So you want to move to Europe: a reality check

[habanero]

Maybe Dutch is a bit harder to learn?

A problem if moving especially to northern Europe is that pretty much everyone speak very good English so both the motivation for and the need to learn the local language is lower. I would not even consider moving somewhere without learning the local language myself, but I have lots of examples of people who have moved here and whose language skills are pretty poor considering how long they have been here.

It is clear that you loose out on a lot of social life etc if you don't speak the local language, but on the other hand you will get by just fine, making the hurdle a bit higher to climb.

When a native english speaker meets someone here, the local's English is likely to be much better than the other's mastery of the local language, so conversation quickly defaults to English. On the other hand people are quite tolerant of grammatical errors etc, when I speak to some foreigner I only point out minor mistakes if they speak the language really, really well as I assume they are actually interested in knowing if they make small insignificant mistakes - otherwise it's just conversation and understanding what they mean is the main priority.

[Hula Hoop]

@habanero I guess that explains it.  Very few Italians speak really good English although most people have a grasp of the basics.  I've noticed that sometimes people here switch to English when they hear my American accent but I usually just keep speaking Italian and they switch back to Italian.  My Italian is usually a lot better than their English though as I've been here a long time. 

I would think, though, that in Northern Europe, even if someone speaks good English they'd feel more comfortable in their native language with friends.  Also, what about schooling?  Presumably these expats in small villages in the Netherlands have bilingual kids who go to local schools. 

@former player - I didn't get that monarda wanted to live elsewhere in the EU - I assumed that they wanted to move to Austria but maybe not.

[Imma]

@Hula Hoop I think most expats don't live in small villages unless they're close to a larger city. I live in a place that has a little over 200k people and my local primary school is an English immersion school. We also have an international school for those expats that are truly wealthy (10k tuition) but most are in the 45-70k gross income category so they can't afford private school. I'm not actually sure those kids grow up to be bilingual unless they go to a Dutch language primary school - I'm sure the teachers speak reasonable English there because they all have degrees and English is a mandatory subject. My doctor and dentist both advertise that they offer consultations in English, my doctor is actually not Dutch either.

It's true that it's a hassle to not speak Dutch but for a lot of people that's no big deal, it's less of a hassle than learning the language. They don't visit the countryside. Our TV is subtitled, the government websites are available in English and as an expat, if you get stuck you just call your employer's expat service desk. I used to work with expats, I'd help people out with a lot of life admin even though that wasn't my job description.

It's mandatory to learn Dutch if you want to become a citizen, but many people coming to my town aren't actually planning to stay forever. I only personally know one couple who are here for the long term (15+ years) who have chosen not to learn Dutch. English is their first language and they don't want to become citizens, they'll move back home for retirement. I don't understand it either,  I only spent a short period in Finland 10 years ago and I still understand basic Finnish. I have no clue about the grammar but I know all the important words.

I can imagine Dutch is difficult to learn if your mother tongue is Chinese, but I don't think it's extremely difficult for anyone who speaks a Germanic language. I don't speak Danish or Norwegian for example, but I can follow Netflix series well enough to notice when the subtitles are wrong.

[Hula Hoop]

@Imma that's impressive that you learned some Finnish.  That is one tough language for foreigners to learn. 

Now that I speak Italian, I find that I can understand a lot of Spanish and Portugese too.  It's fun how language families go together.  I remember what a shock it was the first time I went back to my hometown of NYC and I was in a taxi and the driver was playing a salsa song.  I suddently understood the words even though I'd never studied Spanish.  It was kind of disappointing to realize how banale the words to most salsa songs are. 

[former player]

@former player - I didn't get that monarda wanted to live elsewhere in the EU - I assumed that they wanted to move to Austria but maybe not.

They mentioned "EU rights", which might mean wanting EU rights or I suppose might just be not understanding that Austrian citizenship rights and EU rights are not the same thing.

[Shane]

In the US, now, there's a lot of talk about white nationalism, which is pretty universally considered to be abhorrent. In 2020, any white person who dared to say out loud that he/she would prefer that the US remain majority white and Christian would be considered a bigot, at best.

I'm sorry, it would be nice if this was true but I think the past 4 years have shown conclusively that it is not the case. They may not come out and say it directly, but it's clear that there is a substantial fraction of the US population that, at the very least tacitly, supports the idea that the US should remain majority white and Christian.

Are things different on the "large island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean" where you live?

Maybe? I'm just judging this from the fact that 60 million people voted for Trump and roughly the same number still seems ready to vote for him again, even after there can no longer be any illusions about the "very fine people" he associate with. I don't see how anyone who thinks white supremacy is "abhorrent" can vote for him regardless of how much they agree with conservative politics.

Although it's impossible to know for sure what's really in a person's heart, several Americans I know, who I've never heard utter any racist statements and who repeatedly insist they are not, at all, racist, have told me they voted for Donald Trump in 2016 and are planning on voting for him again in 2020, solely because of his claims to be against abortion. Many Americans believe strongly that abortion = murder of innocent babies. They want abortion to be criminalized, and no amount of arguing will convince them otherwise. Attempting to dissuade people from this narrative is like trying to convince devout Christians that God doesn't exist or that Jesus did not literally die on a cross and, then, come back to life, three days later.

[Shane]

Given that Norway can get pretty cold, it's not hard to imagine that a custom of encouraging people to start eating as soon as they are served makes a lot of sense, given that waiting, even just a few minutes, until everyone is served might mean that the food would get cold.

Sweden also has the same custom of waiting until everyone is served, though.

Which is also not surprising, since Sweden gets pretty cold, as well.

[Metalcat]

Given that Norway can get pretty cold, it's not hard to imagine that a custom of encouraging people to start eating as soon as they are served makes a lot of sense, given that waiting, even just a few minutes, until everyone is served might mean that the food would get cold.

Sweden also has the same custom of waiting until everyone is served, though.

Which is also not surprising, since Sweden gets pretty cold, as well.

Huh???

[habanero]

Even up here, in Scandinavia on the outskirts of civilization we have thins invention called "heating" which seems to work wonders in countering the effect of low temperatures through a good chunk of the year. Currently, in our guest room  - now my home office - there is a devce on the wall often referred to as "a radiatior". Though this ingenious device a liquid - H2O, or water, flows circulated by a pump in my basement. This water is heated through a fascinating interplay between a heat pump mounted outside my house and some copper coils in a tank, Should this device not produce enough energy to maintain the desired temperature of the water (goverend by air temperature out side nonetheless!) several electrical heating elements are waiting to be switched on to heat the circulating water. And I dont even need to do anything - this system and the thermostats keep the home comfy through the cold season. We do not have A/C, however so when it gets too hot we are on our own and might need to open a window or something.

All this means that when a dish lands on the table, it will loose temperature at the same speed as the same dish placed on a table elsewhere with the same ambient temperature.

Yes, it's customary here  to heat hot food when it's served and not neccessarily wait until everyone has their plate but restaurants tend to be pretty good at servering dishes at the same time and I manage to feed all four people in the household without much time delay. Probably becuase it's the only sensible way to do it. Hot food is best when it's, you know, hot.

We are pretty pragmatic up here and on the balance probably care less than most about all sorts of elaborate social rituals. As long as you say please and thank you when you think it's appropriate you are most likely good to go. And oh, if you go to a funeral black is still the new balck, at least for men.

I can understand that a foreigner might find some of the local standards a tad rude, too informal and maybe not very polite. But you probably have to work quite hard for the opposite to happen.

[Shane]

@Shane I have some family members who never used to say racist things but have started that over the last couple of years. In my country of course a group of people are very angry about refugees entering this country (I'm sure those groups exist in all countries) but refugees are a small group. Most people don't meet refugees in their real life.

What my relatives are concerned about, which I understand even though I don't agree with their racism, that in a short period of time, my country town has become an English speaking expat hub. I'm 30 and when I was a kid, only tourists and American soldiers stationed here would speak English. Now English is the main language spoken in all of the big cities and at universities too. If you are eating in a restaurant in a big city, chances are the person serving you doesn't even speak Dutch. I speak English, so it's not an issue for me. But I understand that my elderly relatives are struggling because of this change in the dominant language. One of them is almost housebound and used to have all these neighbours who would drop in to visit her. Now she can't even communicate with anyone living on her floor. A few have learned a few words of textbook Dutch but they still don't understand the local dialect. As most immigrants are Asian, I hear a lot of racist stuff about Asians now. My relative was never a racist and is very well travelled for someone of that generation. It's just loneliness and desperation.

That's interesting that the NL has so many Asian immigrants. I'm curious. What country(ies) are they from? Based on my experience living in Japan, I'm certain that Japanese people would feel exactly like your elderly relatives if, suddenly, they were surrounded by immigrants speaking a language they didn't understand in their own country. It seems to me that elites in Europe and North America are making the pragmatic decision to allow mass immigration, based mostly on economic reasons. Without significant immigration, both Europe and North America would soon become unable to pay their bills. They wouldn't have enough workers paying taxes to keep providing the services their people have become used to: healthcare, pensions, etc. The complaints I've heard from Europeans sounded legitimate to me. French and German people told us they felt like their political leaders were inviting large numbers of people into their countries, to the point where they no longer felt at home. The elites who are making those decisions, though, are completely insulated from the effects on every day people of large numbers of immigrants entering their countries in a relatively short period of time. I think from an economic standpoint, European leaders are doing the right thing. If Japan were to open up to immigration it would be great for their country economically but, so far, anyway, they don't seem open to doing that...yet.

Last year, I read a good book called How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi. We also got the opportunity to listen to Dr. Kendi give an interesting talk at a local bookstore. Reading Kendi's book and listening to him speak has changed the way I think about racism. He was pretty convincing in his arguments that we are, basically, wasting our time labeling people as "racists." Kendi's position is that it would be better to start talking about people's racist "thoughts, statements and actions," rather than the people themselves. I've found that it actually works. A friend who will argue until the sun goes down that "Donald Trump is NOT a racist," has been willing to admit that certain things that Trump has said and tweeted and particular things he and his administration have done are, in fact, racist. Whereas, in the past, he was never willing to admit that Donald Trump, the man, was "a racist." I feel like thinking about racism from that slightly different perspective has been helpful to me. Maybe, @Imma , rather than thinking of your elderly relatives as "racists," i.e., bad people, if you were able to talk with them openly about some of the things they are now saying about their new Asian neighbors, you might be able to get them to agree that some of the their thoughts and statements are racist, without trying to get them to admit that they, themselves, are racists, which seems to be much harder, if not impossible, for most people. If you can get your relatives to admit that some of the things they've been thinking and saying are racist, they may become willing to modify their thinking and speech, thus, reducing racism in your country. Good luck!

[former player]

It seems to me that elites in Europe and North America are making the pragmatic decision to allow mass immigration, based mostly on economic reasons. Without significant immigration, both Europe and North America would soon become unable to pay their bills. They wouldn't have enough workers paying taxes to keep providing the services their people have become used to: healthcare, pensions, etc. The complaints I've heard from Europeans sounded legitimate to me. French and German people told us they felt like their political leaders were inviting large numbers of people into their countries, to the point where they no longer felt at home. The elites who are making those decisions, though, are completely insulated from the effects on every day people of large numbers of immigrants entering their countries in a relatively short period of time. I think from an economic standpoint, European leaders are doing the right thing. If Japan were to open up to immigration it would be great for their country economically but, so far, anyway, they don't seem open to doing that...yet.

A significant part of immigration is not that elites are in favour of it but that, essentially, it is impossible to stop without taking actions that are inhumane.  Do we let people drown in the Mediterranean in overcrowded dingies or pick them up and let them land in Europe?  Do we separate breast-feeding mothers from their children on the southern border of the USA?  Do you warehouse people trying to reach Australia by boat on Nauru for a decade or two of their lives?  Do we station people with machine guns on the white cliffs of Dover to kill anyone trying to cross the Channel in a small boat?  What's the answer?  Add in to the reason that a lot of these people are trying to move is that they will die if they stay where they are, either directly because climate change is killing their crops or because climate change has led to civil war which is killing them directly?  If you were in charge, what's your answer?

[Shane]

Even up here, in Scandinavia on the outskirts of civilization we have thins invention called "heating" which seems to work wonders in countering the effect of low temperatures through a good chunk of the year. Currently, in our guest room  - now my home office - there is a devce on the wall often referred to as "a radiatior". Though this ingenious device a liquid - H2O, or water, flows circulated by a pump in my basement. This water is heated through a fascinating interplay between a heat pump mounted outside my house and some copper coils in a tank, Should this device not produce enough energy to maintain the desired temperature of the water (goverend by air temperature out side nonetheless!) several electrical heating elements are waiting to be switched on to heat the circulating water. And I dont even need to do anything - this system and the thermostats keep the home comfy through the cold season. We do not have A/C, however so when it gets too hot we are on our own and might need to open a window or something.

All this means that when a dish lands on the table, it will loose temperature at the same speed as the same dish placed on a table elsewhere with the same ambient temperature.

Yes, it's customary here  to heat hot food when it's served and not neccessarily wait until everyone has their plate but restaurants tend to be pretty good at servering dishes at the same time and I manage to feed all four people in the household without much time delay. Probably becuase it's the only sensible way to do it. Hot food is best when it's, you know, hot.

We are pretty pragmatic up here and on the balance probably care less than most about all sorts of elaborate social rituals. As long as you say please and thank you when you think it's appropriate you are most likely good to go. And oh, if you go to a funeral black is still the new balck, at least for men.

I can understand that a foreigner might find some of the local standards a tad rude, too informal and maybe not very polite. But you probably have to work quite hard for the opposite to happen.

Haha, yeah, my brother who lives in Norway complains that Norwegians generally keep their thermostats set too high for his liking. He argues with his girlfriend to turn the heat down, mostly because he feels like it's wasteful of energy. Apparently, since most of their power comes from hydro, many Norwegians feel like it's fine to just leave lights, heaters and whatnot on, all the time. Out of habit, I think, my brother still feels uncomfortable with this Norwegian custom, even after many years of living there. The fact that in 2020 Norwegians' homes are all comfortably warm in the winter doesn't really say much about the origins of their custom of not waiting for everyone to be served before eating food. It's possible that a custom still practiced today may have originated many, many years ago, perhaps even before central heating became a thing. Maybe not, though. :)

[Shane]

It seems to me that elites in Europe and North America are making the pragmatic decision to allow mass immigration, based mostly on economic reasons. Without significant immigration, both Europe and North America would soon become unable to pay their bills. They wouldn't have enough workers paying taxes to keep providing the services their people have become used to: healthcare, pensions, etc. The complaints I've heard from Europeans sounded legitimate to me. French and German people told us they felt like their political leaders were inviting large numbers of people into their countries, to the point where they no longer felt at home. The elites who are making those decisions, though, are completely insulated from the effects on every day people of large numbers of immigrants entering their countries in a relatively short period of time. I think from an economic standpoint, European leaders are doing the right thing. If Japan were to open up to immigration it would be great for their country economically but, so far, anyway, they don't seem open to doing that...yet.

A significant part of immigration is not that elites are in favour of it but that, essentially, it is impossible to stop without taking actions that are inhumane.  Do we let people drown in the Mediterranean in overcrowded dingies or pick them up and let them land in Europe?  Do we separate breast-feeding mothers from their children on the southern border of the USA?  Do you warehouse people trying to reach Australia by boat on Nauru for a decade or two of their lives?  Do we station people with machine guns on the white cliffs of Dover to kill anyone trying to cross the Channel in a small boat?  What's the answer?  Add in to the reason that a lot of these people are trying to move is that they will die if they stay where they are, either directly because climate change is killing their crops or because climate change has led to civil war which is killing them directly?  If you were in charge, what's your answer?

It sounds like what you are describing is refugees and not immigrants. Of course, people who are actually fleeing wars deserve help. My understanding, though, is that refugees are a small minority of the people who have migrated to Europe in recent years. The vast majority are economic migrants, who are moving to Europe seeking better lives, basically more Euros/hour of pay for their labor. Just like in North America, European leaders are allowing, even encouraging, economic migrants to come to their countries, because they need wait tables, scrub toilets, etc., and most locals aren't willing to do that kind of work for the pay that is being offered.

[habanero]

Haha, yeah, my brother who lives in Norway complains that Norwegians generally keep their thermostats set too high for his liking. He argues with his girlfriend to turn the heat down, mostly because he feels like it's wasteful of energy. Apparently, since most of their power comes from hydro, many Norwegians feel like it's fine to just leave lights, heaters and whatnot on, all the time. Out of habit, I think, my brother still feels uncomfortable with this Norwegian custom, even after many years of living there. The fact that in 2020 Norwegians' homes are all comfortably warm in the winter doesn't really say much about the origins of their custom of not waiting for everyone to be served before eating food. It's possible that a custom still practiced today may have originated many, many years ago, perhaps even before central heating became a thing. Maybe not, though. :)

I know an aussie who moved here, it took her quite some time to view running freshwater as a pretty much infinite resource. Some places have installed meters, but most still don't and if there is something we have plenty of, it's freshwater. I pay an annual fee to be connected to the public grid, but after that I can use as much as I want and shortages due to prolonged draught happen very rarely, like maybe once a decade every year. And that basically means "please dont water your garden, except every other day" or something like that.

Letting water run for half a minute just to make sure it's really cold before filling up a small glass is completely common and I find it tad strange when someone doesn't do that. Like, there is really no reason to save on water.

[gaja]

Even up here, in Scandinavia on the outskirts of civilization we have thins invention called "heating" which seems to work wonders in countering the effect of low temperatures through a good chunk of the year. Currently, in our guest room  - now my home office - there is a devce on the wall often referred to as "a radiatior". Though this ingenious device a liquid - H2O, or water, flows circulated by a pump in my basement. This water is heated through a fascinating interplay between a heat pump mounted outside my house and some copper coils in a tank, Should this device not produce enough energy to maintain the desired temperature of the water (goverend by air temperature out side nonetheless!) several electrical heating elements are waiting to be switched on to heat the circulating water. And I dont even need to do anything - this system and the thermostats keep the home comfy through the cold season. We do not have A/C, however so when it gets too hot we are on our own and might need to open a window or something.

All this means that when a dish lands on the table, it will loose temperature at the same speed as the same dish placed on a table elsewhere with the same ambient temperature.

Yes, it's customary here  to heat hot food when it's served and not neccessarily wait until everyone has their plate but restaurants tend to be pretty good at servering dishes at the same time and I manage to feed all four people in the household without much time delay. Probably becuase it's the only sensible way to do it. Hot food is best when it's, you know, hot.

We are pretty pragmatic up here and on the balance probably care less than most about all sorts of elaborate social rituals. As long as you say please and thank you when you think it's appropriate you are most likely good to go. And oh, if you go to a funeral black is still the new balck, at least for men.

I can understand that a foreigner might find some of the local standards a tad rude, too informal and maybe not very polite. But you probably have to work quite hard for the opposite to happen.

Haha, yeah, my brother who lives in Norway complains that Norwegians generally keep their thermostats set too high for his liking. He argues with his girlfriend to turn the heat down, mostly because he feels like it's wasteful of energy. Apparently, since most of their power comes from hydro, many Norwegians feel like it's fine to just leave lights, heaters and whatnot on, all the time. Out of habit, I think, my brother still feels uncomfortable with this Norwegian custom, even after many years of living there. The fact that in 2020 Norwegians' homes are all comfortably warm in the winter doesn't really say much about the origins of their custom of not waiting for everyone to be served before eating food. It's possible that a custom still practiced today may have originated many, many years ago, perhaps even before central heating became a thing. Maybe not, though. :)

Heating has sort of been a necessity in Norwegian houses since day one, back when central heating meant the open fire place in the middle of the floor, and ventilation was the hole in the roof where the smoke escaped. In the really old days, porridge was served in one tray, and everyone had a personal spoon. Later, the pot was set on the table, and you could ladle it into your own bowl. Since porridge takes a little while to cool, it is not a big issue to wait until everyone is ready. Non-porridge meals were rare, and usually soup.

[Shane]

Haha, yeah, my brother who lives in Norway complains that Norwegians generally keep their thermostats set too high for his liking. He argues with his girlfriend to turn the heat down, mostly because he feels like it's wasteful of energy. Apparently, since most of their power comes from hydro, many Norwegians feel like it's fine to just leave lights, heaters and whatnot on, all the time. Out of habit, I think, my brother still feels uncomfortable with this Norwegian custom, even after many years of living there. The fact that in 2020 Norwegians' homes are all comfortably warm in the winter doesn't really say much about the origins of their custom of not waiting for everyone to be served before eating food. It's possible that a custom still practiced today may have originated many, many years ago, perhaps even before central heating became a thing. Maybe not, though. :)

I know an aussie who moved here, it took her quite some time to view running freshwater as a pretty much infinite resource. Some places have installed meters, but most still don't and if there is something we have plenty of, it's freshwater. I pay an annual fee to be connected to the public grid, but after that I can use as much as I want and shortages due to prolonged draught happen very rarely, like maybe once a decade every year. And that basically means "please dont water your garden, except every other day" or something like that.

Letting water run for half a minute just to make sure it's really cold before filling up a small glass is completely common and I find it tad strange when someone doesn't do that. Like, there is really no reason to save on water.

When we lived in Hawaii, we had our own private water system. We collected water on the roof of our house and stored it in two cisterns that held a total of 36K gallons. Since it usually rained >150 inches/years where we lived, we never had a shortage of water, either. I miss not having to ever worry about wasting water. Where we live now, water is our single biggest monthly bill. It costs more than electricity and gas, by far, which seems really strange to us.

[Shane]

Even up here, in Scandinavia on the outskirts of civilization we have thins invention called "heating" which seems to work wonders in countering the effect of low temperatures through a good chunk of the year. Currently, in our guest room  - now my home office - there is a devce on the wall often referred to as "a radiatior". Though this ingenious device a liquid - H2O, or water, flows circulated by a pump in my basement. This water is heated through a fascinating interplay between a heat pump mounted outside my house and some copper coils in a tank, Should this device not produce enough energy to maintain the desired temperature of the water (goverend by air temperature out side nonetheless!) several electrical heating elements are waiting to be switched on to heat the circulating water. And I dont even need to do anything - this system and the thermostats keep the home comfy through the cold season. We do not have A/C, however so when it gets too hot we are on our own and might need to open a window or something.

All this means that when a dish lands on the table, it will loose temperature at the same speed as the same dish placed on a table elsewhere with the same ambient temperature.

Yes, it's customary here  to heat hot food when it's served and not neccessarily wait until everyone has their plate but restaurants tend to be pretty good at servering dishes at the same time and I manage to feed all four people in the household without much time delay. Probably becuase it's the only sensible way to do it. Hot food is best when it's, you know, hot.

We are pretty pragmatic up here and on the balance probably care less than most about all sorts of elaborate social rituals. As long as you say please and thank you when you think it's appropriate you are most likely good to go. And oh, if you go to a funeral black is still the new balck, at least for men.

I can understand that a foreigner might find some of the local standards a tad rude, too informal and maybe not very polite. But you probably have to work quite hard for the opposite to happen.

Haha, yeah, my brother who lives in Norway complains that Norwegians generally keep their thermostats set too high for his liking. He argues with his girlfriend to turn the heat down, mostly because he feels like it's wasteful of energy. Apparently, since most of their power comes from hydro, many Norwegians feel like it's fine to just leave lights, heaters and whatnot on, all the time. Out of habit, I think, my brother still feels uncomfortable with this Norwegian custom, even after many years of living there. The fact that in 2020 Norwegians' homes are all comfortably warm in the winter doesn't really say much about the origins of their custom of not waiting for everyone to be served before eating food. It's possible that a custom still practiced today may have originated many, many years ago, perhaps even before central heating became a thing. Maybe not, though. :)

Heating has sort of been a necessity in Norwegian houses since day one, back when central heating meant the open fire place in the middle of the floor, and ventilation was the hole in the roof where the smoke escaped. In the really old days, porridge was served in one tray, and everyone had a personal spoon. Later, the pot was set on the table, and you could ladle it into your own bowl. Since porridge takes a little while to cool, it is not a big issue to wait until everyone is ready. Non-porridge meals were rare, and usually soup.

That's interesting. When my wife and I lived in rural, northern Japan back in the early 90s, basically no one we knew had central heat in their homes, even though the part of Japan where we lived was considered the great white north of the country. Even when we visited Japan just a few years ago, I remember visiting an older couple in their huge, beautiful home in the countryside, and only the room where we were sitting and talking was heated. When we walked down the hall to use the bathroom, the temperature in the rest of the house was the same as outside, close to freezing.

[former player]

It seems to me that elites in Europe and North America are making the pragmatic decision to allow mass immigration, based mostly on economic reasons. Without significant immigration, both Europe and North America would soon become unable to pay their bills. They wouldn't have enough workers paying taxes to keep providing the services their people have become used to: healthcare, pensions, etc. The complaints I've heard from Europeans sounded legitimate to me. French and German people told us they felt like their political leaders were inviting large numbers of people into their countries, to the point where they no longer felt at home. The elites who are making those decisions, though, are completely insulated from the effects on every day people of large numbers of immigrants entering their countries in a relatively short period of time. I think from an economic standpoint, European leaders are doing the right thing. If Japan were to open up to immigration it would be great for their country economically but, so far, anyway, they don't seem open to doing that...yet.

A significant part of immigration is not that elites are in favour of it but that, essentially, it is impossible to stop without taking actions that are inhumane.  Do we let people drown in the Mediterranean in overcrowded dingies or pick them up and let them land in Europe?  Do we separate breast-feeding mothers from their children on the southern border of the USA?  Do you warehouse people trying to reach Australia by boat on Nauru for a decade or two of their lives?  Do we station people with machine guns on the white cliffs of Dover to kill anyone trying to cross the Channel in a small boat?  What's the answer?  Add in to the reason that a lot of these people are trying to move is that they will die if they stay where they are, either directly because climate change is killing their crops or because climate change has led to civil war which is killing them directly?  If you were in charge, what's your answer?

It sounds like what you are describing is refugees and not immigrants. Of course, people who are actually fleeing wars deserve help. My understanding, though, is that refugees are a small minority of the people who have migrated to Europe in recent years. The vast majority are economic migrants, who are moving to Europe seeking better lives, basically more Euros/hour of pay for their labor. Just like in North America, European leaders are allowing, even encouraging, economic migrants to come to their countries, because they need wait tables, scrub toilets, etc., and most locals aren't willing to do that kind of work for the pay that is being offered.

BiB It is in fact very hard to tell the difference between these two groups.  Is someone from Afghanistan or Syria or Sudan a refugee or an economic migrant?

There isn't a lot of organised, planned immigration into Europe, as far as I know, it's mostly people coming informally and probably either choosing to remain undocumented or claiming asylum.  Agricultural labourers come to western Europe from either the poorer EU countries (Bulgaria and Romania) or further east in Europe such as Ukraine.

[cerat0n1a]

It sounds like what you are describing is refugees and not immigrants. Of course, people who are actually fleeing wars deserve help. My understanding, though, is that refugees are a small minority of the people who have migrated to Europe in recent years. The vast majority are economic migrants, who are moving to Europe seeking better lives, basically more Euros/hour of pay for their labor. Just like in North America, European leaders are allowing, even encouraging, economic migrants to come to their countries, because they need wait tables, scrub toilets, etc., and most locals aren't willing to do that kind of work for the pay that is being offered.

Depends very much on which part of Europe you look at. The UK currently has >20% of its population born overseas, making it arguably more of a country of immigration than the US or Australia (at least currently, clearly historically we've been a massive source of migrants). Very few of those are refugees (and migrants from Western Europe & India have higher median salaries than locals; it's certainly not the case that most people came here to do the kind of work that migrants do in the US.) That's a massively different situation to say Germany, where more than 1 million refugees arrived in a single year. There are, for example, more than 1 million people of Kurdish descent in Germany.

[monarda]

@former player - I didn't get that monarda wanted to live elsewhere in the EU - I assumed that they wanted to move to Austria but maybe not.

They mentioned "EU rights", which might mean wanting EU rights or I suppose might just be not understanding that Austrian citizenship rights and EU rights are not the same thing.

Thank you @former player for all this information while I was asleep!

I don't have a plan yet. I'm just parsing out options to retire in the EU, have extended travel there, work there, have full Austrian/EU rights there, have my partner and I have health care there, and learn what the rules are for each, which will inform our decisions.  I'm just applying for  Austrian citizenship now because it's possible for the first time. Both of my parents escaped from Austria during WWII. So now, I have the option- but it would have been more handy a decade ago. At age 60 now, I'm not sure I want to work full time for 5 more years, if that's what's required. My brother and his children are all applying. We'll send the forms in as a family package.

[Shane]

It seems to me that elites in Europe and North America are making the pragmatic decision to allow mass immigration, based mostly on economic reasons. Without significant immigration, both Europe and North America would soon become unable to pay their bills. They wouldn't have enough workers paying taxes to keep providing the services their people have become used to: healthcare, pensions, etc. The complaints I've heard from Europeans sounded legitimate to me. French and German people told us they felt like their political leaders were inviting large numbers of people into their countries, to the point where they no longer felt at home. The elites who are making those decisions, though, are completely insulated from the effects on every day people of large numbers of immigrants entering their countries in a relatively short period of time. I think from an economic standpoint, European leaders are doing the right thing. If Japan were to open up to immigration it would be great for their country economically but, so far, anyway, they don't seem open to doing that...yet.

A significant part of immigration is not that elites are in favour of it but that, essentially, it is impossible to stop without taking actions that are inhumane.  Do we let people drown in the Mediterranean in overcrowded dingies or pick them up and let them land in Europe?  Do we separate breast-feeding mothers from their children on the southern border of the USA?  Do you warehouse people trying to reach Australia by boat on Nauru for a decade or two of their lives?  Do we station people with machine guns on the white cliffs of Dover to kill anyone trying to cross the Channel in a small boat?  What's the answer?  Add in to the reason that a lot of these people are trying to move is that they will die if they stay where they are, either directly because climate change is killing their crops or because climate change has led to civil war which is killing them directly?  If you were in charge, what's your answer?

It sounds like what you are describing is refugees and not immigrants. Of course, people who are actually fleeing wars deserve help. My understanding, though, is that refugees are a small minority of the people who have migrated to Europe in recent years. The vast majority are economic migrants, who are moving to Europe seeking better lives, basically more Euros/hour of pay for their labor. Just like in North America, European leaders are allowing, even encouraging, economic migrants to come to their countries, because they need wait tables, scrub toilets, etc., and most locals aren't willing to do that kind of work for the pay that is being offered.

BiB It is in fact very hard to tell the difference between these two groups.  Is someone from Afghanistan or Syria or Sudan a refugee or an economic migrant?

There isn't a lot of organised, planned immigration into Europe, as far as I know, it's mostly people coming informally and probably either choosing to remain undocumented or claiming asylum.  Agricultural labourers come to western Europe from either the poorer EU countries (Bulgaria and Romania) or further east in Europe such as Ukraine.

Elites in both NA and Europe benefit disproportionately and bear little, if any, of the societal costs of their purposefully thought out plans to allow the "informal, unplanned, unorganized" migration you describe to continue. Longer term, most of those recent migrants will become integrated into the societies where they have settled. It's only in the short term where there is some pain, such as Imma described her elderly relatives experiencing in the NL, but very little of it is experienced by the elites who are making the decision to allow the migration to happen. I think that's the basis of the frustration many people on both continents are feeling about immigration.

[Imma]

@Shane where I live expats are from China and India and come to work in the tech industry. These are all highly educated and highly compensated people and they are generally well liked as people, they are not seen as dangerous or bad people.

A lot of people just mind the volume of outsiders coming in and the extremely overpriced housing market that means their own children can't find a place to live here. On top of Asians we also have plenty of EU- nationals moving here. My family members live in an apartment block close to a big employer, with mostly young singles or couples these days. So I'm not sure the neighbours would come over for tea even if they did speak Dutch, but I think my family members would feel less upset if they were able to have some small talk in the hallway every now and then.

I live in a residential area where before the pandemic about 1/3 of the families was from India. When lockdown came a lot of those people went home and I'm not sure if and when they're coming back. Rents are going down for the first time in years due to all the people going home because of the pandemic.

@former player In my experience all big cities in Europe are full of economic migrants and it's pretty easy to qualify as one, I think in my country you only need to show a letter from your employer they couldn't find anyone in our country + a job offer over €45k. Refugees are a big political topic but if you look at the statistics, most immigrants are people we invite to live here to make our country rich, not refugees. I would actually welcome more economic refugees. Those people have guts. The bravest members of my family emigrated to Canada in the late 40s and they were very succesful there. They survived a war and had the guts to start over in a new place that wasn't bombed to pieces. I think Canada was lucky to get them.

[Shane]

@Shane where I live expats are from China and India and come to work in the tech industry. These are all highly educated and highly compensated people and they are generally well liked as people, they are not seen as dangerous or bad people.

A lot of people just mind the volume of outsiders coming in and the extremely overpriced housing market that means their own children can't find a place to live here. On top of Asians we also have plenty of EU- nationals moving here. My family members live in an apartment block close to a big employer, with mostly young singles or couples these days. So I'm not sure the neighbours would come over for tea even if they did speak Dutch, but I think my family members would feel less upset if they were able to have some small talk in the hallway every now and then.

I live in a residential area where before the pandemic about 1/3 of the families was from India. When lockdown came a lot of those people went home and I'm not sure if and when they're coming back. Rents are going down for the first time in years due to all the people going home because of the pandemic.

@former player In my experience all big cities in Europe are full of economic migrants and it's pretty easy to qualify as one, I think in my country you only need to show a letter from your employer they couldn't find anyone in our country + a job offer over €45k. Refugees are a big political topic but if you look at the statistics, most immigrants are people we invite to live here to make our country rich, not refugees. I would actually welcome more economic refugees. Those people have guts. The bravest members of my family emigrated to Canada in the late 40s and they were very succesful there. They survived a war and had the guts to start over in a new place that wasn't bombed to pieces. I think Canada was lucky to get them.

@Imma That's interesting. We happen to know a Brit, married to a German, raising their kids and working in the tech industry in the NL, but I wouldn't have guessed there'd be so many Chinese and Indians doing so, as well.

The bravest members of my family emigrated to Canada in the late 40s and they were very succesful there. They survived a war and had the guts to start over in a new place that wasn't bombed to pieces. I think Canada was lucky to get them.

In my experience, it's almost always the case that the people who choose to emigrate are the bravest, most determined and, often, the smartest people in their societies. They're definitely an asset to whichever country they decide to settle in. In Europe and North America, I think politicians need to do a better job of explaining that fact to their citizens. Once people realize that immigrants are one of our countries' greatest assets, hopefully, they will become more open to allowing much more organized legal immigration to happen. If done in an organized and well thought out way, immigration only makes the countries that welcome immigrants stronger in the long run.

[Paul der Krake]

Depends very much on which part of Europe you look at. The UK currently has >20% of its population born overseas, making it arguably more of a country of immigration than the US or Australia (at least currently, clearly historically we've been a massive source of migrants). Very few of those are refugees (and migrants from Western Europe & India have higher median salaries than locals; it's certainly not the case that most people came here to do the kind of work that migrants do in the US.)

That's one of the perks of living on an island and having the border in Calais instead of Dover.

The handling of refugees is going to one of the EU's biggest challenges for a long time. It's not stopping anytime soon, so they might as well turn this influx of young workers into a positive. Germany seems to be doing a decent-ish job of it so far considering how many they've taken in. We'll see how it goes.

[cerat0n1a]

The handling of refugees is going to one of the EU's biggest challenges for a long time. It's not stopping anytime soon, so they might as well turn this influx of young workers into a positive. Germany seems to be doing a decent-ish job of it so far considering how many they've taken in.

Very much agree with both your points here.

My wife was helping out in the refugee camps at Calais for a while. Hard to see why France would continue to do this, so I expect a lot more stories about refugees trying to cross the English channel.

[seattlecyclone]

Depends very much on which part of Europe you look at. The UK currently has >20% of its population born overseas, making it arguably more of a country of immigration than the US or Australia (at least currently, clearly historically we've been a massive source of migrants). Very few of those are refugees (and migrants from Western Europe & India have higher median salaries than locals; it's certainly not the case that most people came here to do the kind of work that migrants do in the US.) That's a massively different situation to say Germany, where more than 1 million refugees arrived in a single year. There are, for example, more than 1 million people of Kurdish descent in Germany.

Of course that 20% stat is very much related to what types of migration we consider to be "immigration." Pre-Brexit you needed just as little permission to move from Paris to London for work as you did to move from New York to Los Angeles. The latter move is ten times as much distance than the former, but we consider the former trip to be "immigration" and the latter trip not because EU member states retain a bit more sovereignty than US member states. Look at how much of each place's population is living more than 500 km from their birthplace, or how much of each country's workforce needed a visa to move there, and the comparison would likely be different.

[Imma]

@Shane they call this area Brainport, there are lots of tech companies here nowadays! Indians are the second largest immigrant group in the Netherlands these days, after Polish people.

[cerat0n1a]

Of course that 20% stat is very much related to what types of migration we consider to be "immigration." Pre-Brexit you needed just as little permission to move from Paris to London for work as you did to move from New York to Los Angeles. The latter move is ten times as much distance than the former, but we consider the former trip to be "immigration" and the latter trip not because EU member states retain a bit more sovereignty than US member states.

I'd suggest it's more than just because EU states have "a bit more sovereignty". Individual US states don't have their own armies, languages, and cultural differences dating back hundreds or thousand years. I could move 30 miles from my birthplace in England and be somewhere where the majority of the population is Welsh-speaking.

Culture is slowly homogenising. There would easily be 50 or 60 nationalities amongst my colleagues in a small English city when I was working, for example. My wife and I took a post-FIRE slow travel train trip around Europe. It still feels far more diverse than our corresponding coast to coast road trips in the US did, in spite of the EU and the internet and 5 euro flights bringing us closer together.

[deborah]

It sounds like what you are describing is refugees and not immigrants. Of course, people who are actually fleeing wars deserve help. My understanding, though, is that refugees are a small minority of the people who have migrated to Europe in recent years. The vast majority are economic migrants, who are moving to Europe seeking better lives, basically more Euros/hour of pay for their labor. Just like in North America, European leaders are allowing, even encouraging, economic migrants to come to their countries, because they need wait tables, scrub toilets, etc., and most locals aren't willing to do that kind of work for the pay that is being offered.

Depends very much on which part of Europe you look at. The UK currently has >20% of its population born overseas, making it arguably more of a country of immigration than the US or Australia (at least currently, clearly historically we've been a massive source of migrants). Very few of those are refugees (and migrants from Western Europe & India have higher median salaries than locals; it's certainly not the case that most people came here to do the kind of work that migrants do in the US.) That's a massively different situation to say Germany, where more than 1 million refugees arrived in a single year. There are, for example, more than 1 million people of Kurdish descent in Germany.

At 30% of our population, migration to Australia is about twice that of the other countries you are talking about.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_dependent_territories_by_immigrant_population

[seattlecyclone]

Individual US states don't have their own armies...

Yes they do.

...languages...

Yes they absolutely do.

and cultural differences dating back hundreds or thousand years.

That's also false.

Now I'm not suggesting that the US is as linguistically or culturally heterogenous as the EU; clearly it is not. I just think that the differences are perhaps more a matter of degree than a matter of kind.

[RetiredAt63]

In my experience, it's almost always the case that the people who choose to emigrate are the bravest, most determined and, often, the smartest people in their societies. They're definitely an asset to whichever country they decide to settle in. In Europe and North America, I think politicians need to do a better job of explaining that fact to their citizens. Once people realize that immigrants are one of our countries' greatest assets, hopefully, they will become more open to allowing much more organized legal immigration to happen. If done in an organized and well thought out way, immigration only makes the countries that welcome immigrants stronger in the long run.

Canada has long talked about the "brain drain" to the US.  Get educated here in our reasonably priced universities, then go to the US to make your fortune.  We have our own example right here, in Mr. Money Mustache.  Our immigration requirements mean we also receive people who will be assets here.  That is totally separate from our refugee policy.

[seattlecyclone]

In my experience, it's almost always the case that the people who choose to emigrate are the bravest, most determined and, often, the smartest people in their societies. They're definitely an asset to whichever country they decide to settle in. In Europe and North America, I think politicians need to do a better job of explaining that fact to their citizens. Once people realize that immigrants are one of our countries' greatest assets, hopefully, they will become more open to allowing much more organized legal immigration to happen. If done in an organized and well thought out way, immigration only makes the countries that welcome immigrants stronger in the long run.

Canada has long talked about the "brain drain" to the US.  Get educated here in our reasonably priced universities, then go to the US to make your fortune.  We have our own example right here, in Mr. Money Mustache.  Our immigration requirements mean we also receive people who will be assets here.  That is totally separate from our refugee policy.

This is a problem in many US states as well. Plenty of folks (myself included) pick up valuable technical skills in Midwestern universities and then bolt for the coasts after graduating because that's where the best jobs are.

[Bloop Bloop]

@Shane where I live expats are from China and India and come to work in the tech industry. These are all highly educated and highly compensated people and they are generally well liked as people, they are not seen as dangerous or bad people.

A lot of people just mind the volume of outsiders coming in and the extremely overpriced housing market that means their own children can't find a place to live here. On top of Asians we also have plenty of EU- nationals moving here. My family members live in an apartment block close to a big employer, with mostly young singles or couples these days. So I'm not sure the neighbours would come over for tea even if they did speak Dutch, but I think my family members would feel less upset if they were able to have some small talk in the hallway every now and then.

I live in a residential area where before the pandemic about 1/3 of the families was from India. When lockdown came a lot of those people went home and I'm not sure if and when they're coming back. Rents are going down for the first time in years due to all the people going home because of the pandemic.

@former player In my experience all big cities in Europe are full of economic migrants and it's pretty easy to qualify as one, I think in my country you only need to show a letter from your employer they couldn't find anyone in our country + a job offer over €45k. Refugees are a big political topic but if you look at the statistics, most immigrants are people we invite to live here to make our country rich, not refugees. I would actually welcome more economic refugees. Those people have guts. The bravest members of my family emigrated to Canada in the late 40s and they were very succesful there. They survived a war and had the guts to start over in a new place that wasn't bombed to pieces. I think Canada was lucky to get them.

@Imma That's interesting. We happen to know a Brit, married to a German, raising their kids and working in the tech industry in the NL, but I wouldn't have guessed there'd be so many Chinese and Indians doing so, as well.

The bravest members of my family emigrated to Canada in the late 40s and they were very succesful there. They survived a war and had the guts to start over in a new place that wasn't bombed to pieces. I think Canada was lucky to get them.

In my experience, it's almost always the case that the people who choose to emigrate are the bravest, most determined and, often, the smartest people in their societies. They're definitely an asset to whichever country they decide to settle in. In Europe and North America, I think politicians need to do a better job of explaining that fact to their citizens. Once people realize that immigrants are one of our countries' greatest assets, hopefully, they will become more open to allowing much more organized legal immigration to happen. If done in an organized and well thought out way, immigration only makes the countries that welcome immigrants stronger in the long run.

It's the less skilled natives who resent migration because it results in more competition for their jobs - first generation migrants, even very smart ones, often work menial jobs while establishing themselves in their new homeland, and this is not good for the locals who want a cruisy passage with those jobs.

[daverobev]

It's the less skilled natives who resent migration because it results in more competition for their jobs - first generation migrants, even very smart ones, often work menial jobs while establishing themselves in their new homeland, and this is not good for the locals who want a cruisy passage with those jobs.

I mean, you can't really blame them, can you? Objectively. If you're a below average person, and bearing in mind there are only a certain number of below average person jobs about... how can you compete against Eastern European people who will live in HMOs - ie really low costs - will work stupidly hard for a few years and send all the money 'back home'?

Migration is a very complicated issue - it's easy for it to descend into name-calling on both sides. The fact is, cheap labour keeps prices low, but there is a cost to that.

Don't get me wrong - life isn't fair, people shouldn't expect it to be, but things have changed very rapidly over the last 50 years say. Over the last 20 years. I don't blame the migrants, if you can move and get 3x the money why the hell wouldn't you.

[ctuser1]

It's the less skilled natives who resent migration because it results in more competition for their jobs - first generation migrants, even very smart ones, often work menial jobs while establishing themselves in their new homeland, and this is not good for the locals who want a cruisy passage with those jobs.

I mean, you can't really blame them, can you? Objectively. If you're a below average person, and bearing in mind there are only a certain number of below average person jobs about... how can you compete against Eastern European people who will live in HMOs - ie really low costs - will work stupidly hard for a few years and send all the money 'back home'?

Migration is a very complicated issue - it's easy for it to descend into name-calling on both sides. The fact is, cheap labour keeps prices low, but there is a cost to that.

Don't get me wrong - life isn't fair, people shouldn't expect it to be, but things have changed very rapidly over the last 50 years say. Over the last 20 years. I don't blame the migrants, if you can move and get 3x the money why the hell wouldn't you.

I am not convinced this concern for lower skilled workers is real at all!! Look up the "lump of labor" fallacy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lump_of_labour_fallacy).

We even have real-world examples of this. New York City had 70%+ foreign born population during a lot of the late 1800's. That coincided with the crazy economic growth of this city and it's position in world economy that is extremely resilient. It is so tightly woven into the whole world's supply chain (thx in no small part to the connections that the immigrant enclaves bring) that I think it will bounce right back after COVID.

Has a low-skilled worker in NYC, at any point of time, been worse off compared to another similar city that did not have so much immigration? We can take Cincinnati, OH for comparison - as it was considered a very large city back in those days (late 1800s).

There sure is a perception among the lower skilled workers that they are worse off when funny looking and talking foreigners are occupying so much social space that you have to get out of your comfort zone. It's even worse if some of them climb above you in the economic ladder. But, I am not at all sure that there is a "real" impact to the low skilled immigrants. So the issue appears to be cultural to me, and not economic.

For all the bloviating from the far right, how many unemployed American's or Western Europeans will agree to pick lettuce or gut pigs for a pay that will allow a market to exist?? I doubt you will ever find many of them anywhere!!

[SunnyDays]

^^^^^
Yes, exactly.  At a certain point (mostly related to the hard work required rather than the pay), locals will simply refuse to do the job.  Why would they when employment insurance or welfare pays almost as much for them to not work at all?  The foreign workers don’t have the luxury of such social programs.  In the last year, some owners of dairy farms here in Canada were interviewed about foreign labour and all said the same thing - either locals don’t even apply for the jobs, apply and then don’t show up even for the first day, or walk out after a short while when they realize how hard the work is.  People just aren’t hard up enough in western countries to fill low level jobs that demand more than standing around all day, flipping burgers or pumping gas.  (No offence to those who do such work.)

[Shane]

The idea that Americans don't want/are too lazy to do hard jobs is a myth. Americans are more than happy to work hard if the pay and benefits are reasonable. It is correct, though, that Americans are mostly unwilling to work for Tegucigalpa wages.

My cousin put himself through college and grad school by working hard gutting fish at a cannery in Seward, Alaska, during all 4 months of his summer "vacations." The current hourly pay rate for working in an AK cannery is only $10.19/hr., which is AK's minimum wage. My cousin explained to me, though, that the reason he was able to save so much money working at a cannery job was through LOTS of overtime, paid at time and a half, and because of the fact that he had very low living expenses, since he camped out in his tent all summer in a free spot near his workplace.

If employers did not have access to a big pool of workers who were not legally entitled to work in our country, and therefore willing to accept below market wages and no benefits, they would have to increase wages and benefits until they were enough to entice American workers to do the work that needs to be done on farms, in slaughter houses, on construction sites, etc. This would mean that food and other items and services in the US would become more expensive and/or that the companies engaged in these businesses would make less profits. It would also be more ethical, imho, than continuing to allow tens of millions of undocumented workers to be exploited for our benefit.

The only reason that Congress has not enacted significant immigration legislation since the 1980s is because all the people who benefit from the status quo are rich and all the people who are harmed by it are poor. If things were the other way around and poor people were benefiting and rich people were being hurt by allowing 12MM+ undocumented workers to continue to illegally reside and work in our country, Congress would've put a stop to it decades ago.

[seattlecyclone]

Yep, the status quo where we have a bunch of undocumented labor in this country bothers me quite a bit. These folks are not in any position to speak out if they're mistreated, and if any immigration enforcement happens it's almost always the workers and not the employers who pay the price. You're right that Americans don't want to work for "Tegucigalpa wages," but absent people physically present in America who will work for those wages, at some point it makes financial sense to put your Alaskan fish on ice and ship it to Tegucigalpa to put it in cans there for $2/hr instead of hiring locals to do it for $10/hr plus overtime. Is that really better for America than letting some foreigners in to compete in our labor market? I have some strong doubts on that point.

I find the existence of an undocumented underclass of workers to be problematic for a number of reasons. I also think it would be perhaps worse if we enforced our existing immigration laws even more strictly, with essentially no path for low-skilled labor to ever immigrate here if they're not related to an existing citizen or permanent resident. Let's find a way to change the laws to legalize the types of work that is already happening. This will ensure that proper taxes are paid, worker safety laws are followed, and that people get to move here legally instead of living in hiding for a generation until their US citizen kids are grown.

[reeshau]

The idea that Americans don't want/are too lazy to do hard jobs is a myth. Americans are more than happy to work hard if the pay and benefits are reasonable. It is correct, though, that Americans are mostly unwilling to work for Tegucigalpa wages.

My cousin put himself through college and grad school by working hard gutting fish at a cannery in Seward, Alaska, during all 4 months of his summer "vacations." The current hourly pay rate for working in an AK cannery is only $10.19/hr., which is AK's minimum wage. My cousin explained to me, though, that the reason he was able to save so much money working at a cannery job was through LOTS of overtime, paid at time and a half, and because of the fact that he had very low living expenses, since he camped out in his tent all summer in a free spot near his workplace.

If employers did not have access to a big pool of workers who were not legally entitled to work in our country, and therefore willing to accept below market wages and no benefits, they would have to increase wages and benefits until they were enough to entice American workers to do the work that needs to be done on farms, in slaughter houses, on construction sites, etc. This would mean that food and other items and services in the US would become more expensive and/or that the companies engaged in these businesses would make less profits. It would also be more ethical, imho, than continuing to allow tens of millions of undocumented workers to be exploited for our benefit.

The only reason that Congress has not enacted significant immigration legislation since the 1980s is because all the people who benefit from the status quo are rich and all the people who are harmed by it are poor. If things were the other way around and poor people were benefiting and rich people were being hurt by allowing 12MM+ undocumented workers to continue to illegally reside and work in our country, Congress would've put a stop to it decades ago.

I understand the point you are trying to make, and I agree that the willful overlooking of the undocumented in the US is a terrible thing.  But I caution you not to assume that's the end of the story; legal immigration of some level will not address the disparity in living standards between the US and Central / South America.

I saw a similar dynamic play out in my time in Ireland--there, though, with 100% legal immigration with fellow EU countries.  (Generally, former communist countries like Bulgaria)

https://www.rte.ie/news/2020/0421/1132970-keelings-covid-documents/

These people were driven enough to take jobs that local Irish would not, and in one picking season would make more than they could in a whole year locally.  A very smart move, given their circumstances.  As bad as any circumstance may seem from a particular standpoint, there is always worse.  Inequality exists in all countries, but on a global scale it's hardly imaginable.

[ctuser1]

The idea that Americans don't want/are too lazy to do hard jobs is a myth. Americans are more than happy to work hard if the pay and benefits are reasonable. It is correct, though, that Americans are mostly unwilling to work for Tegucigalpa wages.

My cousin put himself through college and grad school by working hard gutting fish at a cannery in Seward, Alaska, during all 4 months of his summer "vacations." The current hourly pay rate for working in an AK cannery is only $10.19/hr., which is AK's minimum wage. My cousin explained to me, though, that the reason he was able to save so much money working at a cannery job was through LOTS of overtime, paid at time and a half, and because of the fact that he had very low living expenses, since he camped out in his tent all summer in a free spot near his workplace.

If employers did not have access to a big pool of workers who were not legally entitled to work in our country, and therefore willing to accept below market wages and no benefits, they would have to increase wages and benefits until they were enough to entice American workers to do the work that needs to be done on farms, in slaughter houses, on construction sites, etc. This would mean that food and other items and services in the US would become more expensive and/or that the companies engaged in these businesses would make less profits. It would also be more ethical, imho, than continuing to allow tens of millions of undocumented workers to be exploited for our benefit.

There is a big problem with having a set of indentured workers (illegal immigration does that). As far as I understand, it is the indentured aspect of the illegal workers, and that alone, that really harm American workers (by depressing and skewing the labor market) and benefits the capital owners. If you can abuse 50% of your workers because they are illegal, then that sets the tone and the entire labor market loses negotiating power against the capital owners.

However, having a large enough pool of legalized low-skilled immigration that meets the economic demands doesn't tend to be as economically harmful. If there was a properly functioning labor market (with nobody beholden to their employers like the illegal immigrants are), there may be localized disruptions, but the entire labor market would not be as distorted that workers get no part of the expansion of the economic pie.

Having zero immigrants and thereby driving the cost up is likely worse than both of these. At a certain point of labor cost, the entire economic activity will be not-feasible, which means the entire business shuts down. Will an Alaska Fish farm find enough American workers before that point? I don't have economic research to point to - but my gut feel says, no!! The path from current economic reality to where a head of lettuce costs $10 runs through a lot of economic misery.

The only reason that Congress has not enacted significant immigration legislation since the 1980s is because all the people who benefit from the status quo are rich and all the people who are harmed by it are poor. If things were the other way around and poor people were benefiting and rich people were being hurt by allowing 12MM+ undocumented workers to continue to illegally reside and work in our country, Congress would've put a stop to it decades ago.

This I agree with.

Just doing a stronger form of E-Verify would do this (you can create your own account to make sure you info is correct, it works great for I and DW). Putting a few CEO's to jail for hiring illegal workers (while handing the concerned workers green-cards as whistle-blowers) will likely do it faster!!

[bwall]

The idea that Americans don't want/are too lazy to do hard jobs is a myth. Americans are more than happy to work hard if the pay and benefits are reasonable. It is correct, though, that Americans are mostly unwilling to work for Tegucigalpa wages.

My cousin put himself through college and grad school by working hard gutting fish at a cannery in Seward, Alaska, during all 4 months of his summer "vacations." The current hourly pay rate for working in an AK cannery is only $10.19/hr., which is AK's minimum wage. My cousin explained to me, though, that the reason he was able to save so much money working at a cannery job was through LOTS of overtime, paid at time and a half, and because of the fact that he had very low living expenses, since he camped out in his tent all summer in a free spot near his workplace.

If employers did not have access to a big pool of workers who were not legally entitled to work in our country, and therefore willing to accept below market wages and no benefits, they would have to increase wages and benefits until they were enough to entice American workers to do the work that needs to be done on farms, in slaughter houses, on construction sites, etc. This would mean that food and other items and services in the US would become more expensive and/or that the companies engaged in these businesses would make less profits. It would also be more ethical, imho, than continuing to allow tens of millions of undocumented workers to be exploited for our benefit.

The only reason that Congress has not enacted significant immigration legislation since the 1980s is because all the people who benefit from the status quo are rich and all the people who are harmed by it are poor. If things were the other way around and poor people were benefiting and rich people were being hurt by allowing 12MM+ undocumented workers to continue to illegally reside and work in our country, Congress would've put a stop to it decades ago.

+1.

Illegal immigration exists in the USA only because BOTH PARTIES WANT THIS! ! !  The GOP enjoys the cheap labor (and ability to motivate their base) and the Dems don't want to upset their union base by making them legal, as well as motivating the SJW base. So, illegal immigration serves both parties rather well.

I've seen lawyers do 'menial' work that paid them $100/hr. So, yeh, the pay scale determines who will do the work, not the type of work determines who will do it.

[Fru-Gal]

Illegal workers pay taxes on their income.

Immigration in any flavor makes America great (read The Millionaire Next Door). The First Lady is an illegal immigrant who then had an anchor baby. She doesn't necessarily make America great, but does illustrate how easily the laws are flouted.

Farmworkers should be better treated and paid. But many of America's top-paying professions are also immigrant-dominated (health, STEM).

Should we lose that influx of talent and work ethic, we're screwed.

[Shane]

Illegal workers pay taxes on their income.

Some do. They're getting ripped off, because they aren't eligible for any of the benefits that their tax dollars should entitle them to. Some work under the table for cash $$ and, therefore, pay zero taxes.

Immigration in any flavor makes America great.

Sorry, but this is just flat out wrong. Knowingly allowing workers to live their lives in constant fear of being separated from their families and deported does not make America great in any sense of the word that I'm familiar with.

Should we lose that influx of talent and work ethic, we're screwed.

Agreed, immigrants are what has made and will continue to keep America great.

[Shane]

The idea that Americans don't want/are too lazy to do hard jobs is a myth. Americans are more than happy to work hard if the pay and benefits are reasonable. It is correct, though, that Americans are mostly unwilling to work for Tegucigalpa wages.

My cousin put himself through college and grad school by working hard gutting fish at a cannery in Seward, Alaska, during all 4 months of his summer "vacations." The current hourly pay rate for working in an AK cannery is only $10.19/hr., which is AK's minimum wage. My cousin explained to me, though, that the reason he was able to save so much money working at a cannery job was through LOTS of overtime, paid at time and a half, and because of the fact that he had very low living expenses, since he camped out in his tent all summer in a free spot near his workplace.

If employers did not have access to a big pool of workers who were not legally entitled to work in our country, and therefore willing to accept below market wages and no benefits, they would have to increase wages and benefits until they were enough to entice American workers to do the work that needs to be done on farms, in slaughter houses, on construction sites, etc. This would mean that food and other items and services in the US would become more expensive and/or that the companies engaged in these businesses would make less profits. It would also be more ethical, imho, than continuing to allow tens of millions of undocumented workers to be exploited for our benefit.

There is a big problem with having a set of indentured workers (illegal immigration does that). As far as I understand, it is the indentured aspect of the illegal workers, and that alone, that really harm American workers (by depressing and skewing the labor market) and benefits the capital owners. If you can abuse 50% of your workers because they are illegal, then that sets the tone and the entire labor market loses negotiating power against the capital owners.

However, having a large enough pool of legalized low-skilled immigration that meets the economic demands doesn't tend to be as economically harmful. If there was a properly functioning labor market (with nobody beholden to their employers like the illegal immigrants are), there may be localized disruptions, but the entire labor market would not be as distorted that workers get no part of the expansion of the economic pie.

Having zero immigrants and thereby driving the cost up is likely worse than both of these. At a certain point of labor cost, the entire economic activity will be not-feasible, which means the entire business shuts down. Will an Alaska Fish farm find enough American workers before that point? I don't have economic research to point to - but my gut feel says, no!! The path from current economic reality to where a head of lettuce costs $10 runs through a lot of economic misery.

Definitely don't think having "zero immigrants" would be desirable for the US. A strong, steady flow of immigrants is what has and will continue to make America great. I think we should switch to a completely merit based immigration system, similar to what New Zealand does. Immigration should be approached in a business-like way, with the goal of maximizing benefits to existing US citizens. Refugees are a completely unrelated issue. Of course, we should help desperate people fleeing wars, famine, etc. Those types of cases are a small fraction, though, of the immigrants who enter our country, each year. The vast majority of immigrants are economic migrants, people seeking more $/hr in exchange for their labor and a better quality of life. Our government should, on our behalf, be seeking out the brightest and best immigrants from all over the world, with skills that American employers need and cannot find locally.

Like New Zealand, the US should have a website on which it clearly lays out a pathway prospective immigrants who possess needed skills can follow to apply for work visas.

(NZ immigration website)

Skilled Migrant Category Resident Visa

We invite people who have the skills to contribute to New Zealand’s economic growth to apply for this visa. Before we can invite you to apply, we’ll first need you to send us an Expression of Interest (EOI) telling us about your employment in New Zealand, work experience, and qualifications. If your Expression of Interest is successful we’ll offer you the opportunity to apply to live and work in New Zealand indefinitely.

The only reason that Congress has not enacted significant immigration legislation since the 1980s is because all the people who benefit from the status quo are rich and all the people who are harmed by it are poor. If things were the other way around and poor people were benefiting and rich people were being hurt by allowing 12MM+ undocumented workers to continue to illegally reside and work in our country, Congress would've put a stop to it decades ago.

This I agree with.

Just doing a stronger form of E-Verify would do this (you can create your own account to make sure you info is correct, it works great for I and DW). Putting a few CEO's to jail for hiring illegal workers (while handing the concerned workers green-cards as whistle-blowers) will likely do it faster!!

If there were a will to do so, the US government could put an end to illegal immigration pretty quickly. All we'd need to do would be to contract with one of the big tech firms, say Google, and get them to build us a system that all employers could use to quickly and easily identify workers who are legally entitled to work in the US and to weed out those who are not allowed to work. Then, employers would no longer have plausible deniability. If the government caught companies exploiting their workers by hiring people who weren't legally allowed to work in the US, we could throw the book at the CEO and other executives, as you've suggested, ctuser1.

My brother lives in Norway. Several times, he's described to me differences between the way the government and media portray illegal immigration in the US and Norway. In the US, we act like the bad guys are the poor immigrants who come to our country seeking a better life. "They're stealing our jobs!" When ICE sweeps into a meat-packing plant or construction site to do a raid, the people who get hauled off in handcuffs are the poor migrants, people who are working their asses of to make our country a better place. When what should happen, instead, is the managers, executives, CEO, and owners of the company should be the ones getting slammed up against a wall, searched, handcuffed, arrested and taken to jail. My brother says that in contrast to the US, in Norway, whenever he sees a story about illegal immigration, they're always talking about the unscrupulous employers who illegally hire workers in Norway, usually for the purpose of paying them less, and/or avoiding taxes by paying their workers under the table. He says, in Norway, it's always the employers who are portrayed as the bad guys, never the poor migrant workers. The workers are, rightfully, portrayed in the media as victims.

Maybe we could try that in the US, as well. If Americans convicted of knowingly employing illegal immigrant workers were thrown in jail and slapped with tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines, they and others might think twice about doing it again. When it became impossible for people illegally in the country to find paying work, they would self deport back to their countries of origin, from where they should be allowed to apply for a work visa, so that they can legally re-enter the US.

[Shane]

The idea that Americans don't want/are too lazy to do hard jobs is a myth. Americans are more than happy to work hard if the pay and benefits are reasonable. It is correct, though, that Americans are mostly unwilling to work for Tegucigalpa wages.

My cousin put himself through college and grad school by working hard gutting fish at a cannery in Seward, Alaska, during all 4 months of his summer "vacations." The current hourly pay rate for working in an AK cannery is only $10.19/hr., which is AK's minimum wage. My cousin explained to me, though, that the reason he was able to save so much money working at a cannery job was through LOTS of overtime, paid at time and a half, and because of the fact that he had very low living expenses, since he camped out in his tent all summer in a free spot near his workplace.

If employers did not have access to a big pool of workers who were not legally entitled to work in our country, and therefore willing to accept below market wages and no benefits, they would have to increase wages and benefits until they were enough to entice American workers to do the work that needs to be done on farms, in slaughter houses, on construction sites, etc. This would mean that food and other items and services in the US would become more expensive and/or that the companies engaged in these businesses would make less profits. It would also be more ethical, imho, than continuing to allow tens of millions of undocumented workers to be exploited for our benefit.

The only reason that Congress has not enacted significant immigration legislation since the 1980s is because all the people who benefit from the status quo are rich and all the people who are harmed by it are poor. If things were the other way around and poor people were benefiting and rich people were being hurt by allowing 12MM+ undocumented workers to continue to illegally reside and work in our country, Congress would've put a stop to it decades ago.

I understand the point you are trying to make, and I agree that the willful overlooking of the undocumented in the US is a terrible thing.  But I caution you not to assume that's the end of the story; legal immigration of some level will not address the disparity in living standards between the US and Central / South America.

I saw a similar dynamic play out in my time in Ireland--there, though, with 100% legal immigration with fellow EU countries.  (Generally, former communist countries like Bulgaria)

https://www.rte.ie/news/2020/0421/1132970-keelings-covid-documents/

These people were driven enough to take jobs that local Irish would not, and in one picking season would make more than they could in a whole year locally.  A very smart move, given their circumstances.  As bad as any circumstance may seem from a particular standpoint, there is always worse.  Inequality exists in all countries, but on a global scale it's hardly imaginable.

To your bolded point above: Why should US immigration policy be expected to "address the disparity in living standards between the US and Central / South America"? I think our immigration policy should be designed with its main goal being the maximization of benefits to existing US citizens. Just like a company looks to maximize benefits to itself and its shareholders when it hires workers, the US government, as our representative, should be seeking to hire the brightest and best workers from all over the world, with the goal of making the US as great as possible.

Our country is big enough that we should be able to assimilate a reasonably large flow of immigrants, as long as it is steady, reliable and predictable. Migrants should NOT be able to just walk across our southern border, find work illegally, and start living in the US. Migrants should NOT be able to just continue living and working in the US after their visas expire. If we made it impossible for people to work illegally in the US, it would be better for everyone in the long run.

The situation in the EU is different from the US. Bulgarians are legally allowed to move to and work in Ireland. It's not legal for people who are citizens of Honduras or Guatemala or Mexico to just decide they want to move to LA or NYC or Chicago. The only way Central Americans and Mexicans can move to the US is to apply for a visa and wait, sometimes years and years, or else sneak across our southern border or enter legally and then just overstay their visa. Seems like a completely different situation to me.

[Shane]

Yep, the status quo where we have a bunch of undocumented labor in this country bothers me quite a bit. These folks are not in any position to speak out if they're mistreated, and if any immigration enforcement happens it's almost always the workers and not the employers who pay the price. You're right that Americans don't want to work for "Tegucigalpa wages," but absent people physically present in America who will work for those wages, at some point it makes financial sense to put your Alaskan fish on ice and ship it to Tegucigalpa to put it in cans there for $2/hr instead of hiring locals to do it for $10/hr plus overtime. Is that really better for America than letting some foreigners in to compete in our labor market? I have some strong doubts on that point.

I find the existence of an undocumented underclass of workers to be problematic for a number of reasons. I also think it would be perhaps worse if we enforced our existing immigration laws even more strictly, with essentially no path for low-skilled labor to ever immigrate here if they're not related to an existing citizen or permanent resident. Let's find a way to change the laws to legalize the types of work that is already happening. This will ensure that proper taxes are paid, worker safety laws are followed, and that people get to move here legally instead of living in hiding for a generation until their US citizen kids are grown.

I think we should scrap our existing immigration system in favor of a merit based system, similar to what NZ, Australia and Canada are already successfully doing. Our government should approach immigration as if we were a company that was hiring workers. It makes no sense to give visas to people who happen to be related to someone who already got a US work visa. Instead, we should be issuing visas to immigrants who have verifiable skills that are in demand in the US and that employers are struggling to find enough qualified workers to fill locally.

[lutorm]

Yep, the status quo where we have a bunch of undocumented labor in this country bothers me quite a bit. These folks are not in any position to speak out if they're mistreated, and if any immigration enforcement happens it's almost always the workers and not the employers who pay the price. You're right that Americans don't want to work for "Tegucigalpa wages," but absent people physically present in America who will work for those wages, at some point it makes financial sense to put your Alaskan fish on ice and ship it to Tegucigalpa to put it in cans there for $2/hr instead of hiring locals to do it for $10/hr plus overtime. Is that really better for America than letting some foreigners in to compete in our labor market? I have some strong doubts on that point.

I find the existence of an undocumented underclass of workers to be problematic for a number of reasons. I also think it would be perhaps worse if we enforced our existing immigration laws even more strictly, with essentially no path for low-skilled labor to ever immigrate here if they're not related to an existing citizen or permanent resident. Let's find a way to change the laws to legalize the types of work that is already happening. This will ensure that proper taxes are paid, worker safety laws are followed, and that people get to move here legally instead of living in hiding for a generation until their US citizen kids are grown.

I think we should scrap our existing immigration system in favor of a merit based system, similar to what NZ, Australia and Canada are already successfully doing. Our government should approach immigration as if we were a company that was hiring workers. It makes no sense to give visas to people who happen to be related to someone who already got a US work visa. Instead, we should be issuing visas to immigrants who have verifiable skills that are in demand in the US and that employers are struggling to find enough qualified workers to fill locally.

Are you seriously proposing that someone who moves to the US based on "hiring a worker", or someone who's married a not-US citizen, should not be able to bring their family? That's really not going to do wonders if you want highly qualified people to come here and stay, those people have options.

[Shane]

Yep, the status quo where we have a bunch of undocumented labor in this country bothers me quite a bit. These folks are not in any position to speak out if they're mistreated, and if any immigration enforcement happens it's almost always the workers and not the employers who pay the price. You're right that Americans don't want to work for "Tegucigalpa wages," but absent people physically present in America who will work for those wages, at some point it makes financial sense to put your Alaskan fish on ice and ship it to Tegucigalpa to put it in cans there for $2/hr instead of hiring locals to do it for $10/hr plus overtime. Is that really better for America than letting some foreigners in to compete in our labor market? I have some strong doubts on that point.

I find the existence of an undocumented underclass of workers to be problematic for a number of reasons. I also think it would be perhaps worse if we enforced our existing immigration laws even more strictly, with essentially no path for low-skilled labor to ever immigrate here if they're not related to an existing citizen or permanent resident. Let's find a way to change the laws to legalize the types of work that is already happening. This will ensure that proper taxes are paid, worker safety laws are followed, and that people get to move here legally instead of living in hiding for a generation until their US citizen kids are grown.

I think we should scrap our existing immigration system in favor of a merit based system, similar to what NZ, Australia and Canada are already successfully doing. Our government should approach immigration as if we were a company that was hiring workers. It makes no sense to give visas to people who happen to be related to someone who already got a US work visa. Instead, we should be issuing visas to immigrants who have verifiable skills that are in demand in the US and that employers are struggling to find enough qualified workers to fill locally.

Are you seriously proposing that someone who moves to the US based on "hiring a worker", or someone who's married a not-US citizen, should not be able to bring their family? That's really not going to do wonders if you want highly qualified people to come here and stay, those people have options.

No, not at all. US citizens and legal US residents already have the right to apply for and get a fiance visa for a person they plan to marry. Just like how it wouldn't really make good business sense for a company to prioritize hiring workers who happened to be related to existing workers, prospective applicants for US work visas should not be given preference just because they have a brother or sister or cousin who is already living and working in the US.

[PDXTabs]

No, not at all. US citizens and legal US residents already have the right to apply for and get a fiance visa for a person they plan to marry. Just like how it wouldn't really make good business sense for a company to prioritize hiring workers who happened to be related to existing workers, prospective applicants for US work visas should not be given preference just because they have a brother or sister or cousin who is already living and working in the US.

It is true that being able to bring people other than your spouse or your dependents is pretty unique to the USA and rooted in a racist belief that we would get more of the same (white) people that way. It's certainly not how it work in any of the countries I want to immigrate to (eg, Canada, Portugal, Ireland).

[lutorm]

To your bolded point above: Why should US immigration policy be expected to "address the disparity in living standards between the US and Central / South America"? I think our immigration policy should be designed with its main goal being the maximization of benefits to existing US citizens. Just like a company looks to maximize benefits to itself and its shareholders when it hires workers, the US government, as our representative, should be seeking to hire the brightest and best workers from all over the world, with the goal of making the US as great as possible.

This is like asking why the government should help poor people rather than just putting people who commit crimes in jail. Apart from being the morally right thing to do, it's in the interest of the US to help the conditions in those countries precisely so their population doesn't feel the need to trek to the US border where the US government has to expend money building walls, patrolling, jailing, and sending them back.