. Preferably using data from as many countries as possible, over many years, if the topic is “immigration” very generally.
Next, you state:
The most common objection to the Caplan model is that it looks at immigrants only as economic inputs and not as political actors, specifically as voters.
This is confusing. Is the Caplan model not points 1-3 above? Number 3 there explicitly considers the negative externalities of immigrants, considering their role outside of mere economic inputs.
Indeed, consistent with the description there of “you can just solve them through directly targeted policies,” Caplan would far prefer a policy that allows immigrants to work, but not to vote, than one which doesn’t allow them to work.
Next, you state: “The second important critique of the Caplan model is that it ignores the way in which immigrants are not like other economic products one might import, namely that they have agency and you can’t just send them back and demand a refund when they are faulty.”
First of all, there’s no inherent characteristic of immigration that it be permanent. An example of the sort of targeted solution that point 3 of the Caplan model could include is deportation. Caplan would far prefer a system which is more liberal in allowing immigrants to come and work, while also being far more ready to deport them, than a system that generally doesn’t let them come in the first place.
Second, the reductio ad absurdum of this line of reasoning is that economics as a whole can provide no valuable insight, since the factors involved are agentic humans, rather than automata. Criminal propensity of immigrants and estimates of its economic impact are perfectly possible, just as such estimates are possible for the rest of the similarly agentic population, as the rest of the paragraph shows.
Last, the assumption that high housing costs are the result of rational incentives of landowners is questionable. As Caplan points out, surveys find little difference, for example, between the NIMBY preferences of those who rent vs. those who own. (This is related to public choice theory more broadly, and Caplan's arguments against democracy. See his Myth of Rational Voter).
Fair points, but ultimately the discussion of what Caplan wants is not very important because he is a very unusual person with very unusual political preferences. No western country is going to admit immigrants on condition they may not vote. Indeed, the closest real-world policy to this is what America already does, namely have a lot of illegal immigrants that the authorities turn a blind eye to but *Caplan opposes this policy*. Similarly, he may want a system with more deportations, but in the real world it is incredible hard to deport even multiply convicted sex offenders. This is analogous to his view that drugs should be legal, and the police should crack down on antisocial junkie behaviors, but the police can't even detain one George Floyd without causing nationwide rioting. To put the matter simply, the system he prefers is only possible under a Pinochet-style dictatorship (and even then, it would have to be an unusually competent one) and everything else is downstream of that. So his next book should be called "send in the army to arrest Congress".
However, what can happen (because it already has) is that countries choose to dramatically increase their amount of immigration while doing *none* of the other policies Bryan Caplan wants. And ultimately that is what we are talking about. If Bryan Caplan wants to write a book saying "Actually for the time being Open Borders is a bad idea" he can, but I believe I am correct in saying that this argument has been put to him (and Hanania etc.) many times and they dismiss it on the grounds that immigrations is still good even under the current policy regime.
NIMBY preferences are skewed in America to very large extent by being proxies for "I don't want poor black people to move here". Renters have the same interests in that respect as owners. In Britain, it is certainly the case that the Conservative voter base explicitly demands that house prices rise for self-interested reasons.
Someone should write a piece about how much crummy economic growth in non-US Anglophone countries can be explained by composition.
"No western country is going to admit immigrants on condition they may not vote."
I anticipated that you might argue this, but decided not to mention it, since it's uncharitable to accuse your interlocutor of harboring an argument you think is wrong.
It does seem to be wrong, though. The US already has such categories, such as H-1b visa holders and green card holders.
"Indeed, the closest real-world policy to this is what America already does, namely have a lot of illegal immigrants that the authorities turn a blind eye to but *Caplan opposes this policy*."
I have no idea where you're getting the idea that Caplan opposes it. If I recall, he approvingly cites Friedman as pointing out that illegal immigration is better economically than legal immigration. Caplan asserts that welfare in the US isn't so high as to negate the positive economic effects of immigrants, but he acknowledges that their net benefit would be higher if they were entitled to less welfare and if they could work for less money, but of which would be easier if they were here illegally. (He also acknowledges other costs to keeping immigration largely illegal, such as it making it harder for immigrants to work in higher skill jobs).
“Similarly, he may want a system with more deportations, but in the real world it is incredible hard to deport even multiply convicted sex offenders. This is analogous to his view that drugs should be legal, and the police should crack down on antisocial junkie behaviors, but the police can't even detain one George Floyd without causing nationwide rioting.”
Yes and no. You seem inconsistent in whether you’re describing the US, the West or the world as a whole. Similarly, you seem inconsistent in whether you’re describing inherent issues or contingent ones. Regarding the former, note that high levels of deportations are absolutely possible outside the West, as evident in the UAE – the country with the highest share of foreign born population, as Caplan approvingly discusses.
Regarding the latter, your sweeping sentence implies the issue is inherent, not contingent: “immigrants are not like other economic products one might import, namely that they have agency and you can’t just send them back.”
Even if in reality, it were inherent in the West, Caplan still operates within reality! He neither makes policy recommendations that depend on an optimal libertarian utopia to work, nor does he decline to make any recommendations, insisting that we need to wait for libertarian utopia before we can implement anything. Rather, his recommendations are argued on the basis of economic analyses of immigrants as they actually operate in real life (mostly in the US), with all that that entails.
You sort of allude to that later, noting that “they dismiss it on the grounds that immigrations is still good even under the current policy regime.”
I also think that even in the West, ramping up deportations is far more conceivable than you make it out. Without elaborating too much here, note that the public is largely clueless about policy details and tends to care much more about presentation than substance. This make *any* policy more likely to be implemented than would be imagined trying to surmise public opinion on the basis of their reactions or indicated preferences. Some article on Substack made the point that the Nordic countries are doing this by appointing kind looking women as their ministers of remigration, and saying nice things about immigrants, rather than chanting “lock them up.” The presentation makes all the difference.
“In Britain, it is certainly the case that the Conservative voter base explicitly demands that house prices rise for self-interested reasons.”
That would be somewhat of a pleasant surprise. Caplan references studies in the US showing that the public doesn’t understand the basics of supply and demand. Something like a third think more housing leads to higher prices, a third think it leads to lower prices, and a third think it doesn’t affect it.
More broadly, policy preferences are not at all aligned with individual interest, which is one of several reasons why I pointed to Caplan’s book Myth of the Rational Voter, which discusses this.
First, because it provides some reason to be skeptical that current preferences are those that you describe (especially as regards to allowing construction, not just “keeping prices high” as many are ignorant of the connection). Second, because it provides reason to think that even if such sentiments are present, they’re hardly baked in; voter preferences aren’t inexorably linked to their interests – indeed, they’re mostly uncorrelated. While “resource curse is a well-attested phenomenon that has attracted much academic study,” so is public choice theory. Third, because I suspected you’d be interested in the book, given it’s opposition to democracy, your interest in Yarvin, and your suggestion that Caplan write a book against democracy.
The phenomenon I am talking about it that a lot of western countries have tried to boost economic growth by dramatically increasing immigration (or, at least, the policy has been widely justified on that grounds), and in most cases this economic growth just doesn't happen, indeed, the general trend is that countries that do this stagnate shortly afterwards.
I think the case for higher immigration in the U.S. is much better than almost any country. Partly this is because the U.S. gets much better immigrants, and partly it's because the regulatory environment is more suited to realizing the benefits.
In Britain, a Somali rapist was supposed to be deported in 2018, and activists literally stopped the plane taking off. He was finally deported in 2023 after the government agreed to pay for him to spend 14 weeks in luxury hotel. This despite (conservatively) over 80% of the population supporting his deportation. Public opinion isn't the obstacle. To reiterate, if Bryan Caplan has a plan to drop human rights lawyers out of airplanes, then I'm all ears.
It's not that British property owners support a specific policy to raise house prices, it's that they support the outcome. If house prices are going up, the government is doing a good job, if not, it's not doing a good job. For 30 years it has been normal to see headlines like 'House prices rise more than expected in boost to government'. This obviously creates incentives for those who do understand economics to implement or maintain policies that increase house prices.
I know the thesis of the Myth of the Rational Voter. I a not asking Caplan to write a book against democracy, I am asking him to write a book in favour of a dictatorship that will imprison and kill leftists, since this is the only way his ideas can possibly work.
Fair point on Green Cards and H-1b.
I addressed the UAE example in my most popular Note and I think it is fair for all of the high-profile followers of Bryan Caplan, if maybe not himself personally. It is not so much Caplan I have an objection to, but the effect his ideas have had on Yglesias, Hananya, Ezra Klein etc.
You sum up the problems with immigration pretty well but your 'case study' isn't a good one:
1) The numbers don't match what you are saying:
"The implication of the position, to be clear, is that, without this unprecedented boost to immigration, the British economy would not have chugged along at roughly 2% a year growth, it wouldn’t have grown at all. In fact, in most of the years, it would have contracted."
The unprecedented migration has meant that 600 thousand people per year arrived instead of 300 thousand people per year in a United Kingdom with a population over 60 million. This means you should substract 0.5% from the GDP growth every year to make an estimate to "growth without increased migration", and you definitely don't get "contracting economy" as a result .
2) The comparison with previous era without context is also problematic because it ignores that there are other basic demographic reasons - lowered fertility and increased amount of retirees - why the economy slowed down - in fact, that's part of the pro-immigration arguments about why immigration is necessary.
The basic argument of Caplan and co. is that basic economic theory dictates that even if natives slightly suffer from immigration, immigrants benefit immensely and that's why it's worth it.
Bryan Caplan etc. definitely do no argue that the expected economic growth from immigration equivalent to 0.5% of the population is 0.5% economic growth, they argue that it leads to massive economic growth and that it is the single most important thing for growing the economy.
"Bryan Caplan etc. definitely do no argue that the expected economic growth from immigration equivalent to 0.5% of the population is 0.5% economic growth, they argue that it leads to massive economic growth and that it is the single most important thing for growing the economy."
I think you misunderstand their viewpoint.
If immigration (where immigrants come with relatively poor countries such as Pakistan) equivalent to 0.5% of the population is 0.5% economic growth and this relation remains true for even very high immigration rates (that's the part I really doubt), then immigration is the most effective way to grow the GLOBAL economy. It means that if 300 million people migrated to the United States from the developing world, then its GDP would almost double and the world GDP would increase by 20% in one fell swoop.
"The basic argument of Caplan and co. is that basic economic theory dictates that even if natives slightly suffer from immigration, immigrants benefit immensely and that's why it's worth it."
Caplan disavows that perspective in his book. He emphasizes that he's not advocating for immigration on the basis of charity to foreigners (although he certainly cares for their wellbeing quite a bit) but on the basis of benefits to natives.
Indeed, and Japan is an interesting example of the success of low immigration countries, as over the last 30 years, their annual economic growth was less than 1%. South Korea had decent growth over the period (over 3%) but they were starting from a much poorer state. Over more recent years, they've had far more anemic growth of about 2%.
Notably, these "wealthy" countries are still quite poor compared to the US.
The richest of them has a GDP per capita 32% lower than that of the poorest state in the US.
Discussing open borders only in terms of whether states (governments) should open them or not (which logically includes any state limits on immigration), is to overlook the efficient and moral solution to the problem: first privatise all “public” property among the existing populace and then let the private owners decide whom to invite onto their property. This is, of course, the actual libertarian solution.
I read it. It's the same argument made by Hoppe. I don't mean that as an insult (in fact, Hoppe was important in my own intellectual development), but I don't find the whole approach convincing so the specific application of the approach doesn't move me.
It’s not the same argument as Hoppe but it is similar. The argument fails to move you because you are not a libertarian but intellectual defects like that can be corrected in debate. In any event, it is possible for government policy to move in a libertarian direction and libertarians need not be tethered to open borders due to bad arguments.
Great article, however, pretty short shrift to Pakistani female harassment which quickly escalates to assault and rape...as you noted futher down the article. At the end of the day the Muslim/Islam intransigence, religious fervor, entitlement, aggression, lack of assimilition and obvious hostility to all things western is the problem. Time to make that clear and stop hiding it in euphemisms.
All men are not created equal. Instead of making immigration harder for everyone why not just ban Arabs and move on with one's life. Ban Pakistan as well. Basically anyone who fucks their cousin.
Right, the enlightened liberal policy is 'Open Borders except for Muslims and anyone with an IQ below 90'. I am not an enlightened liberal, but if I was, that would be my belief.
Muslims in general are probably fine. They're not insane just conservative. Arabs make up less than 20% of all Muslims. We especially be open to Iranians.
This is the Muslim in the room that no one wants to talk about, instead we have euphemisms for them. "Knife culture", "honor culture", "gang rape", "crowds of men", "highly religious", "impassioned Imams at the mosque".
I suppose any theoretical arguments should be ignored if they don't deal with real world examples. This is obvious of course, but easy to forget.
Good article.
Israel will have many of the same problems due to its high population growth rate due to its limited space and resources and high fertility, no?
One problem that Israel will is that the ones doing a lot of kids are the super-religious Jews. Those people are less economically productive ( and very often a drain). We will have too see what happens when there are too much of them.
Possibly. I think this future is escapable if we choose to build economic focal points in the north and south. It's not really that there isn't enough space, we are just highly concentrated into Tel Aviv and its satellite towns.
You also need to have a nice and secure water supply for the Negev Desert in the south, no?
Anyway, I'd enjoy seeing my birth city of Beersheba massively increase its population, even though I myself no longer live in Israel and haven't for the last 23 years.
Off-topic, but what are your thoughts on the Grandchild Clause of Israel's Law of Return? AFAIK, Israel gets a lot of its new immigrants through this clause. This is especially true for its ex-USSR immigrants. With widespread intermarriage in the USSR, it's unsurprising that nowadays only 30% or less of all ex-USSR olim are actually halakhically Jewish. But in a substantive sense, there isn't all that much difference between ex-USSR olim who are products of 2+ generations of intermarriage and who are halakhic Jews or children of halakhic Jews vs. grandchildren of halakhic Jews. In all of these cases, they would have probably generally considered themselves (and possibly both of their parents as well) to be Russians/Ukrainians/Belarusians in their birth countries and Jews or at least quasi-Jews in Israel. (AFAIK, a lot of the "Others" in Israel do identify as Jewish even though Israeli law does not recognize them as such.)
Anyone who is a Jew in the eyes of Nazis and Islamists is a Jew in my book. I think the Halakha has a time and a place, but it is probably not now.
BTW, desalination solves the water supply issue as long as we have enough cheap energy to maintain it.
Yeah, fair points.
BTW, do you think that it was a mistake on Israel’s part not to prolong its war of independence and not to at least conquer the southern West Bank in 1949?
idk
The article is not good. See my comment.
In regards to Californication, why not simply push to elect more rational Democrats in place of either loony Democrats or Republicans? Rick Caruso in Los Angeles, for instance. You are correct that California still works OK because it still attracts a lot of foreign cognitive elites, which is good.
In regards to banlieuefication, Yes, there aren't really any benefits to natives from this. A lot for migrants themselves, but good luck selling it to natives when they themselves don't benefit. In addition to the crime, chaos, and disorder, there is also sometimes terrorism from these places, which can be especially nasty if people are murdered for engaging in "Islamophobic" speech. Some Islamic doctrines badly need reform, and whenever people who attempt to nudge Islam in the right direction get murdered, it becomes even harder to reform the Muslim faith in a more positive direction. It's an argument in favor of having the West admit liberal reformist Muslims but not generic, more fundamentalist Muslims.
In regards to housing specifically, you can loosen zoning regulations and build much more high-density housing. Apartment buildings with dozens of floors, for instance. You could even make the various apartments there large and luxurious. You could also try passing legislation that would restrict the number of tenants that are allowed to live in a single apartment or house based on its size, though it might be politically and/or legally/constitutionally difficult. But it's quite interesting that even a country such as Israel, with New Jersey's size and also with a lot of desert, will be able to sustain over 20 million people by the late 21st century.
As for economic dead weights, how about either incentivizing (with money) them not to breed or at least making it easy and cheap for them to breed eugenically?
You can do lots of those things. Why do you think any are likely?
Well, in regards to the last part, a lot of prominent voices (intellectuals and pundits) appear to be talking about problematic zoning and arguing in favor of the reform of restrictive zoning laws.
I've never seen the people in my towns zoning meetings discuss Matty Yglesias or any of his ideas.
I think the biggest obstacle to getting rid of zoning is that who your neighbors are matters. The more shitty neighbors, the more you're going to rely on zoning to keep them out. Immigration increases the number of shitty neighbors.
Also, the single biggest aid to zoning reform is school choice. School choice means you no longer have to care who lives in your kids school zone, which is a lot wider than your neighborhood. Immigrants vote left and therefore oppose school choice.
As long as the left opposes things that make it easier for people to live together and self segregate, I do not expect them to achieve any meaningful zoning reform because property owners will eventually rally to protect core interests.
Trvth nvke
You have not given reasons as to why those immigrants vote left a lot. Maybe it could be because of hostility by nationalists/nativists and right wing of the host country.
In mechanism 2, you say - "[...] immigrant might contribute to the economy by working, or he might decide to just get money by robbing people, either on his own, or by using the benefits system as his proxy. Since crime has a very bad effect on the economy, not only directly, but by imposing limitless quantities of security costs and deterring investment, even a minority of immigrants who live by crime could potentially outweigh the economic benefits of those that work."
but you don't cite a good empirical study here and you should cite some empirical data about mild to moderate increase in crime rate outweighing the economic benefits of those immigrants that work because Mexico which has enormously high crime rate than Russia was actually (before the Russia-Ukraine war) had nominal GDP per capita near to Russia - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Mexico
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Russia
Further, you are not thinking about the reasons why those migrants are committing crimes and you are not looking at the incentives they have. For example, Alex Nowrasteh talks about how to reduce migrant and refugee crimes here - https://youtu.be/Vm9LJFRRw74?t=844
Some governments have had strong restrictive policies on migrants with respect to jobs and employment (see the video for evidence for this claim).
You also don't distinguish between regular immigrants and refugees which is a baffling thing to do. Most economists and open border advocates would agree that refugees are at least a fiscal burden for short term - https://knowledge4policy.ec.europa.eu/foresight/topic/increasing-significance-migration/political-social-aspects-migration_en
Note also that denying refugees is not as easy as you think just based on short term fiscal burden. You need to show that those refugees would decrease the total utility in the world by more amount relative to the counterfactual scenario in which refugees just stay in their country in misery and suffer and die there (and you cannot just discount the suffering of those human beings you consider low IQ). Refugees are fleeing from their countries because of horrors in their own nations happening. Even if they are a burden for short term, denying them seem to require stronger justification precisely because denying them would mean a near death sentence to them. Denying refugees from modern day Haiti seems like an obvious human rights violation. Alex Nowrasteh has also talked about decreasing refugee crimes in the host country in the video I mentioned.
In mechanism 3, you cite a cultural critic and a doctor/psychiatrist instead of an economist or economists who are researching economic effects of immigration for years and/or decades. This is not good.
Housing crisis is government regulation issue. Bryan Caplan's new book talks about this in detail. YIMBY movement by left liberal capitalists is there to spread awareness of the harmfulness of government regulations(which they consider excess regulations) - https://www.cato.org/books/build-baby-build
I genuinely beg you to at least read these books - https://rajatsirkanungo.substack.com/p/a-collection-of-recent-excellent (and then think carefully about your criticisms)
I have read Emil Kirkegaard, Noah Carl, and your criticism of open borders or near open borders and I just find these criticisms to be very bad. Also, Alex Nowrasteh also just released a paper examining crime rates of illegal migrants in USA - https://www.cato.org/policy-analysis/illegal-immigrant-murderers-texas-2013-2022
Bryan Caplan and many open borders advocates are totally cool with a few or even some restrictions when you have good reasons, for example, I would agree with a few or some restrictions of immigration to Israel from its neighboring countries that are hostile to it. Israel should still allow much easier immigration from Japan, South Korea, Ukraine, India, and all the allied states. Now, open borders with a few restrictions is still nearly-open borders or 98% open borders. Open borders with some heavy restrictions from hostile countries would be like at least 85% open borders. See Bryan Caplan's 'Open Borders' book chapter "Keyhole Solutions" for evidence for my above claim about open borders advocates being pretty pragmatic rather than dogmatic. Ilya Somin has a very similar chapter in his own book 'free to move'.
Note also that open borders advocates are not just Bryan Caplan (a very respected economist and professor at George Mason University), Matthew Adelstein(Bentham's Bulldog, a philosophy undergrad at University of Michigan), but open borders supporters include Ilya Somin (law professor), Jason Brennan (political philosopher), Alex Nowrasteh(economic analyst with Masters in economic history and bachelor's in economics), Benjamin Powell (PhD in economics and professor of economics at Texas Tech University), Chandran Kuthakas (Dphil in politics from Oxford University and Kukathas holds a chair in Political Theory in the Department of Government at the London School of Economics.), John Cochrane (economist, Stanford University), Jason Furman (economist, Harvard University). See my book collection substack post for evidence for above claims.
Not only that, but overwhelming majority of economists support much much easier immigration compared to the current status quo - https://www.kentclarkcenter.org/surveys/low-skilled-immigrants/
https://www.kentclarkcenter.org/surveys/high-skilled-immigrants/
(also see my book collection on my substack that I linked to you above). Proving majority of economists wrong is going to be a massively hard task. You need to do Albert Einstein level stuff in economics field to do that. If most economists support 80% of open borders, then that is a significant improvement compared to the status quo.
Note also that the way you argue would also pretty much justify denying Jewish refugees escaping the holocaust. All those "mechanisms" would at least partially work even if Jewish refugees are high IQ - https://www.alexnowrasteh.com/p/review-of-the-culture-transplant?utm_source=substack&utm_campaign=post_embed&utm_medium=web
https://www.alexnowrasteh.com/p/review-of-the-culture-transplant-184?utm_source=substack&utm_campaign=post_embed&utm_medium=web
1) I don't find the argument from vicarious narcissism to be very persuasive. Either Jews benefitted the countries they immigrated to, or they didn't. If they did, it's no argument to bring in groups who don't; if they didn't, it's an argument to be extra precautious.
2) You 'keyhole solutions' never actually happen because policy elites could not care less what libertarians think and only use you to promote open borders.
3) It doesn't matter why immigrants vote Left. If you are arguing that immigration can work as long as we find some magic way not to make people have nativist sentiments, that just means it doesn't work.
Also, you are hastily generalizing the groups here. Many Germans in the 1930s were not cool with the Jews. Some Germans did elect Hitler and then Nazi Germany happened and holocaust happened. Denying the Germans with those Nazi attitudes from immigrating to friendly Jewish states or even a majority Jewish state like Israel would be understandable (Chill or cool Germans if they supported Jews and were cool with them at that time should be allowed to immigrate). But now, the modern day Germans are not equivalent to 1930s Germans. So, denying the modern day Germans from immigrating to Israel who are chill with Israel is bad. Similarly, the other groups that have caused some problems (and note that - minority of them do) might be causing problems contingently or temporarily. Even now, most of Islamic refugees are not mass rapists and/or murderers. Most people in Morocco, Kuwait, etc. are not murderers. Most Muslim people are neither murderers nor rapists. So, if minority of them cause some problems, then you should also see the benefits that majority provide. And then carefully check the results after doing meticulous cost-benefit analysis based on both the goods that migrants do and the bads that migrants do.
If the majority are not providing benefits or unable to provide them because of horrible government policy (that Alex Nowrasteh talks about in the video that I linked to you in my first comment), then Jews would fare no better than Muslims because it not their fault that the government is treating them extremely poorly.
I also want other people to see the comment of the author here. Notice that the author replied to me within 15 minutes after my first, in-depth, critical comment, and note again that my comment is filled with many many sources, links, and evidence that experts from multiple different fields produced and researched for years. Notice that the author does not carefully and patiently read, engage, and/or evaluate the evidence/links/sources that I showed to him. He quickly replies with three half-baked (or even less than half-baked) points. I also wrote a quick response to him. But even that quick response by me to this author has at least 1 important link or source for my claim that legal immigration to USA is nearly impossible.
Here's some further info on immigration history (to the author and to his/her/their readers who care about truth) -
Immigration has been disliked (for very poor reasons) for a long time - https://sites.bu.edu/pardeeatlas/advancing-human-progress-initiative/back2school/the-anti-immigrant-movement-in-the-united-states/#:~:text=For%20as%20long%20as%20immigration,good%20relationship%20with%20Great%20Britain.
https://www.theunpopulist.net/p/a-landmark-study-debunks-populist
The author also does not give the full picture on immigration and crime - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_and_crime
Finally, open borders is not as easy to refute if you are a moderate deontologist or an absolute deontologist - https://spot.colorado.edu/~huemer/papers/immigration.htm
I'll be honest, I only responded because more comments makes the blog look better. You obviously are well-read and intelligent, but you would benefit from a writing course to present your arguments clearly, and also probably Adderall.
I do have anxiety and OCD issues but I am able to control them quite well and function normally. Note that the adderall is for ADHD and narcolepsy. I apologize for not presenting my arguments clearly. I believe that the book and article collection I have would give you much clearer arguments than me. So, I just recommend reading those. I believe that you don't have bad intentions and you genuinely care about other sentient beings and want to reduce suffering and promote happiness in the world. I hope I am right about you that you are a good person under the mask of anonymity. Please read those books and articles. Have a good day! God bless you!
1) I don't know what you mean by narcissism here.
2) Policy elites have so far made immigration difficult and not easy - https://www.cato.org/blog/why-legal-immigration-nearly-impossible
People like you are being used here. Not me. Status-quo bias, in-group bias, and scope neglect are straight forward issues with nativists and nationalists. They are more likely to be affected by cognitive biases than open borders advocates.
3) If you read the books, articles, papers I mentioned, then you would understand that I support immigration even if there are nativist sentiments. I am not looking for a magic cure for nativism. My point was that if immigrants vote left and the reason is nationalists, then the main problem is nationalism and not immigration.
1) The idea that I should view the issue of immigration through the prism of past Jewish immigration. I assumed you brought this up because I am Jewish.
2) The reality is that the people who want more immigration (the Left) do not want any of your keyhole solutions to the problems cause by immigration. They do not like you, they do not respect you, they would be happy to throw you in prison.
3) Which is the 'main problem' is a metaphysical question. More relevant is which problem is easier to solve. I don't know of any way of making people less nativist other than relentless totalitarian indoctrination, but I do know of a very easy way of not having immigrants - don't let them in!
You are correct that generally leftists want not only easier immigration but even more generous welfare system that would create bad incentives(we know this but leftists are ignorant about this somewhat).
Some leftists are genuine and do change their views once you talk about the incentive issues and educate them about economics.
4 or 5 years ago, I was a pretty sincere socialist but I changed my views when I encountered good arguments made by people in good faith. I also found that those leftists had no good plan of socialism and it just felt like they were just there for vibes and not genuinely making the world a happier place. The leftists were not properly addressing the arguments of Friedrich Hayek, Milton Friedman. I also read a little bit of public choice economics and that made a lot of sense. Then I encountered Michael Huemer, David Friedman, Jason Brennan, and other libertarian capitalists who are not dogmatic absolute deontologists and they made fantastic case for capitalism.
I am also pretty pro-israel based on what I read and watched so far.
I am pretty right wing but I dislike nationalism based on reading history, Ilya Somin, and Alex Nowrasteh.
Hanania’s main point is that “more diversity will increase social tensions, enough to continue making new expansions of the welfare state impossible.” Seems plausible enough, though, admittedly, California looks like a counterexample.
Indeed! Hanania's position is even more reasonable, since the "social tension" isn't actual tension between individuals (I think Hanania chose his words poorly there), but rather a decrease in feelings of kinship on a national level. Immigration to a country, and the diversity that it brings, can make people in the country feel less sympathetic towards fellow citizens of their country in the abstract, leading to lower support for a welfare state.
That's definitely not the same thing as a decrease in social cohesion, as people probably think of the term, generally.
People can still maintain relatively segregated social circles and maintain higher levels of trust and cohesion within those circles than outside those circles. They aren't going to stop hanging out with their friends, just because Juan moves in down the road.
They can even potentially maintain the same levels of trust when they interact with individual outsiders (he seems like a like a fine one). They might just feel less positive abut government programs supporting generic 'others,' since they feel less connected to those others.
Furthermore, Hananaia didn't say that increasing immigration or diversity necessarily decreases social cohesion. Rather he said the opposite - that it isn't trivially true that increasing immigration leads to anti-market policies, as is often asserted.
The above is one explanation for why the former might not imply the latter, but it's not the only one presented in the article. The article also points out that public sentiment is already very widely anti-market, without that translating into policy, suggesting the relationship between the two hardly matches what one would assume intuitively.
The article also discusses why the US is uniquely pro-market, which is an interesting question in and of itself to which that article makes a valuable contribution.
Related to my other comment discussing issues with the post, in this Note: https://substack.com/@mascilbinah/note/c-92394573, you promote an article on immigration that seems to contain a number of issues:
First, it ignores the compositional issue.
Second, it conflates economic level, with economic growth. Specifically, the key diagram comparing Canadian and American growth states that it's indexed to 1995, but doesn't state that different indices are used for the US and Canada, since the US was already far richer in 1995 (it sort of alludes to that, by referencing Canada previously being America’s slightly less prosperous cousin, but that doesn’t specify the time frame, and understates the difference. By 1995, the difference in GDPs per capita was already over $9,000, about the same size as the difference between Canada and Spain).
This distinction becomes important, as the article attributes workers in each Canadian province now earning less than workers in each US state to Canada's recent economic slowdown, while in reality, that was likely the case before, as well.
Third, if we're just looking at single benchmarks of particular countries, while eschewing broader and more sophisticated economic analyses, we could compare the supposedly wealthy low immigration countries to the US, and see that they, too, are (far) poorer than all US states, as I note here: https://nonzionism.com/p/why-the-economic-benefits-of-immigration/comment/92441398.
Similarly, that article emphasizes Canada's high IQ and lackluster growth, while ignoring the even higher IQ in low immigration countries like Japan and South Korea which are not only quite poor compared to the US (or even Canada) but are growing much slower than the US.
Fourth, the article somewhat contradicts itself. It states that immigration to Canada was higher than the US for decades (from the 1980s until Trudeau) while also implying that growth was identical between the countries during that period. If immigration is so bad, why was growth between the countries so similar for so long, with very different levels of immigration.
Furthermore, the article seems to assume that the economic effects of immigration showed up nearly immediately in Canada, with relative growth dropping immediately in 2015, with the immigration increase, and again after COVID, with the further increase.
But the dates don’t strictly line up. Why did growth slow down in 2015, if, per the graph there, net migration that year was the lowest it had been in over a decade. And why did growth improve prepandemic, while immigration ramped up? Growth was significantly higher in 2017-2019 than it was in 2015 or 2016, in spite of the graph showing that migration in those years was far more than double what it was in 2015. And while like most of the rest of the world, Canada’s post-pandemic recovery has lagged that of the US, growth remains higher than it was in 2015, in spite of immigration being over 6 times as high as it was, then.
Fifth, as other pointed out, the article’s basic presentation of the facts of immigration to Canada and the US respectively seems false for a number of reasons.
For example, it uses a graph of net migration, rather than of immigration, and repeatedly conflates the two, leading it to make major errors about the magnitude and timing of Canadian immigration. Even proponents of immigration can think that on average, immigrants are less economically productive than natives, such that if they come, while natives leave, the net effect could be negative.
Looking at a graph of immigration: https://www.statista.com/statistics/443063/number-of-immigrants-in-canada/, rather than net migration seems to undermine the whole narrative, as it shows immigration peaking in 2015-2016, and then dropping until 2021, the period in which Canada’s immigration was supposedly hampering growth.
Sixth, it states that “The effect on standard of living is even worse.” But what it really means is housing inflation. “standard of living” can be measured with real GDP per capita, which was already addressed. Indeed, if the cost of housing (people’s largest expenditure) is spiking, while real GDP per capita continues to increase, that means that income and productivity – the factors that immigration could potentially increase, are increasing significantly, to overcome that.
(1) It does, but it's not that simple. If a country becomes poorer for purely compositional reasons, it is still poorer, and this may have negative effects. To take an extreme example. If a thousand derelicts turned up in your street tomorrow, then strictly speaking the average net worth has only fallen for compositional reasons, but it is very likely that your standard of living will suffer. In any case, I do not believe that if the compositional element were isolated then the trend of stagnation since 2015 would disappear.
(2) The graph is set up in a way to make the divergence in 2015 clear true, but let's say we move the Canada line down, how is that better? It now shows that Canada was lagging consistently behind the US until it diverted completely. The fact that Canada was already poorer than the US makes it worse because (a) Canada is actually a lot poorer than the graph implies and (b) all things being equal its easier to get growth in less developed economies.
(3) - (6) My position is not that high immigration reliably leads to economic stagnation, it's that it does not reliably lead to economic growth. Indeed, it usually doesn't. You may ask why I dubbed the article 'excellent' when it makes a claim I didn't make (and don't actually believe), and probably I shouldn't, though he is a good writer.
The description of points 1-3 oversimplifies Caplan. He openly acknowledges in his book that the net impact of immigrants is a function of various factors, including the degree of welfare provided by the host country. He acknowledges that it’s trivially true that if it’s high enough, then immigrants are a net negative (even independent of externalities).
Similarly, it’s trivially true that labor conditions in the host country affect the economic impact of immigrants. The major advantage of lower skilled immigrants – their willingness to work for less can only be realized in a labor environment that’s capable of paying them less – legally, or not.
Next, as far as national economics and immigration, there’s obviously the compositional issue. If the GDP per capita of a country of only natives is 100, then 20 immigrants come with a GDP per capita of 20, and double their GDP per capita to 40, then even if the GDP per capita of the 100 natives also increases, but by less than 12%, then the overall GDP per capita of the country will fall, even though both the immigrants and the natives got richer.
This may or many not explain a given country’s economic growth, and similar back of the envelope estimates can be applied.
Of course, while compositional changes may not account for much of a country’s economic picture, immigration might not either! Similar calculations – even rough rudimentary ones – would have to be done to yield a value for expected economic growth, to compare to actual growth. Preferably using data from as many countries as possible, over many years, if the topic is “immigration” very generally.
Next, you state:
The most common objection to the Caplan model is that it looks at immigrants only as economic inputs and not as political actors, specifically as voters.
This is confusing. Is the Caplan model not points 1-3 above? Number 3 there explicitly considers the negative externalities of immigrants, considering their role outside of mere economic inputs.
Indeed, consistent with the description there of “you can just solve them through directly targeted policies,” Caplan would far prefer a policy that allows immigrants to work, but not to vote, than one which doesn’t allow them to work.
Next, you state: “The second important critique of the Caplan model is that it ignores the way in which immigrants are not like other economic products one might import, namely that they have agency and you can’t just send them back and demand a refund when they are faulty.”
First of all, there’s no inherent characteristic of immigration that it be permanent. An example of the sort of targeted solution that point 3 of the Caplan model could include is deportation. Caplan would far prefer a system which is more liberal in allowing immigrants to come and work, while also being far more ready to deport them, than a system that generally doesn’t let them come in the first place.
Second, the reductio ad absurdum of this line of reasoning is that economics as a whole can provide no valuable insight, since the factors involved are agentic humans, rather than automata. Criminal propensity of immigrants and estimates of its economic impact are perfectly possible, just as such estimates are possible for the rest of the similarly agentic population, as the rest of the paragraph shows.
Last, the assumption that high housing costs are the result of rational incentives of landowners is questionable. As Caplan points out, surveys find little difference, for example, between the NIMBY preferences of those who rent vs. those who own. (This is related to public choice theory more broadly, and Caplan's arguments against democracy. See his Myth of Rational Voter).
Fair points, but ultimately the discussion of what Caplan wants is not very important because he is a very unusual person with very unusual political preferences. No western country is going to admit immigrants on condition they may not vote. Indeed, the closest real-world policy to this is what America already does, namely have a lot of illegal immigrants that the authorities turn a blind eye to but *Caplan opposes this policy*. Similarly, he may want a system with more deportations, but in the real world it is incredible hard to deport even multiply convicted sex offenders. This is analogous to his view that drugs should be legal, and the police should crack down on antisocial junkie behaviors, but the police can't even detain one George Floyd without causing nationwide rioting. To put the matter simply, the system he prefers is only possible under a Pinochet-style dictatorship (and even then, it would have to be an unusually competent one) and everything else is downstream of that. So his next book should be called "send in the army to arrest Congress".
However, what can happen (because it already has) is that countries choose to dramatically increase their amount of immigration while doing *none* of the other policies Bryan Caplan wants. And ultimately that is what we are talking about. If Bryan Caplan wants to write a book saying "Actually for the time being Open Borders is a bad idea" he can, but I believe I am correct in saying that this argument has been put to him (and Hanania etc.) many times and they dismiss it on the grounds that immigrations is still good even under the current policy regime.
NIMBY preferences are skewed in America to very large extent by being proxies for "I don't want poor black people to move here". Renters have the same interests in that respect as owners. In Britain, it is certainly the case that the Conservative voter base explicitly demands that house prices rise for self-interested reasons.
Someone should write a piece about how much crummy economic growth in non-US Anglophone countries can be explained by composition.
"No western country is going to admit immigrants on condition they may not vote."
I anticipated that you might argue this, but decided not to mention it, since it's uncharitable to accuse your interlocutor of harboring an argument you think is wrong.
It does seem to be wrong, though. The US already has such categories, such as H-1b visa holders and green card holders.
"Indeed, the closest real-world policy to this is what America already does, namely have a lot of illegal immigrants that the authorities turn a blind eye to but *Caplan opposes this policy*."
I have no idea where you're getting the idea that Caplan opposes it. If I recall, he approvingly cites Friedman as pointing out that illegal immigration is better economically than legal immigration. Caplan asserts that welfare in the US isn't so high as to negate the positive economic effects of immigrants, but he acknowledges that their net benefit would be higher if they were entitled to less welfare and if they could work for less money, but of which would be easier if they were here illegally. (He also acknowledges other costs to keeping immigration largely illegal, such as it making it harder for immigrants to work in higher skill jobs).
“Similarly, he may want a system with more deportations, but in the real world it is incredible hard to deport even multiply convicted sex offenders. This is analogous to his view that drugs should be legal, and the police should crack down on antisocial junkie behaviors, but the police can't even detain one George Floyd without causing nationwide rioting.”
Yes and no. You seem inconsistent in whether you’re describing the US, the West or the world as a whole. Similarly, you seem inconsistent in whether you’re describing inherent issues or contingent ones. Regarding the former, note that high levels of deportations are absolutely possible outside the West, as evident in the UAE – the country with the highest share of foreign born population, as Caplan approvingly discusses.
Regarding the latter, your sweeping sentence implies the issue is inherent, not contingent: “immigrants are not like other economic products one might import, namely that they have agency and you can’t just send them back.”
Even if in reality, it were inherent in the West, Caplan still operates within reality! He neither makes policy recommendations that depend on an optimal libertarian utopia to work, nor does he decline to make any recommendations, insisting that we need to wait for libertarian utopia before we can implement anything. Rather, his recommendations are argued on the basis of economic analyses of immigrants as they actually operate in real life (mostly in the US), with all that that entails.
You sort of allude to that later, noting that “they dismiss it on the grounds that immigrations is still good even under the current policy regime.”
I also think that even in the West, ramping up deportations is far more conceivable than you make it out. Without elaborating too much here, note that the public is largely clueless about policy details and tends to care much more about presentation than substance. This make *any* policy more likely to be implemented than would be imagined trying to surmise public opinion on the basis of their reactions or indicated preferences. Some article on Substack made the point that the Nordic countries are doing this by appointing kind looking women as their ministers of remigration, and saying nice things about immigrants, rather than chanting “lock them up.” The presentation makes all the difference.
“In Britain, it is certainly the case that the Conservative voter base explicitly demands that house prices rise for self-interested reasons.”
That would be somewhat of a pleasant surprise. Caplan references studies in the US showing that the public doesn’t understand the basics of supply and demand. Something like a third think more housing leads to higher prices, a third think it leads to lower prices, and a third think it doesn’t affect it.
More broadly, policy preferences are not at all aligned with individual interest, which is one of several reasons why I pointed to Caplan’s book Myth of the Rational Voter, which discusses this.
First, because it provides some reason to be skeptical that current preferences are those that you describe (especially as regards to allowing construction, not just “keeping prices high” as many are ignorant of the connection). Second, because it provides reason to think that even if such sentiments are present, they’re hardly baked in; voter preferences aren’t inexorably linked to their interests – indeed, they’re mostly uncorrelated. While “resource curse is a well-attested phenomenon that has attracted much academic study,” so is public choice theory. Third, because I suspected you’d be interested in the book, given it’s opposition to democracy, your interest in Yarvin, and your suggestion that Caplan write a book against democracy.
The phenomenon I am talking about it that a lot of western countries have tried to boost economic growth by dramatically increasing immigration (or, at least, the policy has been widely justified on that grounds), and in most cases this economic growth just doesn't happen, indeed, the general trend is that countries that do this stagnate shortly afterwards.
I think the case for higher immigration in the U.S. is much better than almost any country. Partly this is because the U.S. gets much better immigrants, and partly it's because the regulatory environment is more suited to realizing the benefits.
In Britain, a Somali rapist was supposed to be deported in 2018, and activists literally stopped the plane taking off. He was finally deported in 2023 after the government agreed to pay for him to spend 14 weeks in luxury hotel. This despite (conservatively) over 80% of the population supporting his deportation. Public opinion isn't the obstacle. To reiterate, if Bryan Caplan has a plan to drop human rights lawyers out of airplanes, then I'm all ears.
It's not that British property owners support a specific policy to raise house prices, it's that they support the outcome. If house prices are going up, the government is doing a good job, if not, it's not doing a good job. For 30 years it has been normal to see headlines like 'House prices rise more than expected in boost to government'. This obviously creates incentives for those who do understand economics to implement or maintain policies that increase house prices.
I know the thesis of the Myth of the Rational Voter. I a not asking Caplan to write a book against democracy, I am asking him to write a book in favour of a dictatorship that will imprison and kill leftists, since this is the only way his ideas can possibly work.
Fair point on Green Cards and H-1b.
I addressed the UAE example in my most popular Note and I think it is fair for all of the high-profile followers of Bryan Caplan, if maybe not himself personally. It is not so much Caplan I have an objection to, but the effect his ideas have had on Yglesias, Hananya, Ezra Klein etc.
You sum up the problems with immigration pretty well but your 'case study' isn't a good one:
1) The numbers don't match what you are saying:
"The implication of the position, to be clear, is that, without this unprecedented boost to immigration, the British economy would not have chugged along at roughly 2% a year growth, it wouldn’t have grown at all. In fact, in most of the years, it would have contracted."
The unprecedented migration has meant that 600 thousand people per year arrived instead of 300 thousand people per year in a United Kingdom with a population over 60 million. This means you should substract 0.5% from the GDP growth every year to make an estimate to "growth without increased migration", and you definitely don't get "contracting economy" as a result .
2) The comparison with previous era without context is also problematic because it ignores that there are other basic demographic reasons - lowered fertility and increased amount of retirees - why the economy slowed down - in fact, that's part of the pro-immigration arguments about why immigration is necessary.
The basic argument of Caplan and co. is that basic economic theory dictates that even if natives slightly suffer from immigration, immigrants benefit immensely and that's why it's worth it.
Bryan Caplan etc. definitely do no argue that the expected economic growth from immigration equivalent to 0.5% of the population is 0.5% economic growth, they argue that it leads to massive economic growth and that it is the single most important thing for growing the economy.
"Bryan Caplan etc. definitely do no argue that the expected economic growth from immigration equivalent to 0.5% of the population is 0.5% economic growth, they argue that it leads to massive economic growth and that it is the single most important thing for growing the economy."
I think you misunderstand their viewpoint.
If immigration (where immigrants come with relatively poor countries such as Pakistan) equivalent to 0.5% of the population is 0.5% economic growth and this relation remains true for even very high immigration rates (that's the part I really doubt), then immigration is the most effective way to grow the GLOBAL economy. It means that if 300 million people migrated to the United States from the developing world, then its GDP would almost double and the world GDP would increase by 20% in one fell swoop.
I think you are mis-representing their viewpoint (certainly Hanania, and Bentham's Bulldog, but also I think Caplan).
Caplan thinks that global economy would double if borders were truly open, I think it fits well with what I have written.
I haven't read Bentham, and I feel Hanania prioritizes the wrong things (thinking small state is more important than social cohesion).
"The basic argument of Caplan and co. is that basic economic theory dictates that even if natives slightly suffer from immigration, immigrants benefit immensely and that's why it's worth it."
Caplan disavows that perspective in his book. He emphasizes that he's not advocating for immigration on the basis of charity to foreigners (although he certainly cares for their wellbeing quite a bit) but on the basis of benefits to natives.
Sent this to a friend and he made this counterpoint to your original question:
How many wealthy countries haven’t seen lots of immigration over the past 30 years?
Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Lithuania, Hungary.
I should look at the other countries, but isn't Japan getting screwed right now because of low birth rates, and they are starting to import Africans?
Indeed, and Japan is an interesting example of the success of low immigration countries, as over the last 30 years, their annual economic growth was less than 1%. South Korea had decent growth over the period (over 3%) but they were starting from a much poorer state. Over more recent years, they've had far more anemic growth of about 2%.
Notably, these "wealthy" countries are still quite poor compared to the US.
The richest of them has a GDP per capita 32% lower than that of the poorest state in the US.
Discussing open borders only in terms of whether states (governments) should open them or not (which logically includes any state limits on immigration), is to overlook the efficient and moral solution to the problem: first privatise all “public” property among the existing populace and then let the private owners decide whom to invite onto their property. This is, of course, the actual libertarian solution.
https://jclester.substack.com/p/open-borders-today-stupid-or-sinister?utm_source=publication-search
Ok, but that will literally never happen.
Never is literally a very long time.
You ought to read the link Lester provided.
I read it. It's the same argument made by Hoppe. I don't mean that as an insult (in fact, Hoppe was important in my own intellectual development), but I don't find the whole approach convincing so the specific application of the approach doesn't move me.
It’s not the same argument as Hoppe but it is similar. The argument fails to move you because you are not a libertarian but intellectual defects like that can be corrected in debate. In any event, it is possible for government policy to move in a libertarian direction and libertarians need not be tethered to open borders due to bad arguments.
How does it differ from Hoppe’s argument?
Well written, reminds me of Strange Death of Europe.
Great article, however, pretty short shrift to Pakistani female harassment which quickly escalates to assault and rape...as you noted futher down the article. At the end of the day the Muslim/Islam intransigence, religious fervor, entitlement, aggression, lack of assimilition and obvious hostility to all things western is the problem. Time to make that clear and stop hiding it in euphemisms.
All men are not created equal. Instead of making immigration harder for everyone why not just ban Arabs and move on with one's life. Ban Pakistan as well. Basically anyone who fucks their cousin.
Right, the enlightened liberal policy is 'Open Borders except for Muslims and anyone with an IQ below 90'. I am not an enlightened liberal, but if I was, that would be my belief.
Muslims in general are probably fine. They're not insane just conservative. Arabs make up less than 20% of all Muslims. We especially be open to Iranians.
Unfortunately they are infiltrated by IRGC and want to export their 12er "revolution".
This is the Muslim in the room that no one wants to talk about, instead we have euphemisms for them. "Knife culture", "honor culture", "gang rape", "crowds of men", "highly religious", "impassioned Imams at the mosque".