Russia Likely Did Swing Votes For Donald Trump

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_Res Ipsa
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Re: Russia Likely Did Swing Votes For Donald Trump

Post by _Res Ipsa »

Xenophon wrote:My mistake, Doc, I assumed you were referencing the actual situation we have in our country. I'd be willing to bet that completely wide open borders isn't exactly EAllusion's position, but I'll let him answer that.

DocCam wrote:Anyway. I'm pro-immigration, but in a measured, common sense approach. I'm not threatened by Mexican, or Hispanic, or Latino immigration. Quite the opposite; I think it's great.

So how we are doing it now is cool?


Why would anyone ask EA for his actual position on an issue when it’s much more fun to make stuff up and pillory him for it? :lol:
​“The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.”

― Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 1951
_Doctor CamNC4Me
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Re: Russia Likely Did Swing Votes For Donald Trump

Post by _Doctor CamNC4Me »

Xenophon wrote:My mistake, Doc, I assumed you were referencing the actual situation we have in our country. I'd be willing to bet that completely wide open borders isn't exactly EA's position, but I'll let him answer that.

DocCam wrote:Anyway. I'm pro-immigration, but in a measured, common sense approach. I'm not threatened by Mexican, or Hispanic, or Latino immigration. Quite the opposite; I think it's great.

So how we are doing it now is cool?


You believe our immigration is being conducted in a measured, common sense approach? That's weird.

- Doc
In the face of madness, rationality has no power - Xiao Wang, US historiographer, 2287 AD.

Every record...falsified, every book rewritten...every statue...has been renamed or torn down, every date...altered...the process is continuing...minute by minute. History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which the Ideology is always right.
_Themis
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Re: Russia Likely Did Swing Votes For Donald Trump

Post by _Themis »

Doctor CamNC4Me wrote:I'm talking about the Libertarian (?) utopia that EAllusion is proposing that unrestricted immigration would provide everyone.


You use the word utopia, and I suspect EA understands the world is not in this utopia state. If the US were the whole world you would have unrestricted immigration. Past history has seen less restrictions on immigration into the US and it seemed to work out very positively.
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_honorentheos
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Re: Russia Likely Did Swing Votes For Donald Trump

Post by _honorentheos »

Markk wrote: There is a saying in construction that anyone with wheel barrow and a shovel thinks they are are a qualified contractor...the same goes for the many hacks on the web...anyone with a computer and an calculator thinks they are a economist.

Markk wrote:
honorentheos wrote:Game, set, match, EAllusion.

That, anyway, or one of the most ironic things I've read in a while. :lol:



Or you can address the different studies on the topic, that all have different conclusions...why is your choice of links, the correct one? Are wages higher or lower, what is your study of the day you choose to believe?

Markk, here's what I said upthread that hopefully helps you out -

As I noted above to Cam, I personally think government intervention is necessary for capital to move in the economy at levels that create the benefits we've been talking about. It's more intuitive than something I've seen demonstrated in models. So, I guess it's a bias of mine. But that's my sense of why overall we're seeing wealth accrue disproportionately to the most wealthy few even as the effect of both automation and cheaper immigrant labor have positive effects on real wages in the US.

You're complaining about people not addressing things that have been discussed repeatedly and in some depth (or as deep as most things on a message board get discussed.)
The world is always full of the sound of waves..but who knows the heart of the sea, a hundred feet down? Who knows it's depth?
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_Doctor CamNC4Me
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Re: Russia Likely Did Swing Votes For Donald Trump

Post by _Doctor CamNC4Me »

Do the gains from automation only flow through to the owners of businesses or do we institute social programs, such as universal basic income, to ensure that displaced workers have some baseline standard of living?

I'd be interesting in Honor unpacking his comments upthread a bit.

- Doc
In the face of madness, rationality has no power - Xiao Wang, US historiographer, 2287 AD.

Every record...falsified, every book rewritten...every statue...has been renamed or torn down, every date...altered...the process is continuing...minute by minute. History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which the Ideology is always right.
_Themis
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Re: Russia Likely Did Swing Votes For Donald Trump

Post by _Themis »

Markk wrote:
EAllusion wrote:None of these links support the contention that either immigration suppresses wages generally or that immigration does not increase wages generally. I don't think you understand what you are reading. The biggest error in your reasoning, which seems manifest in the fact that you shared this links thinking they contradicted anything I said, is that you confuse absolute wage growth adjusted for inflation with specific pressures on wages.


They prove my point that you just pick and choose links that support your political view, and refuse to look the really issue with your own eyes. You claimed that folks with high school diplomas make more because of illegal immigration...which you failed to remotely prove...and the links I gathered in a few minutes, show how across the board opinions and variables are.

Give some tangible examples that support your assertion?


You picked those links to make a point that you can find sources to back up what ever you want, but EA suggests they didn't back up your position. You would need to show how the back up your position in order to have a real point. I do agree that one could find articles written to support any position out there, but most are just assertion without substance. The more accurate positions to reality will have that substance. They will provide that substance so anyone can check it out for themselves. I also wouldn't assume people doing the research are not out in the field seeing things with there own eyes. I suspect many will be out there more then you or I.
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_Xenophon
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Re: Russia Likely Did Swing Votes For Donald Trump

Post by _Xenophon »

Doctor CamNC4Me wrote:You believe our immigration is being conducted in a measured, common sense approach? That's weird.

There are things I would change if I were king of the USA, unfortunately I am not. Right off the bat I would probably reverse any anti-DACA ruling and expand the program and have ICE take a good long look at when and how they decide to intervene. I don't really care to get down in the weeds on these hypothetical scenarios but on the whole though, I think our current immigration policies (read as mostly not the stuff Trump has done/proposed) are "OK". Everything can be improved but I wouldn't class them as either unmeasured or lacking common sense entirely.
"If you consider what are called the virtues in mankind, you will find their growth is assisted by education and cultivation." -Xenophon of Athens
_EAllusion
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Re: Russia Likely Did Swing Votes For Donald Trump

Post by _EAllusion »

I do not favor completely unrestricted immigration, but I would favor significantly opening up immigration opportunities by having more visas issued and an easier, more streamlined process for naturalization of citizens. I would only favor hard restrictions on those with criminal or similar backgrounds or those who revealed such risk while being screened in.

Efforts to even further restrict immigration I see has misgided, harmul, and in some cases simply cruel. I prefer a vision of America as a melting pot stirred by the values of liberty and democracy rather than one of racial exclusion that know-nothing people like Donald Trump and his white supremacist supporters like Ajax desire.

My comments here are directed at the impacts of immigration that is actually occurring.
_honorentheos
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Re: Russia Likely Did Swing Votes For Donald Trump

Post by _honorentheos »

Doctor CamNC4Me wrote:I might've misinterpreted what you meant by disincentivzing companies and individuals from holding onto their wealth. Let me try this again.

honorentheos wrote:As I noted above to Cam, I personally think government intervention is necessary for capital to move in the economy at levels that create the benefits we've been talking about.

What would you have the government do to get capital moving? I'm not sure what that even means.

It's more intuitive than something I've seen demonstrated in models. So, I guess it's a bias of mine. But that's my sense of why overall we're seeing wealth accrue disproportionately to the most wealthy few even as the effect of both automation and cheaper immigrant labor have positive effects on real wages in the US.


You can't really have it both ways here. One, you're saying automation and immigrant labor has positive effects on wages in the US, while at the same exact time saying automation and immigrant labor result in companies and individuals accruing disproportionate amounts of wealth. You're contradicting yourself.

I think we're talking past one another because what we've seen in the last three decades is indicative of there being a problem with how wealth is accruing that needs looked at but this isn't directly the same thing as Markk complains of where the immigrant worker being paid $11/hour is occupying a space in the market he seems to feel should be occupied by people like him but making $20/hour. Let's use a washing machine to illustrate the concept which hopefully shows what is meant here. If a person spent 10 hours a week doing laundry before and the invention of the automatic washing machine cut this time down to 1 hour, the productivity of that person goes up in that the person is able to do other things while the machine produces clean 9 hours worth of clean laundry. And, hypothetically, the person is able to spend those 9 hours doing something that they can be even more efficient at because it takes more skill to do that they uniquely have compared to most other people. In the case of automation replacing skilled labor, it works the same way provided that person is able to take their skills and interests to perform a different and productive end. And this is what has happened historically. Innovation and technology for most of the 20th century freed people from menial work that anyone could perform so they could become more specialized where their skills and interests benefited them and increased productivity as well. But we're seeing real results shifting over the last few decades since the Reagan tax cuts where the benefits are accruing to fewer and wealthier people.

Earlier you said:

My real argument is that there needs to be disincentives for hording wealth to maintain the benefits of automation and immigrant labor. There's a certain irony in the complaint by blue collar conservatives against immigrant labor in my perspective because of this.

You've stated that automation and immigrant labor result in wealth inequity and you state, in the same sentence, we need to discourage the wealth that results from that. I'm asking you what you would have the government do to move hordes of wealth out of companies' and individuals' clutches into the economy so, I guess, we can have more automation and immigrant labor? I'm trying to wrap my mind around your thought process here.

I don't think we need to "discourage wealth" so much as ensure that it circulates in the broader economy rather than narrowly within financial sectors and the like. I do think that tax rates need to be part of the solution to move horded wealth back into the real economy so that the benefits of increased efficiency get distributed more broadly. I'm not a free market capitalist. I'm for government regulation to ensure the costs of production (economic, environmental, social, etc.) aren't passed off onto communities and the public while the profits are accrued and horded by the corporate entities who will do exactly that with no regard for much else than the bottom line if allowed to be so myopic. I think the most democratic way of using those taxes should be sought to benefit society the most, including investment in infrastructure and innovation industries, scientific research and exploration of new frontiers in space, medicine, and elsewhere. Schools, libraries, public spaces and lands would all be greater beneficiaries of this in my view because they offer the means for people to create the new means of production needed. I'm also inclined to see some form of minimum basic income or other broad safety net program implemented to mitigate the inevitable reality that cheap labor that can be performed by machines is going to prevent some people from being realistically more productive because they can finally take on learning to make the App they have been rolling around in their minds...
The world is always full of the sound of waves..but who knows the heart of the sea, a hundred feet down? Who knows it's depth?
~ Eiji Yoshikawa
_EAllusion
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Re: Russia Likely Did Swing Votes For Donald Trump

Post by _EAllusion »

Markk, what you are doing is the equivalent of retorting to me saying it is the position of climate science that global warming is happening by linking a bunch of articles that say it's cold outside today and claiming anyone can find data to say anything.

This falls in the category of "not even wrong" because you aren't getting that your links don't even contradict what you are disagreeing with.
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