Adam Smith’s Recommendation To End Illegal Immigration

[theworldismine13]

Adam Smith’s Recommendation To End Illegal Immigration

Restrictions on immigration have created a black market in labor and movement. Currently, the U.S. government issues just a pathetic 10,000 green cards to workers who lack higher education, special skills, or family connections. These restrictions have incentivized (as opposed to “caused”) desperate workers from around the world to circumvent the legal process and enter or reside in the U.S. illegally. The lesson of immigration policy is: ignore the market at your own peril.

Policy makers, however, have little respect for the market. Adam Smith famously called the legislator “the man of system” who “seems to imagine that he can arrange the different members of a great society with as much ease as the hand arranges the different pieces upon a chess-board. He does not consider that the pieces upon the chess-board have no other principle of motion besides that which the hand impresses upon them.” But human beings are not chess pieces — they do have principles of motion besides what the legislature would choose to impress upon them.

Unfortunately, as Smith notes, the man of the system “is often so enamoured with the supposed beauty of his own ideal plan of government, that he cannot suffer the smallest deviation from any part of it.” Thus, when human beings act in accordance with their own plans — when they drink alcohol, eat fatty foods, or fail to recycle — the legislature decides to “double down.” But again as Smith point out, if the legislature ignores the principle of motion of his subjects, “the game of society will go on miserably, and the society must be at all times in the highest degree of disorder.”

U.S. immigration policy has followed exactly this pattern. Congress sought to engineer the international market for labor, and it failed. Its “chess pieces” acted in accordance with their own principles. Instead of recognizing its mistake, Congress determined it just wasn’t trying hard enough. They decided what they really needed was more control over the pieces, so they built walls, added more guards, required surveillance by employers and landlords, and spent more and more on detention facilities. Now, America spends $18 billion each year on immigration enforcement. Yet, it is not enough for them.

Smith argued in The Wealth of Nations that the high tariffs have only, “in many cases, served only to encourage smuggling, and, in all cases, have reduced the revenues of the customs below what more moderate duties would have afforded.” As in the case of immigration policy, Smith argued that a high tariff on trade “offers a great temptation to smuggling,” but that “the law, contrary to all the ordinary principles of justice, first creates the temptation, and then punishes those who yield to it.”

In such cases, Smith recommended that smuggling could be eliminated “by diminishing the temptation to smuggle,” which “can be diminished only by the lowering of the tax.” America does not tax immigration, but the effect of the limited numbers issued is the same: people are smuggled into the U.S. sometimes at great cost and danger to themselves. Smith argued that a lower tariff would increase the revenues to government, eliminate smuggling, and benefit the country through lower prices.

Smith’s advice is no less relevant today. Instead of the outright ban on immigration above the arbitrary quotas, why not tax immigration? The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) has proposed exactly that: eliminate quotas and tax immigration. This would increase revenue at a time of great deficits and allow workers an alternative to smuggling. As CEI’s Alex Nowrasteh (now with the Cato Institute) wrote in his 2012 paper “The Conservative Case for Immigration Tariffs,” an “immigration tariff would provide new revenue and increase economic growth by removing the immigration quotas and restrictions that inhibit business creation and legal worker flows.”

Recent estimates show that some immigrants pay between $4,000 (from Mexico by land) and $26,000 (from Asia) to enter the country illegally. This money is pure waste. If it was instead paid as a tax to the U.S. Treasury, Nowrasteh estimates that with 5 million immigrants each year, such a tax could raise $50 billion each year. More importantly, it would almost eliminate illegal immigration, while at the same time increasing legal immigration, which benefits American businesses, lowers prices, raises wages, and expands the U.S. economy.

For Smith, the hands of “the man of the system” were always in constant tension with the “invisible hand” of the market, which directs people to freely create value for others through voluntary trade. The clash between these two forces inevitably results, Smith saw, in disorder, but when the legislature allows his “chess pieces” to act freely, “the game of human society will go on easily and harmoniously, and is very likely to be happy and successful.”

 

[The Real]

Adam Smith's solution might work in an economy with an invisible hand... but our economy doesn't really have one. What we have is the exact opposite- a bunch of colluding, price-setting corporations that dominate every industry among only 3-5 of them. Nobody has any respect or interest in Adam Smith's actual vision for the economy. Corporations are doing precisely what Smith feared these "men of system" dod.

 

[theworldismine13]

Adam Smith's solution might work in an economy with an invisible hand... but our economy doesn't really have one. What we have is the exact opposite- a bunch of colluding, price-setting corporations that dominate every industry among only 3-5 of them. Nobody has any respect or interest in Adam Smith's actual vision for the economy. Corporations are doing precisely what Smith feared these "men of system" dod.

is that something that you needed to get of your chest, because your post has nothing to do with the article

 

[The Real]

is that something that you needed to get of your chest, because your post has nothing to do with the article

It has directly to do with the article. The primary thesis of the article is that Smith's solution is "relevant today." That is not true. The point is that it is not relevant in an economy that is structured like our own.

 

[theworldismine13]

It has directly to do with the article. The primary thesis of the article is that Smith's solution is "relevant today." That is not true. The point is that it is not relevant in an economy that is structured like our own.

The article was talking about the immigration system and how to apply market principles to it, it wasnt talking about the economy as a whole

 

[Brown_Pride]

Adam Smith’s Recommendation To End Illegal Immigration

YOU SON OF A BIOTCH I BEEN SAYING THIS FOR YEARS, PARTICULARLY TO YOU.

I think i even said 4k on on numerous occasions.

I demand you retitle the thread to BP/Adam Smith's recommendations to end illegal immigration.

-4k intro tax with a re-up of 1k a year for legal working status.
-Any felonies and it's revoked for a period of time depending on the violation.
-No social services, save maybe food assistance for 6 months (for the kids homie).
-Ability to apply for full citizenship
-Mandatory finger printing and IDing.

It eliminates the "tax burden" :rollseyes:
It eliminates the human smuggling
It eliminates the fear of snitching on the drug guy up the street
It eliminates damn near every problem.

 

[Brown_Pride]

It has directly to do with the article. The primary thesis of the article is that Smith's solution is "relevant today." That is not true. The point is that it is not relevant in an economy that is structured like our own.

be honest, you read the title, saw Adam Smith, saw the poster and went in.

Immigration <> Economy.

 

[The Real]

be honest, you read the title, saw Adam Smith, saw the poster and went in.

Immigration <> Economy.

Nah. I'll expand on my point later.

 

[Brown_Pride]

 

[theworldismine13]

Nah. I'll expand on my point later.

what are you gonna do, go read up on the communist manifesto to post some marxist comebacks? spare us

 

[Domingo Halliburton]

It has directly to do with the article. The primary thesis of the article is that Smith's solution is "relevant today." That is not true. The point is that it is not relevant in an economy that is structured like our own.

is any of smith's stuff relevant today?

 

[Broke Wave]

what are you gonna do, go read up on the communist manifesto to post some marxist comebacks? spare us

Just when I think you're able to have an adult conversation you remind all of us that you are an emotionally stunted child

is any of smith's stuff relevant today?

I'd say so breh. I mean even as a "leftist" I have to understand the importance of allowing the market to function properly. The market as described by Smith is more of a force for freedom and allowing the efficient transfer of goods and services between individuals. Context is important but Smith is just about as relevant as Marx in 2013 in my opinion.

 

[88m3]

Adam Smith?

 

[theworldismine13]

YOU SON OF A BIOTCH I BEEN SAYING THIS FOR YEARS, PARTICULARLY TO YOU.

I think i even said 4k on on numerous occasions.

I demand you retitle the thread to BP/Adam Smith's recommendations to end illegal immigration.

-4k intro tax with a re-up of 1k a year for legal working status.
-Any felonies and it's revoked for a period of time depending on the violation.
-No social services, save maybe food assistance for 6 months (for the kids homie).
-Ability to apply for full citizenship
-Mandatory finger printing and IDing.

It eliminates the "tax burden" :rollseyes:
It eliminates the human smuggling
It eliminates the fear of snitching on the drug guy up the street
It eliminates damn near every problem.

i remember that you posted something like that now that you mention it

but for the record i post articles that i think are interesting or edifying to HL or for the intellectual development of the hip hop nation, i dont necessarily co-sign everything i post

an interesting side not about all this and what is ironic about the real marxist's vicious attacks is that these free market people are actually for open borders and for maximizing the number of people coming to the us which is essentially the same thing liberals want

this idea is akin to what the public option was for people that want single payer, they dont really care for it but they see it is a stepping stone to single payer, these guys are doing the same thing, ideologically these guys are against tariffs and taxes, but they are proposing an immigrant tax because if this system is used then they can demand that the immigrants tax and tariffs be lowered until its negligable, but anyways thats just a side observation

ive said before im not actually against open borders, in the end the borders should be relatively open, but the key to open borders is reciprocity and that means mexico has to change their immigration laws, labor laws, min wage laws and the overall economic system etc etc to match the US and canada

 

[Professor Moriarty]

On Adam Smith's relevance... Smith knew better than people misappropriating him for their own ends care to admit.

For instance, see, from Wealth of Nations: "For one very rich man, there must be at least five hundred poor, and the affluence of the few supposes the indigence of the many."

He also knew that many market relations are fundamentally coercive. For example, as any of us non-rich folks know, a labor dispute between a worker and a boss will typically end with the employer winning. Says Smith, on this point: "It is not..difficult to foresee which of the two parties must, upon all ordinary occasions, have the advantage in the dispute, and force the other into a compliance with their terms."

Of course, Smith had a hope for markets. But it was a humanist, rationalist hope. And it was tempered by the above kinds of realistic understandings. Today, in retrospect, we might even call his humanist and rationalist hope unrealistic.

Anyway, my point is that those we typically call 'the founders of capitalism' would not endorse our present reality. And before we start proposing market solutions for all kinds of problems, we have to think about: "why, market solutions?" And, "Whose interests are being served?" If our answer to the first question is "because markets are fair, natural, and self-ordering", then its obvious that we aren't thinking hard enough about the second question "Whose interests are being served?" because if you look at history, its hard to see any market or institution that did NOT come about through the triumph of particular interests that like to call their winning the product of "natural" events.

Also, I'd scarcely call the 'solution' provided in the article "Smith's" solution. That solution is just the basic 'rational choice' game: mess around with incentives considering certain constraints. Its really got nothing to do with Smith.