Universal Basic Income

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Re: Universal Basic Income

Postby everything on Tue Jul 16, 2019 12:48 pm

Agree measurement would be incredibly difficult.

From a macroeconomics point of view, the theory (as far as I know of the very basics) should be very clear, though. Essentially there is no "government intervention" and there is a "free market" of labor after some barriers to entry (difficult journey with smugglers, etc.), some kind of fake documentation. So the normal forces of supply and demand apply. Macro indicators like GDP and CPI are probably still very, very reliable as far as seeing how the overall economy is doing. Micro indicators at the firm level should also still be extremely reliable. It's the individual worker picture that isn't so clear because it varies so much and hence we have such disparate views and solutions. But with very low unemployment, it doesn't seem unreasonable to say that someone didn't exactly hop a fence to steal "your" fruit picking manual labor job that you desperately wanted. It also doesn't seem like someone hopped a fence to steal "your" amazing high tech manufacturing job making iPhones (because these aren't able to be made here...)

If we stay at the macro level, we know Japan has very slow GDP growth. Japan has little to no immigration and a greying population, which are some of the usually cited factors. There aren't enough younger workers entering the work force to contribute to faster growth. GDP growth in 2017 was about 1.7%. Vs 2.3% in USA and 6.9% in China (China stats may be off due to various reasons). China has been growing fast as it underwent an "industrial revolution" and a "4th industrial revolution" at the same time while also becoming the factory floor for virtually the entire world, so of course its growth has been faster. How does the USA grow faster? Part of the reason is having enough labor, part of the reason is faster adaptation (lots of new technologies introduced and adopted), part of it is the outsourcing/offshoring (cheaper labor, cheaper COGS), part of it is automation (cheaper and much higher productivity), part of it is the removal of "fat" of outdated paper pushing jobs and middle management "re-engineered" and rationalized away (much to the dismay and alarm of Millenials if those managers were their Boomer parents).

The reality is there is a lot going on, so coming back to 1) blaming immigrants or 2) blaming automation is just not a very good explanation from an economics point of view. From a politics point of view, someone somewhere clearly thinks harping on some simpler marketing message must be worth something to some bloc of voters. I'd prefer if voters understood Yang's positions, but I doubt it. Even if they did, like people pointed out above, it's not really so clear that giving everyone 12k extra makes much sense. We can study that to some extent from the tax cuts that have been done (didn't put 12k in everyone's pockets evenly distributed, but did probably help some people disproportionately tilted more toward higher income folks). As far as just simplistically blaming immigrants (and confusing people on immigration vs. illegal immigration), that's even worse as it's just trying to use racially divisive rhetoric with no clear underlying solution - so it's rhetoric for possible political gain, not to try to economically help anyone who could maybe use the help.
Last edited by everything on Tue Jul 16, 2019 1:35 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Universal Basic Income

Postby Steve James on Tue Jul 16, 2019 3:29 pm

Well, it's easy to say look at California's decline since the increase in immigration --since 2016. However, the state with the least economic growth in the US is Alaska --which doesn't have an immigration problem, especially from the south.
Here's the list: https://www.businessinsider.com/state-e ... ouisiana-2

California is 6th; Texas is 5th; Massachusetts is 3rd. All have high rates of immigration. Why then are the Alaska and Louisiana economies suffering?
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Re: Universal Basic Income

Postby Michael on Tue Jul 16, 2019 6:12 pm

I meant since like 1986 when immigration took off. Maybe there is a closer year from which to begin the examination, like after 1992 immigration law changes, but I was thinking of the 1986 amnesty. California has gone from the richest to nearly the poorest and lost some medical services to the poor because of illegal immigration for just one example.
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Re: Universal Basic Income

Postby Michael on Tue Jul 16, 2019 6:15 pm

The reality is there is a lot going on, so coming back to 1) blaming immigrants or 2) blaming automation is just not a very good explanation from an economics point of view.

In purely economic terms, are you saying it's your conclusion that legal and illegal immigration do not affect the labor pool in regards to driving down wages and increasing unemployment?
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Re: Universal Basic Income

Postby everything on Tue Jul 16, 2019 7:12 pm

Michael wrote:
The reality is there is a lot going on, so coming back to 1) blaming immigrants or 2) blaming automation is just not a very good explanation from an economics point of view.

In purely economic terms, are you saying it's your conclusion that legal and illegal immigration do not affect the labor pool in regards to driving down wages and increasing unemployment?


if we back way way up and remember Adam Smith, the "invisible hand" has allocated labor to demand so that supply and demand meet such that there is 4% unemployment (which economists consider "zero" due to 4% meaning some folks are switching jobs). if there is virtually zero unemployment (from an economist's definition), we cannot logically conclude that this invisible hand (that includes some illegal migrants) is leading to unemployment.

if someone has illegally obtained a job picking cherries or cleaning a house or doing yardwork, if there are legal residents who have a preference for such work, then they are possibly priced out of such work. If they don't want to do those jobs, having 4% unemployment and rising wages is actually good for everyone's wages (Amazon has raised its minimum wage to $15; average retail wages are about $14, etc., lots and lots of data is showing rising income) IF at the micro level, people actually want to do these jobs. If people, however, do not want to work part-time at Walmart, Starbucks, plus do Uber/Lyft and stuff in the gig economy while being a full-time teacher, that is a gigantic underemployment issue that needs to be discussed, debated, have political/economic solutions emerge. If I have to teach and drive Uber, btw, it's not because someone took my cherry picking job. This is where Yang (and the Silicon Valley folks) are correct, but this argument gets a little hard to follow (does anyone even remember micro/macro econ? Did they learn it ever? Almost guaranteed not. This is as certain as those stupid "traditional" MAists losing in those MMA matches or as certain as we will probably beat up tai chi and forms again tomorrow here.).

We are all able to find multiple gigs if we want to (this is virtually defined in the unemployment stat and rising wages stats), but are those jobs any GOOD? Maybe NOT. The economy has gotten more and more efficient ("productivity" has improved) due to automation, fat elimination, offshoring, etc., and that has given us a super long bull market. If you happen to be rich, that is super, super good for you, because now you're even more rich. Money makes more money way more efficiently than labor does. If you happen NOT to be rich, e.g., a Millenial with gigantic college loans you took out to chase the ever shrinking number of high wage, high skill jobs (these jobs are not the ones being "taken" by desperate border crossers btw, but they are being offshored all the time completely legally and rationally, e.g. for "follow the sun" software development cycle - do more in 24 hours instead of 8), this picture may not look so good. You need a job to get your wealth building going. Some people say the millenials will inherit massive wealth from the boomers, but even if so, it doesn't change the current picture for them.
Last edited by everything on Tue Jul 16, 2019 7:15 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Universal Basic Income

Postby Michael on Tue Jul 16, 2019 8:32 pm

Thanks, I enjoyed your explanation.

From my side, it just seems that when approx. 1 million legal immigrants per year are coming into a country with probably about 40 million illegals working, who have obviously displaced large portions of native labor in several markets, this must be causing downward pressure on wages. I wonder if reluctance to recognize this is in order to avoid "blaming the immigrant." if so, I can understand that actually.
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Re: Universal Basic Income

Postby origami_itto on Wed Jul 17, 2019 4:46 am

Michael wrote:Thanks, I enjoyed your explanation.

From my side, it just seems that when approx. 1 million legal immigrants per year are coming into a country with probably about 40 million illegals working, who have obviously displaced large portions of native labor in several markets, this must be causing downward pressure on wages. I wonder if reluctance to recognize this is in order to avoid "blaming the immigrant." if so, I can understand that actually.


Might want to check some of your basic assumptions, there, Super Chief.

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2 ... om-mexico/

There were 11.6 million immigrants from Mexico living in the United States in 2017, and fewer than half of them (43%) were in the country illegally, according to Pew Research Center estimates. Mexico is the country’s largest source of immigrants, making up 25% of all U.S. immigrants.
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Re: Universal Basic Income

Postby everything on Wed Jul 17, 2019 5:34 am

Michael wrote:Thanks, I enjoyed your explanation.

From my side, it just seems that when approx. 1 million legal immigrants per year are coming into a country with probably about 40 million illegals working, who have obviously displaced large portions of native labor in several markets, this must be causing downward pressure on wages. I wonder if reluctance to recognize this is in order to avoid "blaming the immigrant." if so, I can understand that actually.


It depends on "what's in it for me" I suppose. At my employer, if/when we lose an engineer, etc., we always try to hire the replacement in a cheaper location. We don't want to hire very high paid USA (including immigrants) talent. Economically this isn't different than hiring someone with fake documentation to pick the cherries for my farm. It is shifting this work to less expensive "inputs" for production, which can make the firm more profitable. To an extent that profitability does support higher wages for the engineers and others we DO choose to have in the US, so the picture is mixed. My USA colleagues are very highly paid; the shifting of labor did not push their wages down. It's also NOT at all clear that paying someone 1/4 of the wages for the "same job" actually gives us more productivity due to culture, time zone, more coordination costs. If I'm an owner or executive, I'll claim that it's a global economy with a global labor market and I have to do all this to stay competitive. The offshoring shifting of labor (this is high wage, high skill jobs) is totally legal. That imagery isn't politically interesting like robots or people crossing deserts and dead little kids dying in the desert or washed ashore.
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Re: Universal Basic Income

Postby Michael on Wed Jul 17, 2019 6:37 am

It's also NOT at all clear that paying someone 1/4 of the wages for the "same job" actually gives us more productivity due to culture, time zone, more coordination costs.


As well as intellectual property losses and damage to reputation for quality problems. Boeing was apparently paying Indian programmers $9/hour for some fantastic spaghetti code on the 737 MAX. The total monetary cost for globalization, outsourcing, offshoring, and all that is never advertised and that's not an oversight.
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Re: Universal Basic Income

Postby Steve James on Wed Jul 17, 2019 7:45 am

with probably about 40 million illegals working, who have obviously displaced large portions of native labor in several markets


Making a conclusion based on "probably" is just faking an argument. Why not say "probably" 50 or 100 million illegal workers? If unemployment is at 4%, how are 40 million illegal workers displacing "large portions (?) or native labor"? 40 million is more than 10% of the overall population, which includes children and retirees who are not working.

Then, if true, "illegal workers" are essential to the current economy. At any rate, if unemployment were 1%, the argument would still be made that "illegal workers" were displacing native workers. And, if you go back to the 80s, California was doing fine using migrant labor on farms and vineyards. They were treated more like share croppers than workers, and the CA economy benefited as did the rest of the country. More of our healthy foods don't come the "heartland," unless you like genetically modified, government subsidized, corn products. Meh, they use machine harvesting.

Aw, c'mon, you heard Trump say that our wages are too high. That's simple English. This whole anti-immigrant stuff is just red meat for those to scapegoat someone for problems they really don't have. You won't see anyone beating on the Mar a Lago gates trying to take a job from the Honduran lady --who was given permission to work there. Americans should really be complaining about the companies that are recruiting and paying undocumented immigrants. Of course, you and I know that many red-blooded Americans get by by working "off the books." Profit is paramount. Somebody pays immigrants "illegally" in order to make a profit, and that's the problem.

Btw, I hesitate to use the term "native" in this conversation. There's no such thing. There's just immigrants from different times. If there are native French and English in France and England because their ancestors were there for thousands of years --which, btw, is absolutely, scientifically, genetically proven to be false-- then the only "natives" in the Americas have ancestors that go back thousands of years. I use the term citizen.

Oh, I happened to see Richard Spencer (?) on a CNN clip. He's unhappy with Trump (unlike many other white nationalists). He seemed straight out of the 19th century nativist mindset, including opinions about Catholics. Matter of fact, years ago, I recall someone questioning the legitimacy of Catholicism as a branch of Christianity. Anyway, the connection is that a UBI would go to all citizens. But, how does one determine that when someone decides that you don't belong to the group you say you belong to or that you aren't a citizen of the country in which you were born?
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Re: Universal Basic Income

Postby everything on Wed Jul 17, 2019 8:39 am

We can't put the genie back in the bottle.

All of this bullshit is just a distraction.

Maybe it helps someone get votes and then help the rich lobbyists.

No one here sounds naive but there's one born every minute.

--
50% of GDP will be "digital" soon. Why does that matter?

The flow of capital and brainpower is instant.

In many, many cases, "AI" can do what "natural intelligence cannot do, or can do it better.

In this sense Yang is much more right in pinpointing the high stakes whereas Trump is trying to scare a few people over something far lower in stakes.

Most of my career has been in automation and somewhat tangentially related to the emerging AI.

Face App, facial recognition, item recognition, self driving cars are just the tip of the iceberg.

We should maybe do a new thread on BLS info on what jobs and industries are disrupted.
Last edited by everything on Wed Jul 17, 2019 8:40 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Universal Basic Income

Postby Steve James on Wed Jul 17, 2019 9:33 am

everything wrote:We can't put the genie back in the bottle.

All of this bullshit is just a distraction.

Maybe it helps someone get votes and then help the rich lobbyists.
...
We should maybe do a new thread on BLS info on what jobs and industries are disrupted.


No worries mate. There are jobs out there http://www.pickingjobs.com/usa/
If anyone's unemployed and bitching about immigrants (with papers or without) taking his job, that means he really doesn't want to work. Moreover, it's possible to learn a skill --even without Youtube. Shucks, there are child millionaires who only make videos of themselves opening toys. That's not to mention being able to contribute to art or science, or even joining the clergy.

But, people are going to say that the sky is falling, and that the Messiah is coming, no matter what happens. In a year, there'll be threats that the US is doomed, again. Well, if we kick out or restrict the H1B visa recipients, there are no Americans to take their places.
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Re: Universal Basic Income

Postby Michael on Wed Jul 17, 2019 9:47 am

Steve, regarding the numbers estimate, you see it doesn't matter to you. Is there no number large or small for legal and/or illegal immigration that you will concede drives down wages or increases unemployment?

Then, if true, "illegal workers" are essential to the current economy.


Sounds like you have a way of dismissing concerns about this under any circumstances while denying the most basic expectations of supply and demand.
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Re: Universal Basic Income

Postby windwalker on Wed Jul 17, 2019 10:07 am

.Well, if we kick out or restrict the H1B visa recipients, there are no Americans to take their places


an argument often used.

By hiring foreign engineers at below market rates, it disincentivizes American engineers who have to pay back education cost to become engineers.

It also creates a class of people who are tied to their companies basically indentured servants as their visa is tied to employment by the companies that hire them.

the employers understanding this take full advantage of it knowing that if the workers complain they get fired.

They have only so much time to be hired by another employer before they are asked to leave the US.

This is especially true for ethnically owned and run companies that hire based on this, who also use their culture to bind them to rule sets that would not be accepted in the US, that are the norm in their countries.

Many of the h1b engineers still to feel allegiance to their birthplace countries crates problems as far as IP.

For example in a Japanese company I worked for, once a technical problem reached a certain level they brought in their own engineers from Japan, protecting their IP.

American companies working overseas often have to hire so many locals based on number of us workers working there. In Thailand for example the work visa process for foreign workers was vary corrupted. Everyone understands this, it's their process in order to work there they have to accept it.

. Maybe it's changed, never know.
Last edited by windwalker on Wed Jul 17, 2019 10:36 am, edited 2 times in total.
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