I don't post much about politics since I don't believe I have value to add to the discussion, and generally politics doesn't arouse much interest for me. But I have followed the immigration reform debate closely, mostly because like Ross Douthat I'm a moderate restrictionist. Now, people might find that strange seeing as how I'm a naturalized American myself, but really I don't have much empathy for other immigrants as immigrants because I view myself much more as who I chose to be (an American) than what I am (an immigrant). During the 1936 campaign Ayn Rand was an activist for Wendell Wilkie, and when someone in the audience told her to shut up when she was speaking because of her foreign origin, she responded, "I chose to become an American. What did you do except to be born here!" Whatever issues I have with the general Randian outlook I can see the point to that response, immigrants to the United States are not refugees, we voted with our feet, and those of us who are naturalized abjure our ties to foreign states.
As for why I am a restrictionist, the reason is simple: I think America needs to absorb the current Great Wave. In her recent bloggingheads.tv appearance Meagan McArdle pointed out that in 1890 15% of the population was foreign born and that today only 10% is, and the country survived and thrived through the first Great Wave. She doesn't note that World War I resulted in a sharp drop in immigration, and after a quick post-War bounce back legislation in the 1920s sharply reduced numbers until 1965. It is well and fine to "throw out facts," but the past is not the present and we should consider the full shape of contingent conditionalities. Around 1900 millions of unskilled laborers and peasants were flooding a country where the natives were...unskilled laborers and peasants (albeit, free landholders). The New York Times has an article up on the possible shift toward a "Points System" (which Canada and Australia employ). This system would prioritize education & skills over family ties. I strongly favor this for two reasons:
1) The societal ills due to a surfeit of highly skilled & educated workers are far milder than those where a large class of wage laborers without any occupational recourse are a structural fact of life.
2) I am not generally positively inclined toward the clannishness which extended immigrant families in the United States indulge in. I've seen it in my own family as relatives have moved to this country over the past 25 years. The initial years where my parents had to reach out and forge friendships with those outside their "ethnic zone of comfort" has given way to a withdrawal from the outside world into their own comfortable cocoon, which has only developed thanks to the beauty of family reunification.
The linked article mentions that Canada's point system causes problems, that "some professionals, like doctors...perform low-skill occupations such as driving taxis until they can find more appropriate work." I say good! There is no shame in hard labor, and it builds character to not always perceive yourself as a social superior to those you interact with on a day to day level. I reside in a town where a large number of professionals have relocated and gone "downscale." This results in a problem that a bachelor's degree really doesn't get you far, everyone has one. But, when you go to the grocery store, don't be surprised if the checkout clerk has a J.D. and isn't intimidated by your fancy diction. Many of the service sector workers think they're "better than they are," but that's because they are. Of course I've had acquaintances from California fret about how they would survive without their nanny, landscaper and gardener. Well, people raised families without these accoutrements of the nouveau middle class, and there are parts of the country where they still do. "There but for the grace of God go I!" is a lot more plausible when they went to the same schools, received the same degrees and speak English with the same level of proficiency.
Frankly, I've been shocked a little by the arguments made by those who oppose a strong tilt toward high skilled workers. That it is "class bias." That cities depend on "unskilled labor." And so on. Most of the objections have come from the Left, which I found peculiar because they seem to be arguing for a system which will structurally maintain socioeconomic inequality. This the comparative advantage argument trotted out by the libertarian economist Bryan Caplan (though generally in more compassionate guise). There is some validity to this. Is to the world's advantage that all of the hyper-educated live in on nation? Who is going to be cleaning shoes if everyone is a CEO? Back when I was a more thoroughgoing libertarian I would have found these arguments persuasive, but no more. I recall once that National Review bemoaned that in Sweden things had gotten so bad with social and economic egalitarianism that you couldn't find anyone to shine your shoes. The horror! There is the problem in expensive but isolated towns like Aspen or Telluride that low wage service sector workers can't make a go of it, because it isn't like they can commute easily from somewhere affordable.
My first simple answer is this: a nation is not a market, a market is a sector of a nation. There is a large underclass in the United States which we lay off and replace with some industrious Mexicans, but that isn't going to happen, you don't lay off citizens, or export them. That's a reality, so one of the major priorities (in my opinion) should be choking unskilled labor so that wages rise for that sector. If the CEO on vacation wants his shoes shined in Telluride, then he better be willing to pay enough so that the person who does that job actually can afford to live in Telluride! Otherwise, I guess we'll have to deal with the sloven inefficiency of scruffy shoes (or CEOs taking their precious time to shine their own shoes!). I am not as worried about high skilled labor, in part because there is much more of a natural global market for it. Professionals of all sorts will have to scramble to compete with competition from abroad no matter if they move here or not. In contrast, a plumber is not something you can utilize by remote. Some professions, like medicine and law, have been pretty good at restricting the availability of their services (e.g., med schools know how many to let in every year) so that wages remain really, really, high. I don't think it would be a sin if these legally protected professions felt what it was like to be a software engineer, always scrambling with the next certification, figuring out the angle. That's called life for most human beings.
Anyway, end of sermon. A slight re-edit (for clarity) of a chart from The New York Times (the source is the Census 2000, I recognize the data) about skill and English proficiency of various immigrant streams by nation.
Related: Yglesias and Klein go at it over this issue. Ezra needs to go back to Latin class and check out ceteris paribus.
