B1rd wrote:
I don't know what your reasoning is behind claiming that immigrants are a net gain economically. This is veritably untrue and can be seen simply by looking at Europe; immigrants have cost many countries millions of dollars in housing costs and various welfare schemes. Many can't even speak English and they are the furthest thing you could be from being economically adapted to be a benefit to their country. What's more, they commit much more crime and generate lots of social unrest. They have lots of babies and their children continue to be a burden economically and contribute to crime rates.
"A report released by the German Federal Office of Criminal Investigation in November 2015 found that over the period January–September 2015, the crime rate of refugees was the same as that of native Germans."
"despite a 440 percent increase in migrants, crime among that group only increased by 79 percent last year"
etc
Pretty much every statistic I've ever heard has said that immigrants' crimerates are either the same or lower than that of natives. The first result suggesting otherwise was fucking Breitbart- can you link a reputable source for claims like "they commit much more crime"?
Immigrants cost governments a lot of money from welfare, but they're also working. Male immigrants in the UK have either equal or higher employment rates than natives of the country. The economic growth provided by immigrants working in a country's economy actually ends up benefiting all classes of people. I don't know specific statistics behind whether or not immigrants are a net cost because that depends on how much welfare they take in, and I don't have those numbers VS their economic output, but I really doubt that they cost the country THAT much. And I'm thinking of Europe when I say this, since you mentioned refugees. America is surely in a pretty damn good position when it comes to benefits vs costs considering that their welfare system is quite terrible.
B1rd wrote:
Now that's talking about 'refugees' from the Middle East. Illegal immigrants from Mexico aren't the same but they still share lots of characteristics. As Jordan mentioned, they are responsible for lots of crime and drugs.
"Incarceration rate for foreign born: 0.86%, i.e. about a quarter of that for the US born. (non-Hispanic whites 0.57%, non-Hispanic blacks 2.47%, Hispanics ranges from 0.2% to 2.2% based on country of origin, if we exclude Puerto Ricans, who are US citizens, Asians ranges from 0.1% to 0.9%)"
i.e. non-US-born citizens commit crime about 1/4 as much, this is including illegal immigrants
B1rd wrote:
They also consume welfare at a lot higher rate than the natives, and I can't say for certain but this would indicate that they are not an economic benefit for a country. Obviously they can only work low-skilled jobs at best, otherwise they would be able to immigrate legally.
Not necessarily, actually. Waiting lists for legal immigrants can be incredibly fucked up, so some people are willing to pay a lot of money to legally get across the border. That's not including the fact that a significant amount of people (40% being an acceptable estimate) immigrate by overstaying their visa after legally entering America, which doesn't really suggest much about how much money they have.
B1rd wrote:
What's more concerning than this however, is their ability to shift demographics in their favour and influence a country's politics. You see, back in the Cold War when the faults of Communism were being exposed, left wing parties were understandably unpopular. Since they couldn't influence public opinion though facts, they actually resorted to importing voters from third-world countries. Statistically, people from third world and poor countries vote for left-wing, big-government policies and a much higher rate than white people. So it doesn't take much deductive ability to understand why the Democrats would want more immigration. They don't do so out of a desire to help other people, but to buy votes through a cycle or welfare dependence, which actually entrenches certain groups into inter-generational poverty.
Holy fucking tinfoil hat, this is why you don't read too much Breitbart, that site kills braincells
B1rd wrote:
Now, I am actually in favour of unrestricted immigration if we're talking about a proper libertarian society. There, there is no forced redistribution of resources to people, and they can't vote themselves money. So people are free to immigrate, but they will have to have valuable skills than can benefit the economy of their destination country. Otherwise there will be no point for them to immigrate if they can't make a living there. Also, there would be no state holding a gun to people's head forcing them to serve and hire people they don't want to. If say, a certain group immigrated to a country and caused a lot of trouble there, then likely they would be economically ostracised, by means of people not hiring them, or buying or selling to them.
So basically, immigration in itself is a good thing for economies, just not in our current society. The welfare states that we live in necessitate strong border control.
I just feel like the main problem with your argument is that you say they're a net cost on the economy because of how much they use the welfare system, but you don't actually even know if they are or not. You're just using the "feels" argument pretty much, in that you ASSUME immigrants are a net cost just because they use more welfare than natives. It's easy to get emotionally attached to it, but try not to make that kind of argument if you don't actually have a clue about the statistics. There's a reason why I'm not saying anything myself about the subject- because I don't actually know the numbers myself. My assumption, based on supply-side economics, would be that all kinds of immigrants would be a boon to any economy since you're straight up increasing the supply (and therefore the economic power/potential) of labour for that particular economy.
Statistics that I've seen seem to show a decent net gain (~30%+) when it comes to money spent vs money received through taxation (not to mention taxation isn't the only benefit), but those are just what I personally have seen, and haven't really gone in any depth to verify how precisely correct those are.
edit: final note, saying "ofc immigrants are a net cost, just look at europe! they cost money!" is a very silly argument when you're not going to talk about how much they produce
