[The E]

Okay, so that means you'll have to raise your prices, which will raise prices across the board. Which will make the same people who are angry about immigrnats stealing their jobs angry at you for increasing the price of bread.

[Bobboau]

boohoo we aren't exploiting poor people. The fact the US has become complacent about an effective servant class I don't think is a good thing. and all the kids complaining about how there are no jobs can now work a field, and yeah, they'll ***** but if they want to eat they'll work. The fact things have degenerated to the degree they have is not an argument in favor of it any more than it was a when the argument was being made for slavery.

[666maslo666]

Now President Trump comes into office, and declares the US/Mexican border closed for non-US citizens, and starts to enforce this effectively. What do you do to get stuff off of the fields and into the markets?

Obviously, I do the only thing I can do - I raise the wages to attract workers. I can also import guest workers from abroad, but it will have to be done legally, with those migrant workers being registered with the state as temporary workforce and their whereabouts tracked, and respecting minimum wage laws and paying taxes.

And if I cannot do it for a fair price, then I am part of the problem of overproduction of food in the US, and it is arguably better for the economy for me to go out of business and change my occupation.

[666maslo666]

Okay, so that means you'll have to raise your prices, which will raise prices across the board. Which will make the same people who are angry about immigrnats stealing their jobs angry at you for increasing the price of bread.

At least they will now have more jobs with better pay available in the food production sector (and other immigrant dominated sectors, too). All things considered, this would be a net improvement for the native lower class, IMHO, as they would have less competition on the job market and so their bargaining force would increase.

[The E]

Now President Trump comes into office, and declares the US/Mexican border closed for non-US citizens, and starts to enforce this effectively. What do you do to get stuff off of the fields and into the markets?

Obviously, I do the only thing I can do - I raise the wages to attract workers. I can also import guest workers from abroad, but it will have to be done legally, with those migrant workers being registered with the state as temporary workforce and their whereabouts tracked, and respecting minimum wage laws and paying taxes.

No. You can't. President Trump, following the advice of noted economics expert 666maslo666, wants all the low quality foreigners out of the country. You cannot get low-qualified workers from abroad when you could get them right here.

And if I cannot do it for a fair price, then I am part of the problem of overproduction of food in the US, and it is arguably better for the economy for me to go out of business and change my occupation.

What's a fair price?

At least they will now have more jobs with better pay available in the food production sector (and other immigrant dominated sectors, too). All things considered, this would be a net improvement for the native lower class, IMHO, as they would have less competition on the job market and so their bargaining force would increase.

Except the better pay these people supposedly have is eaten up by an across-the-board price hike. And bargaining force for the worker class? Please. I tell you where the bargaining force is: 64 billion USD in foreign trade profits this scheme of yours is endangering.

[666maslo666]

No. You can't. President Trump, following the advice of noted economics expert 666maslo666, wants all the low quality foreigners out of the country. You cannot get low-qualified workers from abroad when you could get them right here.

What's a fair price?

Except the better pay these people supposedly have is eaten up by an across-the-board price hike. And bargaining force for the worker class? Please. I tell you where the bargaining force is: 64 billion USD in foreign trade profits this scheme of yours is endangering.

Noted economics expert 666maslo666 is fine with low quality foreigners as long as they come legally, state keeps track of them, they earn at least minimum wage, pay taxes and only stay temporarily as guest workers. You dont need to have an illegal underclass living inside the country to get cheap labor.

Fair price is price with legal and regulated labor included.

Yes, bargaining force for the working class. Native working class should not have to compete with illegal aliens willing to work for less than minimum wages. And if that 64 billion USD in foreign trade profit is being made thanks to illegal labor then you bet it should be endangered. It is dirty money. And with so much profits, dont tell me food producers cannot pay for legal labor..

[karajorma]

Noted economics expert 666maslo666 is fine with low quality foreigners as long as they come legally, state keeps track of them, they earn at least minimum wage, pay taxes and only stay temporarily as guest workers.

And who the **** is going to pay for that?

[Macielos]

I see discussion have sidetracked from migrant crisis in Europe to economic migration in general.

Noted economics expert 666maslo666 is fine with low quality foreigners as long as they come legally, state keeps track of them, they earn at least minimum wage, pay taxes and only stay temporarily as guest workers. You dont need to have an illegal underclass living inside the country to get cheap labor.

So, we're now operating on marxist terminology as "working class"?

Fair price is price with legal and regulated labor included.

There is no such thing as fair price. Any product is worth only as much as anyone is willing to pay for it. If native worker A wants to work for 1000$ and migrant worker B is ready to do same job for 500$, it's employer's full and unquestionable right to hire the migrant. Thanks to that, he can produce cheaper and better goods, sell them at lower prices or have more money for investments.

It's often ok to the workers as well. Their alternatives is to work as a cheap labour (but they still earn much more than in their homelands) or not have a job at all.

Yes, bargaining force for the working class. Native working class should not have to compete with illegal aliens willing to work for less than minimum wages. And if that 64 billion USD in foreign trade profit is being made thanks to illegal labor then you bet it should be endangered. It is dirty money. And with so much profits, dont tell me food producers cannot pay for legal labor.

You look only at on side of the issue - how much the worker will earn. But if you force producers to raise wages, they will also have to raise prices of their products. That's simply how it works, you can't force them to have less profits or even loss. That means, prices in shops go up, customers can effectively buy less. What's more, same workers who got a pay rise go to shops and see products are more expensive because workers producing them also got a pay rise! So, pay rise was consumed by price rise. In long term, enforcing pay rises is a simple way to inflation. Nominally you earn more, effectively your money is worth less and less.

The alternative to rising prices is to cut costs. That means, to switch to hiring workers illegally, with absolutely no control over their wage and their working conditions. That will happen if the government enforce too high minimum wage and producers can't afford rising prices.

[zookeeper]

But if you force producers to raise wages, they will also have to raise prices of their products. That's simply how it works, you can't force them to have less profits or even loss.

How does that figure? Yes yes, the basics say that if you raise costs then the price of the product needs to rise accordingly, but similarly when you raise the price, you'll sell less. You can't automatically get bigger profits by simply raising the price, and I don't see any reason to assume that in some/many cases the threshold up to which you can hike up the price without starting to see a great loss in sales isn't close enough to the current prices already that letting the increased costs eat into the profits is the path of greatest profit.

IANAEconomist, of course.

[karajorma]

Even if you're right, the food industry making less profits is pretty disastrous too. 

[NGTM-1R]

IANAEconomist, of course.

On the other hand, it's food. People gotta eat. You can stop doing a lot of things, or do them less, but food is more resistant to this sort of thing than pretty much any other purchasable item.

[Macielos]

How does that figure? Yes yes, the basics say that if you raise costs then the price of the product needs to rise accordingly, but similarly when you raise the price, you'll sell less. You can't automatically get bigger profits by simply raising the price, and I don't see any reason to assume that in some/many cases the threshold up to which you can hike up the price without starting to see a great loss in sales isn't close enough to the current prices already that letting the increased costs eat into the profits is the path of greatest profit.

IANAEconomist, of course.

To some extent you are right. Sometimes producers cannot raise their prices because their rivals on the market found a way to pay extra expenditures while keeping prices stable - e.g. by cutting costs, improving efficiency, finding cheaper suppliers, etc. But the harder you press them to spend more for new taxes, enforced pay rises, etc., the more eager they will be to compensate their losses somehow. So either their prices go up, or they cut costs, perhaps by switching to hiring workers illegally.

I've got a fresh example for my country. For a few months Poland has a new right-wing government who won the elections with promises of social benefits - the most costly one is 500 PLN monthly per child. Now, to pay for it, they plan to introduce a financial operations tax, the highest in Europe, which is a bit similar case as the one above - forcing private entrepreneurs to pay extra money for something. As a result several banks have already risen loan interest rates and more are planning to do so in the nearest future.

On the other hand, it's food. People gotta eat. You can stop doing a lot of things, or do them less, but food is more resistant to this sort of thing than pretty much any other purchasable item.

And? What's the problem with that? If everyone has to eat, then it will always be profitable to produce food. On the free market, when there is no war and no politics in place, it's just in nobody's interest to keep people starving when you can produce and sell them food they can afford.

[NGTM-1R]

And? What's the problem with that? If everyone has to eat, then it will always be profitable to produce food. On the free market, when there is no war and no politics in place, it's just in nobody's interest to keep people starving when you can produce and sell them food they can afford.

There is no problem.

I'm pointing out his analogy is inherently faulty applied to the situation at hand.

[666maslo666]

Noted economics expert 666maslo666 is fine with low quality foreigners as long as they come legally, state keeps track of them, they earn at least minimum wage, pay taxes and only stay temporarily as guest workers.

And who the **** is going to pay for that?

The food producers?

I continue to be amazed that some people consider having legal and regulated workforce as some kind of a radical idea. That is the law and that is how it works in most of the world. No, food prices will not skyrocket and no, economy will not collapse. That is BS fearmongering.

[666maslo666]

There is no such thing as fair price. Any product is worth only as much as anyone is willing to pay for it. If native worker A wants to work for 1000$ and migrant worker B is ready to do same job for 500$, it's employer's full and unquestionable right to hire the migrant. Thanks to that, he can produce cheaper and better goods, sell them at lower prices or have more money for investments.

Hiring below minimum wage is illegal in most of the world. And this law is especially important when you have a big pool of very cheap labor outside the borders. You are trying to imply that the situation is somehow in equilibrium, that any rise in wages due to need to hire legal workforce will be offset by higher product costs. That is a very myopic view. At best, maybe there is some kind of such global symmetry, when you consider both the natives and the foreigners, of all classes, and average it out. But I dont care about global view, I care primarily about the situation of people living inside my country, the local situation, that is who national government should serve. And the fact is, allowing big pool of very cheap unregulated labor onto domestic market forces native lower class to compete with them, and therefore harms their net economic situation, decreases their bargaining force. And any economic improvements of migrant workers due to having a job, and of natives due to having cheaper products, come at least partially at the expense of this domestic lower class. They lose more due to their wages being pushed down and increase in unemployment than they would lose due to slightly more costly food.

In a truly free global market with zero trade, migration and work barriers, local inequality will inevitably reflect global one. You will have significant number of people living in absolute poverty inside your country. And your natives will have to compete with them. That is not acceptable to me, and certain amount of protectionist policies is justified in preventing that.

[666maslo666]

Here is a poll of economic experts that seems to agree with my position:

http://www.igmchicago.org/igm-economic-experts-panel/poll-results?SurveyID=SV_5vuNnqkBeAMAfHv

Question B: Unless they were compensated by others, many low-skilled American workers would be substantially worse off if a larger number of low-skilled foreign workers were legally allowed to enter the US each year.

Most of them tend to agree with this statement, and only a few disagree.

[est1895]

I wonder what she is saying in German?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GmzHtTa7FOM

[GhylTarvoke]

A snippet from BBC's article on the stabbing in Sweden:

Sweden's National Police Commissioner, Dan Eliasson, has requested 4,100 additional officers and support staff to help fight against terrorism, carry out migrant deportations and police asylum facilities, Swedish news agency TT reports.

"We are forced to respond to many disturbances in asylum reception centres," he was quoted as saying.

"In some places, this takes significant police resources. This was not the case six months ago and it means that we won't be able to respond as effectively in other areas."

Rightly or wrongly, it seems that the tide of public opinion is turning.

[est1895]

Police Whistleblower from Cologne Speaks:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WvudWVWwzOc

[Macielos]

Hiring below minimum wage is illegal in most of the world.

'Illegal' doesn't mean 'bad'. Illegal labour is usually a straight-forward consequence of local or state law being unsuitable to market situation. Trying to ban working in certain conditions or for certain wage is like banning alcohol or drugs - you cannot wipe them all out, you just push it to the underground, make it out of control, untaxed and in some cases allow bad guys to earn profits from that.

And this law is especially important when you have a big pool of very cheap labor outside the borders. You are trying to imply that the situation is somehow in equilibrium, that any rise in wages due to need to hire legal workforce will be offset by higher product costs. That is a very myopic view. At best, maybe there is some kind of such global symmetry, when you consider both the natives and the foreigners, of all classes, and average it out.

A lot depends on what the current situation is and how you let the migration happen. If borders of your country are closed, you have a much poorer neighbour country and then suddenly the govt decides to get the borders wide open, a migration taking place as a result is unnaturally big and destroys stability of the local market. I agree migration to the country should be somehow regulated, but it should take place on the borders, not via economical regulations.

It seems you still look at only one aspect of the issue. Minimum wage gives some kind of protection to native workers against the immigrants. But it also harms the weakest, the least-qualified NATIVE people preventing them from taking their first legal job. If you are a poor 18-year-old kid from poor district of Detroit, finished some non-significant state school, have no experience at all, then nobody will hire you legally for a minimum wage as our work is simply not worth it. Either you get a badly-paid job now, but you work, learn, gain experience and after some time your wage may go up, or you are out of the labour market on the start. All those people living from social benefits, homeless on the streets of large cities, youngsters wandering around the blocks of flats with no perspectives - lots of them could find their place on the market if not state policy of regulating and taxing labour, including the a minimum wage.

What's worth saying here is that if you don't let cheap labour to the business in the country, then the business may leave the country and move to places with cheap labour. That's what basically took place in the last decades. Europe and America has been mostly deindustrialized and are based on services and trade now. Most big companies have their factories located in China, India, Vietnam etc. exactly because hiring people in Europe or USA is simply too expensive. So there you have your protection - nobody takes your jobs in the country, it's just the jobs that go elsewhere .

But I dont care about global view, I care primarily about the situation of people living inside my country, the local situation, that is who national government should serve. And the fact is, allowing big pool of very cheap unregulated labor onto domestic market forces native lower class to compete with them, and therefore harms their net economic situation, decreases their bargaining force. And any economic improvements of migrant workers due to having a job, and of natives due to having cheaper products, come at least partially at the expense of this domestic lower class. They lose more due to their wages being pushed down and increase in unemployment than they would lose due to slightly more costly food.

In a truly free global market with zero trade, migration and work barriers, local inequality will inevitably reflect global one. You will have significant number of people living in absolute poverty inside your country. And your natives will have to compete with them. That is not acceptable to me, and certain amount of protectionist policies is justified in preventing that.

When Poland entered the EU, about 2 milion Poles left the country seeking a better life in western Europe, mostly in Germany, UK and Ireland. Most of them found it, as they are hard-working and reliable, often highly-qualified, taking jobs the native British were unager to take. British employers, leaking enough labour, were eager to hire them. Both sides benefit with such a deal. If I were a Polish migrant in a UK, worked long hours, paid my taxes, my employer was satisfied with me and wanted to hire me further, then what right can the state have to intervene in our voluntary deal?