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The Impact of Immigrant Innovators
Ramakrishnan writes "The Wall Street Journal is carrying a report on immigrant innovators and entrepreneurs. According to the piece, nearly a quarter of all California startups which went into business between 1995 and 2005 had an immigrant as a founding member. These businesses, together, employ almost half a million workers and generated about $50 billion in sales in the year 2005. The study seems quite topical, given recent discussions in the U.S. capital. From the article: 'Supporters of an immigration bill are likely to use the study to argue the importance of foreign-born workers to the U.S. economy. An immigration bill passed by the last Congress and heavily lobbied by business groups would have greatly increased the number of green cards available to skilled workers. Business has long argued that the U.S. schools aren't turning out enough scientists, mathematicians and engineers, and that the economy will lose its competitive edge without more skilled foreign workers.'"
I absolutely agree; I think borders that are used as anything other than an administrative and organizational convenience are immoral. The notion that hard-working immigrants can be kept out "to preserve [my] way of life" is little more than saying "I have more than you by an accident of birth and am willing to use force to ensure that I don't have to share." Why exactly should an accident of birth guarantee someone more wealth than another? Property is an invention of the state and the social contract and historically the social contract has been limited (and thus discriminatory) in scope; "illegal" immigration is just the codification of social inequality by the more powerful group.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
I am intensely uncomfortable with the morality in that statement: that it is acceptable to have a separate group of people being paid less than minimum wage in order to make living easier for the rest of the country. I am making no statement regarding immigration, legal or not. I just think that the concept of "well, we have to keep a lesser class of people around because they accept wages below the norm in order to make products cheaper" is not a valid argument.
Again, the fact that the single argument is invalid is not in any way support for any other side of the debate. It just strikes me that this particular line of argument is morally repugnant.
--
Evan
"$30 for the One True Ring. $10 each additional ring!" -- JRR "Bob" Tolkien
You're 100% right... and the only way to eliminate illegal immigrants is to make immigration legal.
No, I'm serious: if they weren't illegal, they wouldn't want to work for third world wages for long. The problem now is they can't demand anything and they can't job hop, they can't improve themselves because we've essentially made them slaves by making them "illegal". It is that slave labor that the citizens can't compete against. Let them be an unabashed part of materialistic mainstream American culture and you eliminate the third world people in our country.
Cheers.
and even if it were possible to succeed in that endeavor... what? We get the honor of being like all the lousy countries who have fought to close their borders over the years? Name them for me... not a prestigious list.
Let's see: the EU, Japan, Korea, Vietnam, Singapore, Australia. Quite a rogue's gallery, I agree, but every one of those countries controls who is allowed to immigrate. I wonder if any country currently lets anybody just walk on in.
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
In any survey like this, there is a self selection bias. This is accepted and acknowledges by them. In fact, given the large sample size, this becomes increasingly irrelevant. They've included a range of values for the population and an alpha value based on the characteristics of the sample. Every single survey includes this, its at the heart of statistics.
As for the patents, there are few other ways to determine what an 'innovation' is. Its a fairly vague meaning, something different from what was before it. There is simply no other way to study innovation on a national level than through patent citations. Its not perfect, but its pretty damn good. There are plenty of innovations that aren't patented, but these have a smaller economic impact, which this study is looking at.
TO summarize: social sciences aren't perfect, that's what makes it fun to do (full disclosure: grad student in geography studying innovation diffusion). It means that you do have to read very carefully and look at their methodology. Sure, you can lie with statistics, but if you can read statistics, its not that hard to find the lies. However, these kinds of studies are fairly common, and almost all of them show similar circumstances.
Sleep is for the weak!
To put it bluntly, because liberal groups will attack you as being "racist" otherwise. This has stifled any productive legislation to solve the problems of illegal immigration because politicians are frightened to death of having goofy little protest groups calling them racist because they dared to uphold the law. This culture of fear has gripped the nation and stunted valid debate. You can't address issues like illegal immigration, lack of fathers in black communities, and other problems because they happen to involve minority groups, and that will get you called "racist."
"Sufferin' succotash."
> No, it actually makes our food and housing industries possible.
Not really - after the raid on the Swift meat-packing plant, there was a huge line of people applying for the positions vacated by the 1,282 illegal immigrants. So, I guess Bush was wrong - they weren't "doing jobs Americans won't do". Many of the illegals were also committing ID theft.
Big employers like illegal immigration cause they can pay low wages, and if the illegals complain about poor working conditions - out they go. Illegals like it, cause they make more money than they would at home, and can send much of it back to relatives. Their home countries like it cause it reduces unemployment, increases their foreign income, and reduces the need for the (foreign) government to actually be responsive to their citizens. So everyone's happy - except for US citizens and legal immigrants.
Talk to an American citizen or legal resident who's in construction or manufacturing. Ask what's happened to employment and wages the past few years.
I've got no problem with LEGAL immigration - it's a good thing, and has brought untold benefits to this nation. I'm just opposed to the chaos on our borders and uncontrolled illegal immigration.
[Insert pithy quote here]
Really? I came to the UK with a VC funded company I co-founded. We brought with us 20 people, all of who paid tax. We employed 30 more for a while. The company had to scale back a few years ago, but every single one of the people who left found other high paid jobs and are helping to fund UK. I currently work for another startup and pay almost as much in tax every year as the average UK person earn. Over the last year I was also offered another position in another UK startup, VC funded and again started by two immigrants. For that matter, most of the local businesses where I live in South London were started and and are run by immigrants. Relying on anecdotal evidence will invariably give us biased viewpoints.
But, as I've found out, apparently my experiences in the matter "doesn't really count" because I'm white, from Europe (Norway to be precise), and not muslim. Conveniently, people complaining about immigration almost invariably find ways to redefine the "immigrants" to mean "low paid poor people that look different from us" - I hope you're not one of the people stooping that low.
They take priority over British citizens, because they are a 'minority'.
Really? Can you cite proof, please?
In fact, people who arrive in the UK without a proper work permit, visa or right to work (as a EU/EEA member state citizen for instance) risk being put in detention centers. Of the ones that don't, most are hard working and pay their taxes.
Ever noticed how most parking attendants in the UK are black? Turns out almost the only people prepared to take the level of abuse a parking attendant gets are Nigerian immigrants. Similar situations are found in many other professions that "native" British people just don't want to take, or aren't performing well.
Notice how Polish immigrants are changing the UK building industry? It's because British builders are shit - they overcharge, don't show up on time, and do an overall crappy job, while the Polish and other builders that come here do their jobs well and deliver on time. In fact, given the choice between hiring a British builder and a Polish builder, I'd likely pick the Polish guy even if I had to pay more. I have used a couple of skilled British builders, but they're the exception rather than the rule, and even the skilled ones tend not to understand the concept of delivering to an agreed timeframe.
Notice how nurses in the UK are often African or South Asian? In fact, this is one of the areas where immigration to the UK IS a problem, though not to the UK - the UK is sucking many developing nations dry of skilled workers, especially in the health field.
Immigrants cost me a fortune in tax. And they can't be bothered to learn the language, so now street signs in London can even be seen in Arabic!
Actually, immigrants save you a fortune in tax. It costs the UK far less to import skilled labour than paying child benefit, health care, school and university costs for a child born here and loose the tax revenues from the mother during maternity leave etc., and the immigrants that do come here to work far outnumbers the few that end up on benefits. Immigration is a net economic benefit to most industrialized countries that have reasonable unemployment rates.
The main issue with immigration is that in some professions it's "reverse aid" from developing nations to the developed nations.
And if you even think of bringing up citizens of poorer EU/EEA states, keep in mind that they are required to pay for themselves or leave unless they've been working in the UK for four years and apply for indefinite leave to remain (i.e. even though I've worked here for 6 years, if I become unable to pay my way myself, I could get throw straight out despite having paid around GBP 150k in taxes and n
As an immigrant myself, who is paying on average around 25K GBP a year in taxes and NI (in other words, I'm paying about an average UK salary), who's never received a single penny in welfare payments, I get rather pissed off at assholes like you making generalizations. In fact, all the immigrants I know fall in the "inventive" kind - at least half a dozen of which are co-founders of VC funded startups, and paying similar levels of tax as I am.
The US is currently suffering from less then 5% unemployment. When you have under 5% unemployment it means that you have a labor shortage. The only things corporations, especially ones that work at the fringes of profitability, can do is hire illegals or go out of business. We have a finite amount of labor in this nation. Once it is used up, it is gone. If a farm needs 300 people do manual labor and can't get them without offering enough money to put them out of business, then it goes out of business. Now, I am all for businesses going out of business, but not when there is an ample supply of people willing to work just across the border. Little is gained when a corporation goes out of business in a full employment market. Cutting off immigration just murders a pile of US industries that are out merrily providing us with cheap goods and services.
Don't get me wrong, I am against illegal immigration. However, the solution is not build better fences or waste billions of dollars trying to root out every single smuggler and forcing people into more dangerous methods of crossing. The solution is to make it so that a poor Mexican who will happily work for close to minimum wage in some marginal industry can legally cross. We want to know these people are here. Want to run background checks and make them come in through legal points of entry. So long as our immigration system is so badly fucked up where it takes a decade a pile of money to get across, people are going to illegally immigrate.
As much as I hate a lot of what Bush does, he had a damn good immigration plan that the Republican congress (and a few Dems) murdered. He opened up legal ways for guest workers and immigrants to come here. Allowing legal crossing would have shut down smugglers, saved lives, and resulted in collecting tax money, better health and safety oversight, and all the benefits you receive when workers work legally.
Black markets (even in labor) create crime, poverty, and misery. The only way to bring down a black market is to legalize and regulate the market. This is what we need to do with immigration.
I would suspect that NAFTA has something to do with it, along with the fact that corporations don't have to pay any transportation fees for that particular subset of illegals. With NAFTA the illegal immigration from Mexico exploded - thus proving wrong (as usual) Al "Mr. NAFTA" Gore along with all his corporate cronies (who, amazingly, dried up once he announced he was against the Iraqi War - but that took him by surprise, huh?). NAFTA privatized (or more accurately, "piratized" the individual farms throughout Mexico, leaving many no option but to keep moving north for work. Again, that cheap labor thing has moved on to China, and most importantly with the "privatization" of the Mexican banking system along with a host of other industries (sound familiar?), the money laundering business could be brought back to the USA (buy privatizing said Mexican banks) after that $10,000-bank reporting law was passed in the US. (Ain't our Congress and pols an honest bunch???)
Almost correct.
It is here to give people the changes you mention IF they follow the rules. If you are not a citizen here, then, there are rules you need to follow to either get a work permit, or become a citizen. No, the US is not here for a free-for-all. If anarchy is the purpose and anyone can do anything they want...then it won't work for anyone.
There are rules for a reason, so the the maximum number of people can be free, and have a fair chance...it is a delicate balance.
And there is no such thing as a 'balanced playing field'. That's just a law of nature, and nothing can change that. People are born with different gifts and frailties by nature of what genes their parents donated to them. They are born into different social strata...they are born into different countries, some have more opportunities than others. There are rich and poor...and unless there is some kind of utopia established (impossible IMHO), nothing will change that.
The US isn't here to level the playing field....however, it is here to offer a playfield to everyone and give them opportunity to do as they can to better themselves and their families.
And yes...I DO think that there should be a loyalty to one's country. There is nothing wrong with being proud of it...and defending it, and having a little national pride. Just as it is human nature to feel these things for their immediate families, so it is for your more 'extended' family...your fellow countrymen and the bond that holds you...your country.
It isn't here to build a master class, or give you a big car...no. It is here, however, to give you the freedome to find and use the tools at your disposal to better yourself, and if you like, to gain wealth and buy nice cars and homes and other toys. But, it is up to you to follow the rules....and be responsible for yourself and your actions. And no...you are not obligated to help anyone else, or have your hard earned cash taken and given to someone less. That is for you as an individual to do.
Just because you want to regulate your borders, to allow for ORDERLY immigration, to keep criminals out, to keep it fair...does not make one xenophobic as you alluded to above.
I don't think the US really gives a flying fuck where you come from....as long as you at least sign the guest book on the way in, and follow the fucking rules.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........