08/22/2019
From The New York Times news section:
Economic Antidote for a Shrinking America: Immigrants
Eight in 10 workers at Yardbird Southern Table and Bar in Miami were born abroad. “The idea that legal immigrants are taking jobs away from residents of the U.S. is just not reality,” the head of its parent company said.
By Patricia Cohen, Aug. 22, 2019
MIAMI — After finishing a particularly satisfying dinner at a Coral Gables restaurant with his wife, Pedro Martinez quietly slipped around to the back alley where the kitchen is.
Presumably not the Hall of Fame pitching Pedro Martinez.
“Whatever you’re making, I’ll give you a raise,” Mr. Martinez whispered when the back door swung open. An executive at 50 Eggs, a restaurant group based in Miami, he is always ready with a stack of business cards for occasions like this.
And rising wages for the unskilled is a Bad Thing because … well, just think of the poor Economy.
More immigrants have streamed into South Florida than to most American cities, and for decades, employers have relied on them to wash dishes, put up drywall and care for grandmothers. Still, there are not enough to fill Miami’s relentless boomtown demand for workers.
As unemployment rates nationwide have sunk to record lows, filching workers — from kitchens and construction sites, warehouses and Walmarts, truck cabs and nursing homes — has become routine. In cities like Miami that are magnets for immigrants, newcomers have filled some job openings, but employers across several industries and states insist that many more are needed for their businesses to function, let alone grow.
The economic impact is just one facet of an immigration debate that vibrates with political and moral import, challenging ideas about America’s identity and culture. But it is also one that can be examined more dispassionately by looking at the numbers.
And the numbers, most economists say, indicate that there is plenty of room. Immigrants make the country richer, they argue.
Ask not what the Economy can do for you, ask what you can do for our fragile, endangered Economy.
“Without immigration, we shrink as a nation,” said Douglas Holtz-Eakin, a former director of the Congressional Budget Office who has advised Republican presidential candidates and now leads the conservative American Action Forum.
That’s because growth is driven by two ingredients: the size of the work force and how efficiently those workers produce things.
Sailer’s Law of Inequality Journalism: News stories in the prestige press about the causes of inequality and/or stagnating wages will not include the text string “migra,” as in “immigration” or “migrants.”
Sailer’s Law of Immigration Journalism: Articles about immigration’s effect on The Economy will not include the text string “per capita.”
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