Richard Hanania on unpopular affirmative action; John Londregan and others on college administrative bloat; Why McRaney disappointed me; Matt Yglesias on immigration reform;
Arnold's nice guy naivete on display. Re Yglesias, the bipartisan immigration reform legislation was stopped by a massive public outcry that flooded Capitol switchboards. Based on the Reagan era, the public knew that the deal would be a scam; the liberalization measures would be adopted, and nothing would be done on controls.
Re Barkan quote from the madly open borders WSJ, serving the cheap labor demands of business, we saw it beautifully demonstrated in Martha's Vineyard that Democrats no more than others want "yes, send them here." The attack on DeSantis is not shallow political thinking missing a great opportunity to demonstrate their principles, it is that they don't really believe in their principles when it affects themselves.
"Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me."
Republicans allowed Reagan to give amnesty for the promise of secure borders. Illegals got amnesty, and more illegals came - but no border security.
There won't be a real discussion about the desired level of legal immigration until the border is secured with few illegals.
I hope the homes of Democrat Representatives who oppose funding the fence get targeted by public bus loads of illegals. Biden had semi-secret semi-illegal flights with illegals out of Texas to other places - details not easily available (but should be.)
The Feds need to prove they have the political will to enforce immigration law. Do that for five years and Americans may have confidence there can be both more liberal legal immigration and less illegal immigration.
But if the present law is not a good one, what's the point of proving we can enforce it before improving it? And in particular why not vastly increase immigration of high skilled people, encourage foreign students to stay after graduation, even if we haven't figured out how to exclude low skilled people most cost effectively?
The point of enforcing it is to show that Democrats are able to enforce an arbitrary law. Whatever immigration limits are agreed upon, there will be limits. If the Dems won't agree on enforcing any limits, it's silly to argue about what those limits are.
Reagan: "Trust, but verify", on deals with those who disagree.
What to do after the verification shows failure? Reagan doesn't quite say, but implies - assume no deal.
Reps won't agree to new law without current border law enforcement first - verifiable enforcement / low numbers of illegals.
Like what Trump was succeeding in doing, even without completing the Wall.
And despite GOPe (not really RINOs, but pro-immigrant Reps) lack of desire for a real Wall and real enforcement.
Once the Wall is built, very expensive, the yearly enforcement costs go down.
Do you really want better immigration laws, new laws needing Rep support? If it's not worth investing in a Wall, plus enforcement of current laws, first - then you don't want better laws enough.
"And in particular why not vastly increase immigration of high skilled people..."
Because high-IQ, non-white immigrants vote overwhelmingly as part of what Steve Sailer calls "the coalition of the fringes" against what they perceive as the white, Christian party. Why should I support what amounts to an immigration-driven political revolution? (If immigrants overwhelmingly voted for candidates like Trump, would you be more sympathetic to reducing the number that come here?)
You are right I was looking for an economic explanation. BTW I'm not sure the voting explanation is correct. I do canvassing in NoVa and sense that while South Asians lean D, East Asians lean R. Given the time rewired for higher immigration rates to feed through to higher numbers of citizens and voting mobilization, I would not think this would be THAT important. Of course if all the Indians went to Wyoming and Idaho ... :)
Asians nationally vote 2:1 for Democrats. Asian subgroups by %:
Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese: 50%
Indian: 21%
Filipino: 19%
Others: 15%
NoVa is an outlier because high % are Vietnamese who fled communism, so they're more likely than others to vote R (just like Florida Cubans).
A major cause of increasing political division is the increase in tribalism caused by indiscriminate immigration policy. Voters who have little in common tend to default to lowest-common-denominator political affiliation.
I don't think anyone "fooled" anyone. The Regan amnesty should also have adjusted the criteria for legal immigration. A criterion in which it is in the economic interest of employers to hire immigrants that have entered illegally and in the economic interest of immigrants to enter illegally will be very costly to enforce.
You're fooling yourself if you don't know that many anti-immigrant folk feel fooled, and betrayed, by GOPe Republicans and Democrats who agreed on something they didn't like in order to get something they did like. They got stuck with the bill, but no good border enforcement.
No good arguments about more legals should be expected by Republicans until the border is secure. Yes, "costly to enforce" -- so build the Wall, for starters, while employing US low skill workers.
I can believe that people believe that they were betrayed. I just think that a misinterpretation of history. For all I know the "Wall" may be a cost effective way of enforcing an improved immigration system, but it seem like a funny place to START and even funnier place to start attracting and admitting lots of high value immigrants. Heck, as a political deal I'll support a (maybe waste of money) "Wall" to get more high value immigrants.
Good man! (see my reply above); yes to build the Wall & enforce laws, first. To get more high value immigrants later. (Reps' agreements so far have been kept more than Dems' agreements).
Arnold doesn't actually like too much comment crosstalk, but most popular commenting sites have quite a bit of it. Perhaps you should pay subscribe and join some of his Zoom talks.
That controls were a "scam" is the narrative of those opposed. But the advantages of more legal immigration is not more "cheap labor" (although on current margins the average additional person in the labor force, even in a low wage job, produces more value than they consume) but in more high wage labor. Not every immigrant can be an Elon Musk, but there are millions of people who will enrich the US if our immigration system were geared to recruiting them and excluding those who will not.
Not clear whether you are denying that adding to the supply of low wage workers depresses wage levels, or simply deflecting from it with the value added argument.
As for bringing in millions of people who will make extraordinary contributions, is there not a moral argument that stripping the best talent out of other countries serves to keep those countries mired in poverty?
First I think we should focus on attracting talent. I don't think lack of talent is what keeps countries in poverty and except at Venezuelan levels, emigration is much of a loss. South Africa did not "lose" the billions of value Elon Musk has created here.
Yes, current flows of low skilled immigrants can harm low skilled immigrants who are already here, but at today's levels, I think the additional value added swamp the substitution effect. But I agree such considerations are valid issues in deciding who should be admitted legally
The simplest explanation on immigrants is that the blue states don't really want them. Not as real people en masse. They want them as a way to virtue signal or as a vote bank, but not as neighbors.
I don't know why this is surprise. This is liberals relationship with blacks in the north forever.
Anyway, polling says that the public favors the busing scheme. In a much more practical skin in the game way, the Texas border counties where Trump wanted to build a wall moved about 20-50 points to the right in the 2020 election. Miami underwent a similar change. Governors in Texas and Florida are being rewarded by voters for these policies, especially by immigrant Hispanics who previously voted democrat. That's the explanation for their actions, not primaries.
The problem with immigration reform is that nobody is allowed to be against legal immigration, even when that's what it's really about. One side would like to expand legal immigration, and when it can't do that simply turn a blind eye to illegal immigration. The other wants to reduce and shift immigration altogether, but has to talk about illegal immigration only to do so.
They don't come to an agreement because they want different things. One side thinks that if it doesn't come to an agreement it can just cheat anyway by default. The other side is calling them out.
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As to Affirmative Action, I see it as the basis of Wokeness. Every woke tract begins with "blacks are X% of population, but Y% of Z. this requires ACTION." This was Ibram X Kendi's thesis statement.
In addition, it has to expand. Partly because the quantity and quality of protected groups keeps expanding and changing. But also because if a guy like Kendi can has a sweet ass affirmative action schtick, why not me?! I've seen how much those DEI people make, everyone is going to want in on that grab train. It has to keep growing.
Affirmative Action is meanwhile based on a lie. Therefore it requires other lies to justify. Eventually, the lies expand to take over everything, including truth itself, You get doctors marching in George Floyd rallies while preaching locking everyone else in their home because systematic racism is the real plague. The real threat of affirmative action isn't necessarily the inefficiency of having a couple of incompetent blacks around. It's the justification for why they were around.
When O'Connor put a 25 year time limit on her ruling it was legal mush. But I think what she was really doing was announcing how long it would take for the cognitive dissonance on AA to rip itself apart. When I was growing up I think promises like education reform kept people believing that the tension could be resolved by technocracy, not that they were Charles Murray style intractable.
Wokeness is very unpopular and motivating to voters. How do you keep AA without wokeness? I think its pretty much impossible at this point. It's past its expiration date.
Huh? Republicans are very much against more legal immigration. Who cut the numbers of refugees accepted? Who cut the number of H1B visas? Democrats seem more lukewarm in support of legal immigration. Sadly, neither is as positive as they should be from a per capital growth increasing (for existing residents) point of view.
Republicans are mixed on more legal immigration - but united against illegal immigration. Won't and can't know the popularity or lack of it for legal immigrants until the illegals are resolved.
Maybe that is correct, but it still seem an upside down position. First we ought to decide what kind of immigrants we want -- at least those who will enrich current residents -- and that determines who you want to exclude and how to exclude them in a cost effective way. It seems crazy to me to think that the current rules are so close to optimum that enforcing them is the top priority (and even crazier that we should try rounding up and deporting people who crossed the border "illegally" years ago).
No. First we decide if we're going to enforce any laws about the border. If the current laws aren't enforced anyway, it's stupid to agree to change the rules.
I don't think the current laws are optimal BUT it's a binary question: do we have "rule of law" where the laws are enforced? Yes or no? You're saying - I don't like that law, so we shouldn't enforce it and we should change it, too, to have more immigrants. Motivated Republicans are saying, first we enforce the laws we have, and then we talk about agreeing on what better laws we might want.
To begin with immigration laws are not the only laws that are not enforced 100%. It's not binary.
The effort to enforce a law ought to depend on the costs of allowing it to be less stringently enforced. Did we wait to raise the stupid nationwide 55mph speed limit until we had 100% enforcement? The difficulty of enforcement is information about the optimality of the law.
And have you thought that people who want immigrating reform might be afraid that THEY will be "betrayed" by a quixotic effort to seal the borders under existing law?
The expected cost/benefit of an instance of minor speeding is difficult to even estimate the sign of. Whatever the sign, we're usually talking about a few cents.
The difference in fiscal impact between the marginal Indian that our system is currently excluding, and the marginal person being let in through our southern border, is difficult to estimate precisely but no sane estimate is below hundreds of thousands of dollars in present value. That's SEVEN ORDERS OF MAGNITUDE larger than your example.
Note that the other Anglosphere settler colonies -- Canada, Australia, NZ -- have comparable immigration volume (relative to their population sizes) to the US, but they do a better job of applying a uniform standard across different sources of immigrants, which of course includes effective law enforcement. Not coincidentally, all of those countries avoided the 2016-era "populist revolt". Canadian support for their government's immigration policy has been north of 70%.
Republicans are generally against immigration, period. I would say they are unanimously against unskilled immigration and mixed on skilled immigration. Trump propose adopting the Australian points system.
I myself used to be very pro skilled immigration but changed my mind in the last two years. I would oppose pretty much all immigration below 130 IQ, but would be eager to make is easier for 130 IQ + people to immigrate.
I think a much greater number of people can help make US society and economy better. I am not a 130 and I think anyone like me should be admitted. :) I know it's not a scientific sample, but I've know a lot of immigrants who entered illegally and don't think any one of them has entailed more costs than benefits. America is such a great place with so much opportunity, that (on today's margins) it's not easy for an immigrant to be a net negative unless they try.
It is not just differences in the intensity of feeling about affirmative action, it is where the supporters of affirmative action are located. It is so overwhelmingly supported in academia, and viewed as so central to their mission, that to get rid of it in college admissions would require federal marshals administering the admissions offices. No matter what the Supreme Court says, they just won't comply. It would be like reconstruction in the 1870's and massive resistance in the 1950's.
One big difference in the woke era is that AA has gone from just a thing in academia to something that has infected nearly every level of society via civil rights law. Companies are expected to be woke. K-12 schools are expected to be woke.
If we were just talking about Harvard admissions, whatevs. But it turns out Harvard runs society.
Matt has a good heart and a good head and makes good sense: "the idea of creating a way for the majority of the undocumented population to pay a fine, pay back taxes, and receive legal status still makes sense to me."
What he should suggest, but doesn't, is to start with:
1.) Build a BIG effective WALL, and keep out illegals.
2) Very restrictive asylum policy - and handled in Mexico so the bad conditions of the asylum seekers don't bother most Americans.
Instead, "pairing [amnesty] this with stepped-up enforcement (probably focused on things like E-Verify rather than the border per se) makes sense."
NO.
Border wall and stopping the illegals first. Rep voters won't allow Republicans to win primaries who fail to oppose illegals and want to stop the illegals first.
Neither of the top two (of 435) comments on Matt's post push GREAT border security FIRST.
We have immigration laws on the books, now. Enforce them. NOW.
Then talk about other laws.
Matt made a point about car thefts (in Florida), but one of his commenters noted that not enforcing laws against car thefts in SF & NYC has meant ... more car thefts.
I think Kling is right about Affirmative Action unfortunately:
“In December 2020, a Professor at University of Chicago department of Geophysics released a YouTube Video where he said the following:
“Let’s support women in science by treating women and their scientific ideas with respect,” he said. “Let’s fight bias in science by working hard to reduce bias, not by introducing it. Let’s treat each applicant for conferences, fellowships, and faculty positions as an individual worthy of dignity and respect. Let’s treat all applicants fairly by judging them only on the basis of their ability and promise as scientists.”
— Dr. Dorian Abbot
He was speaking out against affirmative action and the dangers of eschewing meritocracy — which, whether you agree with him or not, is a perfectly acceptable thing to debate the merits of. Universities exist for these debates to be had! Despite this, a grad student in his department weaponized the Ford listserv, urging them to sign a petition saying he “threatens the safety and belonging of all underrepresented groups within the [Geophysical Sciences] department and represents an aggressive act towards research and teaching communities.” This petition also “enumerates 11 demands, many of which would serve to ostracize and shame Prof. Abbot, while stripping him of departmental titles, courses, and privileges. The signatories further demand that the Department of Geophysical Sciences formally and publicly denounce Prof. Abbot’s views, and change hiring and promotion procedures so as to prioritize DEI.”
Today, and for the near future, only a Black politician can be Publicly Acceptable in opposing AA. Tho the Asian suit at Harvard, a bit like Bakkee, shows that for every Black person who gets more, some non-Black person gets less.
Discrimination against the non-Black person.
It won't be acceptable ... until it is. In a quick public preference cascade where all the right thinking people stop discriminating.
One thing that gives me hope for opposition to affirmative action becoming a silver bullet is that these insane inquisitions where a radical minority defeats a majority pretty much all happen within universities. If AA truly became a mainstream issue for ordinary people in battleground states it might be a different story.
I totally agree with Arnold Kling that David McRaney engages in assymetric insight. Massively. I agree it takes something away form the book. That said, it doesn't leave me hanging. What the book describes regarding human thought processes is still profound and still worth investing the time to read this book. For anyone not already familiar with the ideas within this book, it is a valuable addition to understanding both our own and others' viewpoints.
I addressed the intensity of feeling issue in the article. I don't believe liberal voters have a strong attachment to affirmative action, in part because we've all been lied to about it for decades. I see relatively little hysteria about initiatives that have eliminated affirmative action at the state level, and there is a good deal of evidence that if anything intensity of belief goes in the other direction, with liberal positions on race being mainly what divides the left from the general public.
The Londregan article on too many college administrators seems quite reasonable and good, especially for 1993 & earlier.
"we urge that all institutions adopt the [2014] Chicago Principles* of academic freedom, and implement the recommendations of the[1967] Kalven Report to protect the political neutrality of the university."
Very good - but too little, too late.
The real problem is not administrators, but secret discrimination against Republicans.
Some future Republican dominated Congress should end all gov't funding for all colleges that discriminate against hiring Republicans as professors or administrators. Either require at least 20% of: a) registered Republicans for at least 8 years (or since registering to vote), or
b) publicly supporting 2 of the last 3 Republican Presidential candidates, or 4 of the last 6 candidates.
Yes, this is a form of "affirmative action" for Republicans in gov't supported colleges. Justified by the gov't support, especially tax-exempt status of the huge endowments.
In theory, Black female Republicans, like Mia Love or Candace Owens, would become very desirable college hires.
*"the University’s fundamental commitment is to the principle that debate or deliberation may not be suppressed because the ideas put forth are thought by some or even by most members of the University community to be offensive, unwise, immoral, or wrongheaded. It is for the individual members of the University community, not for the University as an institution, to make those judgments for themselves,"
On immigration: voters have consistently and clearly wanted less immigration, elites feel that voters don't have a moral right to exclude foreigners from immigrating. What doomed "bipartisan immigration reform" is voters saw what was happening, and exerted pressure, and politicians who intended to undermine their own voters chose to back down.
Many commenters here argue for larger levels of immigration. I understand and can respect those arguments. But ultimately shouldn't the American voters get to choose what they want? Most elites say no, American voters shouldn't have the right to choose on issues like immigration.
If a nation has a moral obligation to have an open admissions policy, what about universities? How does a publicly funded university have the moral right to tell prospective students, that they aren't welcome to live on campus and take classes to pursue their dreams, but they are still obligated to pay through taxes?
"I see immigration reform as the victim of affective polarization."
Some of that, too, but more so a victim of the bizarro idea that allowing Immigration is some sort of benefit to the immigrants whose costs are extracted from "Americans" (or maybe form everyone except the "elite" who like having someone else mow the lawn) instead of a process by which we recruit and select people whose presence, work, and entrepreneurship are of great benefit to the rest of us (and of course to them, too).
I agree with the commentators who agree - the response from DC and MA is a simple revelation, as intended by DeSantis, of hypocrisy on the part of those who wish to force the migrants on the border states and also make those same migrants very expensive to care for by multiplying their apparent 'rights.' There is no virtue here and asking them to display it won't make them look any better. The attempt to turn on additional lawfare, the 'they were tricked into taking free plane rides to paradise,' doesn't reveal two sides of moral equivalence.
We can have a reasonable debate on immigration only if localities are able to arrange both the pros and cons to their own local satisfaction.
"Ever since Joe Biden became president, conservatives have branded all the problems with the asylum system as “Biden’s border crisis.” This conveniently elides that essentially the same problems existed under Donald Trump’s presidency." << early Yglesias.
"Republicans saying the asylum-seekers were coming because of DACA and Obama denying that was the reason. They then kept coming under Trump, stopping temporarily when he got the Mexican government to stop them. And now they are back under Biden, with Republicans again saying it is Biden’s fault, and Biden — like Obama — denying that it is his fault but not saying that the influx of claimants is good."
Matt claims early that Trump essentially failed, but admits later that Trump succeeded AND Biden is now failing. Tho Matt also claims that more immigration is good. Partly because of low unemployment.
Arnold's nice guy naivete on display. Re Yglesias, the bipartisan immigration reform legislation was stopped by a massive public outcry that flooded Capitol switchboards. Based on the Reagan era, the public knew that the deal would be a scam; the liberalization measures would be adopted, and nothing would be done on controls.
Re Barkan quote from the madly open borders WSJ, serving the cheap labor demands of business, we saw it beautifully demonstrated in Martha's Vineyard that Democrats no more than others want "yes, send them here." The attack on DeSantis is not shallow political thinking missing a great opportunity to demonstrate their principles, it is that they don't really believe in their principles when it affects themselves.
Yes, this. Border security first.
"Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me."
Republicans allowed Reagan to give amnesty for the promise of secure borders. Illegals got amnesty, and more illegals came - but no border security.
There won't be a real discussion about the desired level of legal immigration until the border is secured with few illegals.
I hope the homes of Democrat Representatives who oppose funding the fence get targeted by public bus loads of illegals. Biden had semi-secret semi-illegal flights with illegals out of Texas to other places - details not easily available (but should be.)
The Feds need to prove they have the political will to enforce immigration law. Do that for five years and Americans may have confidence there can be both more liberal legal immigration and less illegal immigration.
But if the present law is not a good one, what's the point of proving we can enforce it before improving it? And in particular why not vastly increase immigration of high skilled people, encourage foreign students to stay after graduation, even if we haven't figured out how to exclude low skilled people most cost effectively?
The point of enforcing it is to show that Democrats are able to enforce an arbitrary law. Whatever immigration limits are agreed upon, there will be limits. If the Dems won't agree on enforcing any limits, it's silly to argue about what those limits are.
Reagan: "Trust, but verify", on deals with those who disagree.
What to do after the verification shows failure? Reagan doesn't quite say, but implies - assume no deal.
Reps won't agree to new law without current border law enforcement first - verifiable enforcement / low numbers of illegals.
Like what Trump was succeeding in doing, even without completing the Wall.
And despite GOPe (not really RINOs, but pro-immigrant Reps) lack of desire for a real Wall and real enforcement.
Once the Wall is built, very expensive, the yearly enforcement costs go down.
Do you really want better immigration laws, new laws needing Rep support? If it's not worth investing in a Wall, plus enforcement of current laws, first - then you don't want better laws enough.
"And in particular why not vastly increase immigration of high skilled people..."
Because high-IQ, non-white immigrants vote overwhelmingly as part of what Steve Sailer calls "the coalition of the fringes" against what they perceive as the white, Christian party. Why should I support what amounts to an immigration-driven political revolution? (If immigrants overwhelmingly voted for candidates like Trump, would you be more sympathetic to reducing the number that come here?)
You are right I was looking for an economic explanation. BTW I'm not sure the voting explanation is correct. I do canvassing in NoVa and sense that while South Asians lean D, East Asians lean R. Given the time rewired for higher immigration rates to feed through to higher numbers of citizens and voting mobilization, I would not think this would be THAT important. Of course if all the Indians went to Wyoming and Idaho ... :)
Asians nationally vote 2:1 for Democrats. Asian subgroups by %:
Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese: 50%
Indian: 21%
Filipino: 19%
Others: 15%
NoVa is an outlier because high % are Vietnamese who fled communism, so they're more likely than others to vote R (just like Florida Cubans).
A major cause of increasing political division is the increase in tribalism caused by indiscriminate immigration policy. Voters who have little in common tend to default to lowest-common-denominator political affiliation.
I don't think anyone "fooled" anyone. The Regan amnesty should also have adjusted the criteria for legal immigration. A criterion in which it is in the economic interest of employers to hire immigrants that have entered illegally and in the economic interest of immigrants to enter illegally will be very costly to enforce.
You're fooling yourself if you don't know that many anti-immigrant folk feel fooled, and betrayed, by GOPe Republicans and Democrats who agreed on something they didn't like in order to get something they did like. They got stuck with the bill, but no good border enforcement.
No good arguments about more legals should be expected by Republicans until the border is secure. Yes, "costly to enforce" -- so build the Wall, for starters, while employing US low skill workers.
I can believe that people believe that they were betrayed. I just think that a misinterpretation of history. For all I know the "Wall" may be a cost effective way of enforcing an improved immigration system, but it seem like a funny place to START and even funnier place to start attracting and admitting lots of high value immigrants. Heck, as a political deal I'll support a (maybe waste of money) "Wall" to get more high value immigrants.
Good man! (see my reply above); yes to build the Wall & enforce laws, first. To get more high value immigrants later. (Reps' agreements so far have been kept more than Dems' agreements).
Arnold doesn't actually like too much comment crosstalk, but most popular commenting sites have quite a bit of it. Perhaps you should pay subscribe and join some of his Zoom talks.
That controls were a "scam" is the narrative of those opposed. But the advantages of more legal immigration is not more "cheap labor" (although on current margins the average additional person in the labor force, even in a low wage job, produces more value than they consume) but in more high wage labor. Not every immigrant can be an Elon Musk, but there are millions of people who will enrich the US if our immigration system were geared to recruiting them and excluding those who will not.
Not clear whether you are denying that adding to the supply of low wage workers depresses wage levels, or simply deflecting from it with the value added argument.
As for bringing in millions of people who will make extraordinary contributions, is there not a moral argument that stripping the best talent out of other countries serves to keep those countries mired in poverty?
First I think we should focus on attracting talent. I don't think lack of talent is what keeps countries in poverty and except at Venezuelan levels, emigration is much of a loss. South Africa did not "lose" the billions of value Elon Musk has created here.
Yes, current flows of low skilled immigrants can harm low skilled immigrants who are already here, but at today's levels, I think the additional value added swamp the substitution effect. But I agree such considerations are valid issues in deciding who should be admitted legally
The simplest explanation on immigrants is that the blue states don't really want them. Not as real people en masse. They want them as a way to virtue signal or as a vote bank, but not as neighbors.
I don't know why this is surprise. This is liberals relationship with blacks in the north forever.
Anyway, polling says that the public favors the busing scheme. In a much more practical skin in the game way, the Texas border counties where Trump wanted to build a wall moved about 20-50 points to the right in the 2020 election. Miami underwent a similar change. Governors in Texas and Florida are being rewarded by voters for these policies, especially by immigrant Hispanics who previously voted democrat. That's the explanation for their actions, not primaries.
The problem with immigration reform is that nobody is allowed to be against legal immigration, even when that's what it's really about. One side would like to expand legal immigration, and when it can't do that simply turn a blind eye to illegal immigration. The other wants to reduce and shift immigration altogether, but has to talk about illegal immigration only to do so.
They don't come to an agreement because they want different things. One side thinks that if it doesn't come to an agreement it can just cheat anyway by default. The other side is calling them out.
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As to Affirmative Action, I see it as the basis of Wokeness. Every woke tract begins with "blacks are X% of population, but Y% of Z. this requires ACTION." This was Ibram X Kendi's thesis statement.
In addition, it has to expand. Partly because the quantity and quality of protected groups keeps expanding and changing. But also because if a guy like Kendi can has a sweet ass affirmative action schtick, why not me?! I've seen how much those DEI people make, everyone is going to want in on that grab train. It has to keep growing.
Affirmative Action is meanwhile based on a lie. Therefore it requires other lies to justify. Eventually, the lies expand to take over everything, including truth itself, You get doctors marching in George Floyd rallies while preaching locking everyone else in their home because systematic racism is the real plague. The real threat of affirmative action isn't necessarily the inefficiency of having a couple of incompetent blacks around. It's the justification for why they were around.
When O'Connor put a 25 year time limit on her ruling it was legal mush. But I think what she was really doing was announcing how long it would take for the cognitive dissonance on AA to rip itself apart. When I was growing up I think promises like education reform kept people believing that the tension could be resolved by technocracy, not that they were Charles Murray style intractable.
Wokeness is very unpopular and motivating to voters. How do you keep AA without wokeness? I think its pretty much impossible at this point. It's past its expiration date.
Huh? Republicans are very much against more legal immigration. Who cut the numbers of refugees accepted? Who cut the number of H1B visas? Democrats seem more lukewarm in support of legal immigration. Sadly, neither is as positive as they should be from a per capital growth increasing (for existing residents) point of view.
Republicans are mixed on more legal immigration - but united against illegal immigration. Won't and can't know the popularity or lack of it for legal immigrants until the illegals are resolved.
Maybe that is correct, but it still seem an upside down position. First we ought to decide what kind of immigrants we want -- at least those who will enrich current residents -- and that determines who you want to exclude and how to exclude them in a cost effective way. It seems crazy to me to think that the current rules are so close to optimum that enforcing them is the top priority (and even crazier that we should try rounding up and deporting people who crossed the border "illegally" years ago).
No. First we decide if we're going to enforce any laws about the border. If the current laws aren't enforced anyway, it's stupid to agree to change the rules.
I don't think the current laws are optimal BUT it's a binary question: do we have "rule of law" where the laws are enforced? Yes or no? You're saying - I don't like that law, so we shouldn't enforce it and we should change it, too, to have more immigrants. Motivated Republicans are saying, first we enforce the laws we have, and then we talk about agreeing on what better laws we might want.
To begin with immigration laws are not the only laws that are not enforced 100%. It's not binary.
The effort to enforce a law ought to depend on the costs of allowing it to be less stringently enforced. Did we wait to raise the stupid nationwide 55mph speed limit until we had 100% enforcement? The difficulty of enforcement is information about the optimality of the law.
And have you thought that people who want immigrating reform might be afraid that THEY will be "betrayed" by a quixotic effort to seal the borders under existing law?
The expected cost/benefit of an instance of minor speeding is difficult to even estimate the sign of. Whatever the sign, we're usually talking about a few cents.
The difference in fiscal impact between the marginal Indian that our system is currently excluding, and the marginal person being let in through our southern border, is difficult to estimate precisely but no sane estimate is below hundreds of thousands of dollars in present value. That's SEVEN ORDERS OF MAGNITUDE larger than your example.
Note that the other Anglosphere settler colonies -- Canada, Australia, NZ -- have comparable immigration volume (relative to their population sizes) to the US, but they do a better job of applying a uniform standard across different sources of immigrants, which of course includes effective law enforcement. Not coincidentally, all of those countries avoided the 2016-era "populist revolt". Canadian support for their government's immigration policy has been north of 70%.
Republicans are generally against immigration, period. I would say they are unanimously against unskilled immigration and mixed on skilled immigration. Trump propose adopting the Australian points system.
I myself used to be very pro skilled immigration but changed my mind in the last two years. I would oppose pretty much all immigration below 130 IQ, but would be eager to make is easier for 130 IQ + people to immigrate.
I think a much greater number of people can help make US society and economy better. I am not a 130 and I think anyone like me should be admitted. :) I know it's not a scientific sample, but I've know a lot of immigrants who entered illegally and don't think any one of them has entailed more costs than benefits. America is such a great place with so much opportunity, that (on today's margins) it's not easy for an immigrant to be a net negative unless they try.
It is not just differences in the intensity of feeling about affirmative action, it is where the supporters of affirmative action are located. It is so overwhelmingly supported in academia, and viewed as so central to their mission, that to get rid of it in college admissions would require federal marshals administering the admissions offices. No matter what the Supreme Court says, they just won't comply. It would be like reconstruction in the 1870's and massive resistance in the 1950's.
One big difference in the woke era is that AA has gone from just a thing in academia to something that has infected nearly every level of society via civil rights law. Companies are expected to be woke. K-12 schools are expected to be woke.
If we were just talking about Harvard admissions, whatevs. But it turns out Harvard runs society.
Matt has a good heart and a good head and makes good sense: "the idea of creating a way for the majority of the undocumented population to pay a fine, pay back taxes, and receive legal status still makes sense to me."
What he should suggest, but doesn't, is to start with:
1.) Build a BIG effective WALL, and keep out illegals.
2) Very restrictive asylum policy - and handled in Mexico so the bad conditions of the asylum seekers don't bother most Americans.
Instead, "pairing [amnesty] this with stepped-up enforcement (probably focused on things like E-Verify rather than the border per se) makes sense."
NO.
Border wall and stopping the illegals first. Rep voters won't allow Republicans to win primaries who fail to oppose illegals and want to stop the illegals first.
Neither of the top two (of 435) comments on Matt's post push GREAT border security FIRST.
We have immigration laws on the books, now. Enforce them. NOW.
Then talk about other laws.
Matt made a point about car thefts (in Florida), but one of his commenters noted that not enforcing laws against car thefts in SF & NYC has meant ... more car thefts.
I think Kling is right about Affirmative Action unfortunately:
“In December 2020, a Professor at University of Chicago department of Geophysics released a YouTube Video where he said the following:
“Let’s support women in science by treating women and their scientific ideas with respect,” he said. “Let’s fight bias in science by working hard to reduce bias, not by introducing it. Let’s treat each applicant for conferences, fellowships, and faculty positions as an individual worthy of dignity and respect. Let’s treat all applicants fairly by judging them only on the basis of their ability and promise as scientists.”
— Dr. Dorian Abbot
He was speaking out against affirmative action and the dangers of eschewing meritocracy — which, whether you agree with him or not, is a perfectly acceptable thing to debate the merits of. Universities exist for these debates to be had! Despite this, a grad student in his department weaponized the Ford listserv, urging them to sign a petition saying he “threatens the safety and belonging of all underrepresented groups within the [Geophysical Sciences] department and represents an aggressive act towards research and teaching communities.” This petition also “enumerates 11 demands, many of which would serve to ostracize and shame Prof. Abbot, while stripping him of departmental titles, courses, and privileges. The signatories further demand that the Department of Geophysical Sciences formally and publicly denounce Prof. Abbot’s views, and change hiring and promotion procedures so as to prioritize DEI.”
This is the reality.
Today, and for the near future, only a Black politician can be Publicly Acceptable in opposing AA. Tho the Asian suit at Harvard, a bit like Bakkee, shows that for every Black person who gets more, some non-Black person gets less.
Discrimination against the non-Black person.
It won't be acceptable ... until it is. In a quick public preference cascade where all the right thinking people stop discriminating.
One thing that gives me hope for opposition to affirmative action becoming a silver bullet is that these insane inquisitions where a radical minority defeats a majority pretty much all happen within universities. If AA truly became a mainstream issue for ordinary people in battleground states it might be a different story.
Source:
https://karlstack.substack.com/p/whistleblower-emails-reveal-partisan?utm_source=substack&utm_campaign=post_embed&utm_medium=web
I totally agree with Arnold Kling that David McRaney engages in assymetric insight. Massively. I agree it takes something away form the book. That said, it doesn't leave me hanging. What the book describes regarding human thought processes is still profound and still worth investing the time to read this book. For anyone not already familiar with the ideas within this book, it is a valuable addition to understanding both our own and others' viewpoints.
I addressed the intensity of feeling issue in the article. I don't believe liberal voters have a strong attachment to affirmative action, in part because we've all been lied to about it for decades. I see relatively little hysteria about initiatives that have eliminated affirmative action at the state level, and there is a good deal of evidence that if anything intensity of belief goes in the other direction, with liberal positions on race being mainly what divides the left from the general public.
The Londregan article on too many college administrators seems quite reasonable and good, especially for 1993 & earlier.
"we urge that all institutions adopt the [2014] Chicago Principles* of academic freedom, and implement the recommendations of the[1967] Kalven Report to protect the political neutrality of the university."
Very good - but too little, too late.
The real problem is not administrators, but secret discrimination against Republicans.
Some future Republican dominated Congress should end all gov't funding for all colleges that discriminate against hiring Republicans as professors or administrators. Either require at least 20% of: a) registered Republicans for at least 8 years (or since registering to vote), or
b) publicly supporting 2 of the last 3 Republican Presidential candidates, or 4 of the last 6 candidates.
Yes, this is a form of "affirmative action" for Republicans in gov't supported colleges. Justified by the gov't support, especially tax-exempt status of the huge endowments.
In theory, Black female Republicans, like Mia Love or Candace Owens, would become very desirable college hires.
*"the University’s fundamental commitment is to the principle that debate or deliberation may not be suppressed because the ideas put forth are thought by some or even by most members of the University community to be offensive, unwise, immoral, or wrongheaded. It is for the individual members of the University community, not for the University as an institution, to make those judgments for themselves,"
On immigration: voters have consistently and clearly wanted less immigration, elites feel that voters don't have a moral right to exclude foreigners from immigrating. What doomed "bipartisan immigration reform" is voters saw what was happening, and exerted pressure, and politicians who intended to undermine their own voters chose to back down.
Many commenters here argue for larger levels of immigration. I understand and can respect those arguments. But ultimately shouldn't the American voters get to choose what they want? Most elites say no, American voters shouldn't have the right to choose on issues like immigration.
If a nation has a moral obligation to have an open admissions policy, what about universities? How does a publicly funded university have the moral right to tell prospective students, that they aren't welcome to live on campus and take classes to pursue their dreams, but they are still obligated to pay through taxes?
"I see immigration reform as the victim of affective polarization."
Some of that, too, but more so a victim of the bizarro idea that allowing Immigration is some sort of benefit to the immigrants whose costs are extracted from "Americans" (or maybe form everyone except the "elite" who like having someone else mow the lawn) instead of a process by which we recruit and select people whose presence, work, and entrepreneurship are of great benefit to the rest of us (and of course to them, too).
I agree with the commentators who agree - the response from DC and MA is a simple revelation, as intended by DeSantis, of hypocrisy on the part of those who wish to force the migrants on the border states and also make those same migrants very expensive to care for by multiplying their apparent 'rights.' There is no virtue here and asking them to display it won't make them look any better. The attempt to turn on additional lawfare, the 'they were tricked into taking free plane rides to paradise,' doesn't reveal two sides of moral equivalence.
We can have a reasonable debate on immigration only if localities are able to arrange both the pros and cons to their own local satisfaction.
"A significant investment in border security and interdiction."
This is Yglesias lying outright.
"Ever since Joe Biden became president, conservatives have branded all the problems with the asylum system as “Biden’s border crisis.” This conveniently elides that essentially the same problems existed under Donald Trump’s presidency." << early Yglesias.
"Republicans saying the asylum-seekers were coming because of DACA and Obama denying that was the reason. They then kept coming under Trump, stopping temporarily when he got the Mexican government to stop them. And now they are back under Biden, with Republicans again saying it is Biden’s fault, and Biden — like Obama — denying that it is his fault but not saying that the influx of claimants is good."
Matt claims early that Trump essentially failed, but admits later that Trump succeeded AND Biden is now failing. Tho Matt also claims that more immigration is good. Partly because of low unemployment.