The mass of immigrants into the U.S. under the Biden administration were not all granted status to legally work. So whatever housing they were consuming, they weren't paying for it, and presumably NGOs laundering taxpayer dollars were. File that under adding insult to injury (and the elites expecting everyone impacted to just smile and dumbly nod their heads). We may have reached the point of exceeding the insularity, and insolence, of 18th century French aristocracy.
An annual wealth transfer from employees to employers of approximately $500bn helps explain the resentment of Trump’s working-class supporters towards mass immigration.
Mercy, this was a great blog post. Yes, there are some benefits to immigration.
I do have one small quibble. If a domestic population decides it wants to entirely forgo the benefits of immigration, even tolerate lower living standards so as to protect their language, culture, customs, work ethics, traditions, religion, way of life, and stability, I think that is the right of the citizenry.
I am not Japanese, but in Japan this question is being raised now. I would understand if the Japanese decide they are better off with very limited immigration.
South Korea really faces some drama ahead. We will see if labor scarcity drives up wages, lowers housing costs, and then birth rates climb again.
We have financialized the cost of raising children (whereas in the era of heads of household being the sole breadwinner, the cost was imputed in the labor of the mother). That is quite a disincentive except where we have subsidized it via welfare (at the bottom rungs of the socio-economic ladder).
As for purpose, Nietzsche saw that coming, that nihilism would become socially dominant in the West (because our value system was collapsing).
Not disagreeing with you, but I see it more in the collapse of religion in the West. Take a Catholic for instance, Catholics are banned from premarital sex, use of conception and abortion. What are the effects of these constraints? They get married earlier and have more children. The outcome? They reproduce at above replacement levels - so do Muslims and practicing Jews.
The secular West on the other hand reproduce at below replacement levels.
Once reliable conception arrived on the scene how do you suppose the Church could enforce the ban? What kept people in line was the fear of the consequences, remove the consequences and there is much less likelihood of compliance.
Just a guess, but maybe when housing becomes a near give-away, and labor becomes scarce (and wages go up), we may see a change.
South Korea may be heading to that juncture.
It will take some cultural changes too. Maybe people will come to see commercial life as vapid and family life as richer. I confess that idea is easier in a nation of small farms rather than large urban centers.
But then, only 60 years ago big families were still a norm in developed nations, especially Catholic.
We would need to see a change around constraints placed on sex (vey unlikely). At present with conception and easy available abortion (at least in my country), there is really not a lot of incentive to get married early. Why would you, when you can enjoy as much sex as you want without consequence, until later in life, when you might start thinking about starting a family. But by then you are too old to have more than a couple.
Lorenzo, I particularly like the insight that industrial revolution, like agricultural revolution, are parts of a 'Great Enrichment' which is really an Energy Revolution (or at least prolonged evolution with several step changes). I think I first came across this idea from the historian Ian Morris in 'Why the West Rules' and 'Measures of Civilisation'. The later emphasised energy capture as crucial to humans surviving, thriving, to advancement, modernity, progress and even as a measure feature of civilisation. Good work as always. G
Interestingly, even in cases of high skilled immigration, once an ethnic group reaches a critical mass in a specific industry, the native-born can get completely shut out of a career in said industry. This is happening in the US, in the IT industry, as it is increasingly becoming Indian dominated and any non-Indian has very small chance of having a career in it. Source: https://substack.com/@mattforney/note/p-179822542?utm_source=notes-share-action&r=5tspa9
A beautiful essay. Without a doubt awesome. I particularly found your piecemeal treatment and breakdown of the "but more gains from trade" narrative really convincing.
At one point it reminded me of my previous comment on a previous essay of yours concerning Foucault/Power/Narratives. I think inserting this appropriately would make the essay digestible to the crowd outside the converted you're [unfortunately] preaching to (it's a case of give and take, served on a platter of your favorite, which wrong-foots your adversary, so to speak, use their tools against them etc). Looking back at the object of my research then (slum demolitions), the narrative fizzled out because there weren't any more slums left to demolish and so the zeitgeist and upper class focus moved on. Using this logic on the immigration theme hardly inspires confidence we'll find a way to dislodge the epistemic intellectually dishonest binary in polite society.
As your essay makes clear, and I completely agree, finding it a joy to see so many separate strings brought together, we're dealing with a stacked heap of pancakes.
I remember enjoying reading Elias and his use of the fork (table manners) to map out the civilizing process and thinking, it's so fucking obvious, why can't the multicultural crowd get-it? As an ethnic Italian whose a multicultural European-British-American-Indian, I think I might have the answer. And it's the same answer you're giving in the essay: polite society: class tastes (discernment): narrative control: masters of theory.
In this sense we're drunk on our cool aide (hubris as you pointed out). And because the higher classes have bridged the gap across nation-states, across cultures - we're downstream of a situation where back in the 60s-80s capital flows across borders in the West were promoted, but labour had big hurdles (you probably know as well as me the mountains of paperwork legally migrating necessitated) - across generations, they're aloof to how the local [backward, uncivilized] in their nation-state organically reacts (racists!). Perhaps this is the unconscious reason for the flagrant attack on nationalism? Personally I don't believe there's no plan, just that perhaps the enablers don't know their roles as cogs in a bigger plan.
I thought your conclusion, or rather, lack of conclusion, a bit dispiriting. I hope you'll forgive my saying so.
"There is a straightforward, respectable view on immigration to Western countries. More people means more transactions, means more gains from trade, so immigration is a good thing. Immigration grows the economy, it increases GDP, so sensible folk support immigration."
"One of Australia’s advantages is that the combination of compulsory voting and preferential voting"
Not to be too cheeky of a Yank, but as one nonetheless, my mental image of Australia is as the one place where the police jackboots yanked a guy out of his car to force one of those disgusting blue masks on him. It's an iconic image from Covid times.
Based on that. I'm not sure your voting system is the advantage that you think it is.
I also used to want to visit, but now I've pretty much decided that's never happening, ever.
Won’t pretend Australia doesn’t have an authoritarian streak, it does. But also, a federation. Would you want all of the US to be judged by, say, California?
Eh, I feel like we often get judged by New York (City) due to its prominence in media.
And NY is just Commiefornia with bigger buildings, higher tolls, worse weather, and fewer earthquakes.
The image I saw looked like it happened in the middle of nowhere (which I guess is pretty much a large part of the interior of Australia?). The worst of the crazy stuff here is mostly contained in the "blue" (Democrat, far-left) cities.
Australia was founded by convicts … and their gaolers. We are absolutely a somewhat authoritarian society. Also, a bit obsessed with quarantine, with keeping diseases out. (Introduced rabbits, foxes and cane toads have been disasters.)
Australia is highly urbanised and different States handled things differently. Victoria (where I am) was particularly bad. Generally, however, we are a well-managed country with high state capacity. We avoided both the Global Financial Crisis and the Great Recession, for instance.
The mass of immigrants into the U.S. under the Biden administration were not all granted status to legally work. So whatever housing they were consuming, they weren't paying for it, and presumably NGOs laundering taxpayer dollars were. File that under adding insult to injury (and the elites expecting everyone impacted to just smile and dumbly nod their heads). We may have reached the point of exceeding the insularity, and insolence, of 18th century French aristocracy.
An annual wealth transfer from employees to employers of approximately $500bn helps explain the resentment of Trump’s working-class supporters towards mass immigration.
https://cis.org/Costs-US-immigration-vastly-exceed-benefits
Mercy, this was a great blog post. Yes, there are some benefits to immigration.
I do have one small quibble. If a domestic population decides it wants to entirely forgo the benefits of immigration, even tolerate lower living standards so as to protect their language, culture, customs, work ethics, traditions, religion, way of life, and stability, I think that is the right of the citizenry.
I am not Japanese, but in Japan this question is being raised now. I would understand if the Japanese decide they are better off with very limited immigration.
South Korea really faces some drama ahead. We will see if labor scarcity drives up wages, lowers housing costs, and then birth rates climb again.
The problem of low birth rates in the West is unlikely to go away any time soon.
https://x.com/newstart_2024/status/1994167706355167643
We have financialized the cost of raising children (whereas in the era of heads of household being the sole breadwinner, the cost was imputed in the labor of the mother). That is quite a disincentive except where we have subsidized it via welfare (at the bottom rungs of the socio-economic ladder).
As for purpose, Nietzsche saw that coming, that nihilism would become socially dominant in the West (because our value system was collapsing).
Not disagreeing with you, but I see it more in the collapse of religion in the West. Take a Catholic for instance, Catholics are banned from premarital sex, use of conception and abortion. What are the effects of these constraints? They get married earlier and have more children. The outcome? They reproduce at above replacement levels - so do Muslims and practicing Jews.
The secular West on the other hand reproduce at below replacement levels.
Not disagreeing about the collapse of religion, including the Catholic church. That is precisely why I mentioned Nietzsche.
I can assure you that Pius X High School in Pottstown PA in the late 70´s was not a place where the ban on premarital sex was widely enforced.
Once reliable conception arrived on the scene how do you suppose the Church could enforce the ban? What kept people in line was the fear of the consequences, remove the consequences and there is much less likelihood of compliance.
Reliable conception is one thing, immaculate conception is another.
No actually they don't. Italy's demographic collapse is even worse than our own. Mexico is trailing us but following the same trajectory.
Not all Catholics by name are practicing Catholics. I am talking about practicing Catholics who by definition follow the rules of the Church.
No true Scotsmen?
You want to subsidize reproduction by the very people who do not need subsidies.
How to do that, politically, I don't know.
It isn't a political question.
Verily.
Just a guess, but maybe when housing becomes a near give-away, and labor becomes scarce (and wages go up), we may see a change.
South Korea may be heading to that juncture.
It will take some cultural changes too. Maybe people will come to see commercial life as vapid and family life as richer. I confess that idea is easier in a nation of small farms rather than large urban centers.
But then, only 60 years ago big families were still a norm in developed nations, especially Catholic.
We would need to see a change around constraints placed on sex (vey unlikely). At present with conception and easy available abortion (at least in my country), there is really not a lot of incentive to get married early. Why would you, when you can enjoy as much sex as you want without consequence, until later in life, when you might start thinking about starting a family. But by then you are too old to have more than a couple.
There is no such thing as enjoying "as much sex as you want". Impossible. What you get is usually not what you want.
Lorenzo, I particularly like the insight that industrial revolution, like agricultural revolution, are parts of a 'Great Enrichment' which is really an Energy Revolution (or at least prolonged evolution with several step changes). I think I first came across this idea from the historian Ian Morris in 'Why the West Rules' and 'Measures of Civilisation'. The later emphasised energy capture as crucial to humans surviving, thriving, to advancement, modernity, progress and even as a measure feature of civilisation. Good work as always. G
Interestingly, even in cases of high skilled immigration, once an ethnic group reaches a critical mass in a specific industry, the native-born can get completely shut out of a career in said industry. This is happening in the US, in the IT industry, as it is increasingly becoming Indian dominated and any non-Indian has very small chance of having a career in it. Source: https://substack.com/@mattforney/note/p-179822542?utm_source=notes-share-action&r=5tspa9
A beautiful essay. Without a doubt awesome. I particularly found your piecemeal treatment and breakdown of the "but more gains from trade" narrative really convincing.
At one point it reminded me of my previous comment on a previous essay of yours concerning Foucault/Power/Narratives. I think inserting this appropriately would make the essay digestible to the crowd outside the converted you're [unfortunately] preaching to (it's a case of give and take, served on a platter of your favorite, which wrong-foots your adversary, so to speak, use their tools against them etc). Looking back at the object of my research then (slum demolitions), the narrative fizzled out because there weren't any more slums left to demolish and so the zeitgeist and upper class focus moved on. Using this logic on the immigration theme hardly inspires confidence we'll find a way to dislodge the epistemic intellectually dishonest binary in polite society.
As your essay makes clear, and I completely agree, finding it a joy to see so many separate strings brought together, we're dealing with a stacked heap of pancakes.
I remember enjoying reading Elias and his use of the fork (table manners) to map out the civilizing process and thinking, it's so fucking obvious, why can't the multicultural crowd get-it? As an ethnic Italian whose a multicultural European-British-American-Indian, I think I might have the answer. And it's the same answer you're giving in the essay: polite society: class tastes (discernment): narrative control: masters of theory.
In this sense we're drunk on our cool aide (hubris as you pointed out). And because the higher classes have bridged the gap across nation-states, across cultures - we're downstream of a situation where back in the 60s-80s capital flows across borders in the West were promoted, but labour had big hurdles (you probably know as well as me the mountains of paperwork legally migrating necessitated) - across generations, they're aloof to how the local [backward, uncivilized] in their nation-state organically reacts (racists!). Perhaps this is the unconscious reason for the flagrant attack on nationalism? Personally I don't believe there's no plan, just that perhaps the enablers don't know their roles as cogs in a bigger plan.
I thought your conclusion, or rather, lack of conclusion, a bit dispiriting. I hope you'll forgive my saying so.
Good stuff. Thank you for writing and sharing.
Once again, absolutely spot-on analysis. Impressive!
The INDBREEDING Intensity Index map seems to paint Bunbury WA as very red. That might even be true!
Yeah car crashes also mean more transactions.
So car crashes are a good thing.
"There is a straightforward, respectable view on immigration to Western countries. More people means more transactions, means more gains from trade, so immigration is a good thing. Immigration grows the economy, it increases GDP, so sensible folk support immigration."
"One of Australia’s advantages is that the combination of compulsory voting and preferential voting"
Not to be too cheeky of a Yank, but as one nonetheless, my mental image of Australia is as the one place where the police jackboots yanked a guy out of his car to force one of those disgusting blue masks on him. It's an iconic image from Covid times.
Based on that. I'm not sure your voting system is the advantage that you think it is.
I also used to want to visit, but now I've pretty much decided that's never happening, ever.
Won’t pretend Australia doesn’t have an authoritarian streak, it does. But also, a federation. Would you want all of the US to be judged by, say, California?
Eh, I feel like we often get judged by New York (City) due to its prominence in media.
And NY is just Commiefornia with bigger buildings, higher tolls, worse weather, and fewer earthquakes.
The image I saw looked like it happened in the middle of nowhere (which I guess is pretty much a large part of the interior of Australia?). The worst of the crazy stuff here is mostly contained in the "blue" (Democrat, far-left) cities.
Australia was founded by convicts … and their gaolers. We are absolutely a somewhat authoritarian society. Also, a bit obsessed with quarantine, with keeping diseases out. (Introduced rabbits, foxes and cane toads have been disasters.)
Australia is highly urbanised and different States handled things differently. Victoria (where I am) was particularly bad. Generally, however, we are a well-managed country with high state capacity. We avoided both the Global Financial Crisis and the Great Recession, for instance.