Dystopia 2018

I hate to keep harping on this, I really do, but the new information coming out in rebuttal to Donald Trump—and the Republican party in general as they lean ever more in his direction—is just so fascinating to me. This article puts cold hard numbers to Republican claims (because Cruz is saying it too now, dear Lord help us all) that they will deport all undocumented immigrants in the nation by 2018. Even if such a thing were possible, which I doubt, this study finds that it would cost the nation upwards of four hundred billion dollars, and even that assuming that 20% of the undocumented population leaves the country voluntarily. And if that weren’t enough like the Twilight Zone, this is a study put out by conservatives against their own candidates. If the implications weren’t so completely terrifying, this would be the most enjoyable election season I’ve ever had the pleasure to witness, simply because of the completely incredible nature of some of the issues being raised here.

Deporting All Undocumented Immigrants

Multinational America

I already have next weeks blog post written and scheduled so I won't write anything much on this one, but golly this map is COOL I just had to share it. It basically shows everything I've ever thought about our country's different cultures on a map! I always knew I was culturally immigrating driving between home in El Norte and school in The Left Coast, but now it's all there in a lovely little graphic for everyone to enjoy.

The 11 nations of the United States

Modeled Minorities

"Only at an economics conference will people talk for two hours about immigration and never mention Donald Trump."

So opens this article, a look at a recent San Francisco economics conference at which a paper was presented on the modeled effects of an influx of low-skill immigrant workers on native low-skill workers in a given trade. While the researchers found that this situation leads to an increase in trade, it also leads to wage stagnation as the supply of workers grows to meet the demand. However, in this situation, they also found that the native low-skilled workers are more likely to seek after more job training to become mid-skilled workers, thereby bettering their circumstances by lifting themselves out of competition from the new immigrant populations. Though these results are just modeled and there is some question of whether real live people would follow these patterns, they are an interesting rebuttal to the kind of rhetoric usually thrown around when jobs and immigrants are mentioned in the same sentence.

Immigrants might be holding your salary down--and making you better off anyway

Trickle-down Amnesty

This article is really just a blurb, and I feel a little guilty about posting it when its so small, but golly what a wonderful thing it is. It describes the recent changes New York, California, and a few other states have made to their policy regarding the granting of certain professional licenses to undocumented workers. This is the first I’ve heard of such a change, and I think it’s absolutely wonderful. The implications of such a policy are incredible. First, there would have to be a certain level of amnesty for those undocumented people receiving the new professional licenses, which can only improve their lives and the lives of their families. Second, many of these licenses would be given out in areas of shortage in our communities, such as nursing and elementary school teaching. This has a four-fold advantage: first, this helps take the burden off the other members of those professions by helping bear some of the load with newly qualified workers, second, the immigrants being given these licenses are able to work at the level at which they are qualified, which means that, third, they do not have to accept unskilled labor positions which then, fourth, frees those positions for other immigrants who may not have the qualifications for any other position. 

Changes to Immigrant Work Licenses

A Cartographer's Holiday

I’ve really got a great amount of enjoyment out of the interesting immigration maps that people keep posting as parts of their blogs, so I’ve gone out and found an article made up of 37 of them. There is so much here that it’s really hard to write up a summary for it. Included in this article are maps for almost every kind of immigration data you could wish for, maps by county, maps by state, maps by nation; it deals with slavery, past and present, immigrants sorted by impetus, location, time, and even has a mention for the most famous metal immigrant of all, Lady Liberty herself. My favorite I think is number eleven, listed as ‘An insanely detailed map of immigrants in America from 1903’ which features ethnic groups as obscure as Teutonic (my people!), Iberic, and Mongolic, and then turns right around and racially stereotypes the latter two groups as having ‘poorer mental and physical equipment’ than some others listed. Just enjoy this one, it’s truly an exploration into all the differing ways immigrants and immigration can be depicted in cartographic form.

37 American Immigration Maps