I don't see anything about speeding up immigration proceedings, which would decrease the incentive to enter and work while waiting for your day in immigration court. It seems to me that there are tons of retired or semi-retired lawyers who could be hired as part-time immigration judges, doing remote hearings.
I find “high dudgeon” people who focus on their emotions without bothering to think about facts, logic, and causation utterly insufferable. Thank you for not being one of them. Thank you for being a voice of reason in unreasonable times.
To increase immigration, here are some ideas which might help the cause…
1. Allow in a million or two high-capital immigrants with college degrees and complete fluency in English. Doctors, engineers, etc.
2. Set up an improved guest worker program for lower skilled jobs.
3. Triple the employer paid SS and Medicare taxes on immigrants (including the above two categories). Then the employer will be responsible for this, and for any fraud. This will help immigrants fund American retirements.
4. Require asylum claims to be presented and adjudicated prior to entering US soil. Alternatively, only allow claims from citizens of direct proximate neighbors (Caribbean). Or just cancel it completely.
5. Allow states to determine if they want illegal aliens or not. Instead of deporting them, send them from those not wanting them to accommodating states.
6. Instead of deporting hard workers, get the lists of people getting medical support paid by states (California, Oregon, etc) cross check against citizenship records and deport based upon some definition of abuse (TBD). This will be controversial to the left, but probably acceptable to the middle and right voters.
This immigration policy flies in the face of affordability. There needs to be the economic case made for why immigration can make everyday things more affordable. There need to be tradeoffs for the general public. Yes using ice for crime and strengthening the border are great. However any party that does this will still get punished at the ballot box because it doesn't address affordability.
Obama went so hard on deportations and border enforcement because he thought it would make comprehensive immigration reform possible. But by then, too many Republicans in Congress had given up on that goal. For Republicans, the answer to how much immigration enforcement we need is *always* more, no matter the reality on the ground. Just like the answer to the right level of income tax is always less.
I think one thing that’s missing is that Democrats need to talk about immigration in terms of benefits to Americans. Too often they talk about the benefits to the immigrants instead. I am not saying this as a “one weird trick” kind of thing but IMO is a necessary condition.
That runs you right into the issue of highly skilled people with capital usually having a more positive economic effect than low skill broke people, and it is not permissible to notice (or talk about) that because most D's are more interested in the latter group than the former. You can't make the case if you care more about the welfare of the immigrant than the American.
"If a million new immigrants come to the United States, it would be kind of wild for them to collectively commit zero crimes, and in that sense immigration makes crime worse."
You could say the same thing about native-born children. If a million families give birth, it would be wild to expect the children to collectively commit zero crimes, and in that sense, having babies makes crime worse. So, to be consistent, we would need to ban babies.
Note: I am not seriously proposing banning babies, I'm making the argument to show how nonsensical the argument that zero immigrants reduces crime actually is. What really matters in terms of public safety is the probability of a random person becoming a crime victim, and the determining factor for that is the number of crimes per people, not the total number of crimes; adding more people increases the denominator, which can still reduce the crime rate overall, even if the numerator increases too.
Of, course, my above argument presumes some basic understanding of math and probability, as well as the ability to think rationally about an emotionally charged topic, which is quite probably beyond the capability of the average American. To a person who thinks on emotion, rather than reason, and is already naturally suspicious of people with different cultures or skin colors, of course they are going to be swayed by the argument that less immigration implies less crime, without thinking too deeply. But, it's still mathematically inaccurate, so long as the crime rate of immigrants is lower than the crime rate of the native-born population.
> What really matters in terms of public safety is the probability of a random person becoming a crime victim,
No, what matters is the probability of a random citizen (or legal immigrant) becoming a crime victim. Illegal immigrants can only increase the numerator, not the denominator.
ICE cannot be allowed to continue to exist in its current form. Stephen Miller has taken the always present threat it posed and forged it into a weapon for use against freedom. It is rotten from top to bottom, it has too much power and range of action, too many weapons, and it's full of bad apples. Any attempt to preserve ICE is an attempt to sign the death warrant of our democracy.
Roll it back to INS and deeply circumscribe the areas over which it can operate solo. This doesn't mean no border enforcement. But any attempt to write an immigration policy for 2029 that doesn't include disbanding ICE and replacing it is at best an unserious exercise and at worst a declaration that our democracy cannot be saved.
The proposal that the incoming (fingers crossed) Democratic President in 2029 can repurpose the enlarged ICE force for other LE functions is indeed intriguing but fails for one specific reason: that Democratic President should fire every damn ICE person who was hired by the Trump thugs and goons. Anyone who wants to join ICE at the urging of Miller, Noem, Homans, Bovino et al is not a person I want to spend in government service one second after noon on Jan. 20, 2029.
I broadly agree with this. But I would like to emphasize how harmful catch and release policies are including people that apply for asylum.
NOBODY should be released into the US unless they have an approved claim/VISA. Once you open that door a whole lot of people are going to try and get in because they will rightly believe their chance of being deported is low.
If detention centers are full, then you need to close the border to new claims or people coming through.
Any immigration policy that doesn't start with an increase in the number of legal immigrants permitted in the United States isn't going to succeed in the long-term. You can win an election or two based upon the premise of "immigration enforcement done right", but the enforcement is never going to change the factors that cause people to seek a better life in the United States in the first place.
I'm quite disappointed the author of 1 billion immigrants didn't mention the current US policy towards legal immigration at all in his essay. Immigrants enter the United States without documents because they are unable to secure legal immigration visas prior to arrival. Make those visas easier to acquire and our chaotic system of sneaking across the border or violating the terms of a temporary visitation visas can be replaced by an orderly one of legal immigration.
There needs to be an economic policy here. If the usa is doing a ton of factory building and rare earths then there's room for work permits that don't lead to citizenship or leave to remain for the time immigrants do these jobs. Working in a rare earth mine or refinery is a tough job and we need to work out whose going to do it. I'm sure the case can be made to the american public.
I read the article early in the morning, got a few more hours of sleep just in case I wasn't reading it properly, gave it another shot just a little bit ago, and... I'm still not seeing a lot of substance in this article. The policy here seems to be to prioritize on deporting immigrants who commit other crimes, then are discovered to also be in the country illegally. But there's also an acknowledgement that immigrants commit crimes at lower rates, and also that racial/ethnic profiling on the citizenship check can't be avoided.
I'm not going to outright say that the policy is bad, but it seems to me that it's either not going to amount to much at all, or if pursued more maximally, will result in some adverse tradeoffs in the labor market. I get the political atmosphere on this right now, but I still can't get around either having to take on those adverse tradeoffs head on, or getting more to understand that some of rules around immigration law are bad, and we need to change the rules to make more of the illegal immigration legal.
I don't see anything about speeding up immigration proceedings, which would decrease the incentive to enter and work while waiting for your day in immigration court. It seems to me that there are tons of retired or semi-retired lawyers who could be hired as part-time immigration judges, doing remote hearings.
I find “high dudgeon” people who focus on their emotions without bothering to think about facts, logic, and causation utterly insufferable. Thank you for not being one of them. Thank you for being a voice of reason in unreasonable times.
To increase immigration, here are some ideas which might help the cause…
1. Allow in a million or two high-capital immigrants with college degrees and complete fluency in English. Doctors, engineers, etc.
2. Set up an improved guest worker program for lower skilled jobs.
3. Triple the employer paid SS and Medicare taxes on immigrants (including the above two categories). Then the employer will be responsible for this, and for any fraud. This will help immigrants fund American retirements.
4. Require asylum claims to be presented and adjudicated prior to entering US soil. Alternatively, only allow claims from citizens of direct proximate neighbors (Caribbean). Or just cancel it completely.
5. Allow states to determine if they want illegal aliens or not. Instead of deporting them, send them from those not wanting them to accommodating states.
6. Instead of deporting hard workers, get the lists of people getting medical support paid by states (California, Oregon, etc) cross check against citizenship records and deport based upon some definition of abuse (TBD). This will be controversial to the left, but probably acceptable to the middle and right voters.
This immigration policy flies in the face of affordability. There needs to be the economic case made for why immigration can make everyday things more affordable. There need to be tradeoffs for the general public. Yes using ice for crime and strengthening the border are great. However any party that does this will still get punished at the ballot box because it doesn't address affordability.
Obama went so hard on deportations and border enforcement because he thought it would make comprehensive immigration reform possible. But by then, too many Republicans in Congress had given up on that goal. For Republicans, the answer to how much immigration enforcement we need is *always* more, no matter the reality on the ground. Just like the answer to the right level of income tax is always less.
I think one thing that’s missing is that Democrats need to talk about immigration in terms of benefits to Americans. Too often they talk about the benefits to the immigrants instead. I am not saying this as a “one weird trick” kind of thing but IMO is a necessary condition.
That runs you right into the issue of highly skilled people with capital usually having a more positive economic effect than low skill broke people, and it is not permissible to notice (or talk about) that because most D's are more interested in the latter group than the former. You can't make the case if you care more about the welfare of the immigrant than the American.
"If a million new immigrants come to the United States, it would be kind of wild for them to collectively commit zero crimes, and in that sense immigration makes crime worse."
You could say the same thing about native-born children. If a million families give birth, it would be wild to expect the children to collectively commit zero crimes, and in that sense, having babies makes crime worse. So, to be consistent, we would need to ban babies.
Note: I am not seriously proposing banning babies, I'm making the argument to show how nonsensical the argument that zero immigrants reduces crime actually is. What really matters in terms of public safety is the probability of a random person becoming a crime victim, and the determining factor for that is the number of crimes per people, not the total number of crimes; adding more people increases the denominator, which can still reduce the crime rate overall, even if the numerator increases too.
Of, course, my above argument presumes some basic understanding of math and probability, as well as the ability to think rationally about an emotionally charged topic, which is quite probably beyond the capability of the average American. To a person who thinks on emotion, rather than reason, and is already naturally suspicious of people with different cultures or skin colors, of course they are going to be swayed by the argument that less immigration implies less crime, without thinking too deeply. But, it's still mathematically inaccurate, so long as the crime rate of immigrants is lower than the crime rate of the native-born population.
> What really matters in terms of public safety is the probability of a random person becoming a crime victim,
No, what matters is the probability of a random citizen (or legal immigrant) becoming a crime victim. Illegal immigrants can only increase the numerator, not the denominator.
ICE cannot be allowed to continue to exist in its current form. Stephen Miller has taken the always present threat it posed and forged it into a weapon for use against freedom. It is rotten from top to bottom, it has too much power and range of action, too many weapons, and it's full of bad apples. Any attempt to preserve ICE is an attempt to sign the death warrant of our democracy.
Roll it back to INS and deeply circumscribe the areas over which it can operate solo. This doesn't mean no border enforcement. But any attempt to write an immigration policy for 2029 that doesn't include disbanding ICE and replacing it is at best an unserious exercise and at worst a declaration that our democracy cannot be saved.
The proposal that the incoming (fingers crossed) Democratic President in 2029 can repurpose the enlarged ICE force for other LE functions is indeed intriguing but fails for one specific reason: that Democratic President should fire every damn ICE person who was hired by the Trump thugs and goons. Anyone who wants to join ICE at the urging of Miller, Noem, Homans, Bovino et al is not a person I want to spend in government service one second after noon on Jan. 20, 2029.
I broadly agree with this. But I would like to emphasize how harmful catch and release policies are including people that apply for asylum.
NOBODY should be released into the US unless they have an approved claim/VISA. Once you open that door a whole lot of people are going to try and get in because they will rightly believe their chance of being deported is low.
If detention centers are full, then you need to close the border to new claims or people coming through.
Also, implement e-verify.
Any immigration policy that doesn't start with an increase in the number of legal immigrants permitted in the United States isn't going to succeed in the long-term. You can win an election or two based upon the premise of "immigration enforcement done right", but the enforcement is never going to change the factors that cause people to seek a better life in the United States in the first place.
I'm quite disappointed the author of 1 billion immigrants didn't mention the current US policy towards legal immigration at all in his essay. Immigrants enter the United States without documents because they are unable to secure legal immigration visas prior to arrival. Make those visas easier to acquire and our chaotic system of sneaking across the border or violating the terms of a temporary visitation visas can be replaced by an orderly one of legal immigration.
There needs to be an economic policy here. If the usa is doing a ton of factory building and rare earths then there's room for work permits that don't lead to citizenship or leave to remain for the time immigrants do these jobs. Working in a rare earth mine or refinery is a tough job and we need to work out whose going to do it. I'm sure the case can be made to the american public.
What does the polling show about E-Verify (or any employer-based enforcement policy).
Does this kind of thing turn off voters?
Now I'm picturing Mackinac Island as the Ellis Island of the Midwest, complete with a giant Paul Bunyan in place of the Statue of Liberty.
I read the article early in the morning, got a few more hours of sleep just in case I wasn't reading it properly, gave it another shot just a little bit ago, and... I'm still not seeing a lot of substance in this article. The policy here seems to be to prioritize on deporting immigrants who commit other crimes, then are discovered to also be in the country illegally. But there's also an acknowledgement that immigrants commit crimes at lower rates, and also that racial/ethnic profiling on the citizenship check can't be avoided.
I'm not going to outright say that the policy is bad, but it seems to me that it's either not going to amount to much at all, or if pursued more maximally, will result in some adverse tradeoffs in the labor market. I get the political atmosphere on this right now, but I still can't get around either having to take on those adverse tradeoffs head on, or getting more to understand that some of rules around immigration law are bad, and we need to change the rules to make more of the illegal immigration legal.