On immigration, not necessarily limited to the united states. I find laws that discriminate based on national origin to be unfair, in the sense that they limit good outcomes arbitrarily. On the other hand, I do not know of a way to transition to more lenient immigration laws successfully (though I haven’t thought about it much and it’s far from my areas of interest). I want to know if there are arguments for limiting the rights of immigrants (legal or not) that aren’t rooted in excessive self-interest (“they took our jobs!”) Or perhaps xenophobia.
It is clear that some countries are more productive and generally nicer places than others. Why is that? A large part of it is because of the people in those countries. (I’ll not get into the question of whether genetic or memetic differences are more important since it’s not directly relevant to my point.) Thus it makes sense to restrict immigration from the type of people likely to make the country a worse place to live.
I think you’re arguing at a cross purpose; Eugine is, I believe, suggesting that there are other potential costs; for example, the -politics- of immigrants could cause problems. Suppose, for argument’s sake, that socialism is the best economic system (you can easily reverse this argument for the sake of argument; I’m a laissez-faire capitalist, so I’m choosing a hypothetical that fights me); if laissez-faire capitalists immigrate to a socialist area because it has more opportunity, their subsequent demands for economic reform could destroy the very economy that brought them in to begin with.
I want to know if there are arguments for limiting the rights of immigrants (legal or not) that aren’t rooted in excessive self-interest (“they took our jobs!”) Or perhaps xenophobia.
I’m unsure whether you want arguments for limits on (1) immigration in itself, or (2) the rights of immigrants once settled in a new country, but I’ll focus on arguments against (1), since they can be turned into arguments against (2) by observing that policies in favour of (2) are likely to encourage (1). I don’t know how you draw the line in terms of excessive self-interest or xenophobia so I’ve set those worries aside in listing these arguments; take ‘em or leave ’em.
Potential immigrants might be worse than current residents, however you choose to define “worse”. (Similar to Eugine_Nier’s point.)
The sheer rate at which people would immigrate to a given country in the absence of limits might overwhelm that country’s resources.
The loss of migrants from their home countries might harm those countries.
Immigrants themselves might actually be worse off in a different country.
Immigrants, regardless of their personal characteristics, might generate a negative reaction from the existing residents, institutions, and/or economy of their destination country.
Other countries might suffer negative externalities from immigration even if immigrants, their countries of origin, and their destination country all enjoy a net benefit.
Allowing certain immigrants to enter a country could provoke interference or punishment from their home country.
Limiting (or outright banning) immigrants from a particular country could be a useful signal or sanction against that country.
I find laws that discriminate based on national origin to be unfair
What is this “fair” thing? Life isn’t fair. The governments are responsible to the citizens a single country, not the whole world, so they are unfair to non-citizens when it makes sense economically or politically. The immigration laws will be relaxed once it’s in the interests of the country to attract more immigrants and tighten when there are enough. Happens all the time all over the world. You can pretend that this is about human rights, but it’s really economics, with a healthy dose of politics.
“Life isn’t fair” is one of the least effective arguments I have ever heard, though it is a great example of naturalistic fallacy (this thing is better because it’s natural / don’t try to mess with the way things are meant to be). I also said why I thought unfairness in this particular case is bad, so I’m down voting.
I also said why I thought unfairness in this particular case is bad
You said “I find laws that discriminate based on national origin to be unfair, in the sense that they limit good outcomes arbitrarily.” Good outcomes for whom? Often a good outcome for one person is a bad outcome for another. What are the reasons you would prefer one person over another?
Society is thankfully not a zero sum game. In many cases, an immigrant having the option to move to a new country is gaining a significant amount of utility, and the citizens of that country do not lose as much as the immigrant gains (they usually even benefit from the immigrant’s presence). And in the cases where the immigrant is taking too much, there already laws in place to counteract antisocial behavior such as stealing or fraud. We already have laws to limit bad outcomes, so restrictions on immigration should tend to cause more harm than good by blocking outcomes regardless of utility. This is in the case where I do not give any advantage to the citizens already in the country by valuing their happiness more, and I don’t see a reason why I should.
Tragedy of the commons. On the margin, what a first world society loses and what the immigrant gains from coming to a vastly better country are unbalanced in the favor of the immigrant. On the other hand, unrestricted immigration can lead to cultural shifts, more crime, etc. Eg, if I live in a mansion by myself, and I let someone move in from out on the street, I’m a little worse off and they are vastly better off. If I let every homeless person into my mansion, it very quickly becomes its own slum, I am vastly worse off and on margin each homeless person is slightly better off. Not only do I now not have the use of all that space for my own pleasure, I have to deal with more crime, smelly housemates, and drugs and alcohol. Maybe I don’t want to raise a family there anymore. It’s easy to argue that a nation should take a small loss to its citizens to greatly improve the life for a non-citizen, but a lot harder to argue that it should screw itself over to make life better for a lot of non-citizens.
On your account I am worse off with one person in my house, albeit marginally, and I am vastly worse off with lots of them in my house. In other words, on this account people are negative-value, and I am best off living alone in my house while the homeless people stay outside.
At some point it seems worth asking under what conditions (if any) an additional person in my house provides positive value (for example, if they can provide valuable labor or entertaining company).
It also seems worth asking whether and how we can make those conditions obtain more generally, and whether the cost of doing so offsets the value obtained by doing so or not.
It refers to aspects of behavioral symmetry that the speaker prefers and is willing to use power to enforce in his or her environment of interest. (At very least via an attempt at moral persuasion.)
On immigration, not necessarily limited to the united states. I find laws that discriminate based on national origin to be unfair, in the sense that they limit good outcomes arbitrarily. On the other hand, I do not know of a way to transition to more lenient immigration laws successfully (though I haven’t thought about it much and it’s far from my areas of interest). I want to know if there are arguments for limiting the rights of immigrants (legal or not) that aren’t rooted in excessive self-interest (“they took our jobs!”) Or perhaps xenophobia.
It is clear that some countries are more productive and generally nicer places than others. Why is that? A large part of it is because of the people in those countries. (I’ll not get into the question of whether genetic or memetic differences are more important since it’s not directly relevant to my point.) Thus it makes sense to restrict immigration from the type of people likely to make the country a worse place to live.
Would they, actually?
I think you’re arguing at a cross purpose; Eugine is, I believe, suggesting that there are other potential costs; for example, the -politics- of immigrants could cause problems. Suppose, for argument’s sake, that socialism is the best economic system (you can easily reverse this argument for the sake of argument; I’m a laissez-faire capitalist, so I’m choosing a hypothetical that fights me); if laissez-faire capitalists immigrate to a socialist area because it has more opportunity, their subsequent demands for economic reform could destroy the very economy that brought them in to begin with.
I don’t think Eugeine_Nier is talking about wages.
I’m unsure whether you want arguments for limits on (1) immigration in itself, or (2) the rights of immigrants once settled in a new country, but I’ll focus on arguments against (1), since they can be turned into arguments against (2) by observing that policies in favour of (2) are likely to encourage (1). I don’t know how you draw the line in terms of excessive self-interest or xenophobia so I’ve set those worries aside in listing these arguments; take ‘em or leave ’em.
Potential immigrants might be worse than current residents, however you choose to define “worse”. (Similar to Eugine_Nier’s point.)
The sheer rate at which people would immigrate to a given country in the absence of limits might overwhelm that country’s resources.
The loss of migrants from their home countries might harm those countries.
Immigrants themselves might actually be worse off in a different country.
Immigrants, regardless of their personal characteristics, might generate a negative reaction from the existing residents, institutions, and/or economy of their destination country.
Other countries might suffer negative externalities from immigration even if immigrants, their countries of origin, and their destination country all enjoy a net benefit.
Allowing certain immigrants to enter a country could provoke interference or punishment from their home country.
Limiting (or outright banning) immigrants from a particular country could be a useful signal or sanction against that country.
What is this “fair” thing? Life isn’t fair. The governments are responsible to the citizens a single country, not the whole world, so they are unfair to non-citizens when it makes sense economically or politically. The immigration laws will be relaxed once it’s in the interests of the country to attract more immigrants and tighten when there are enough. Happens all the time all over the world. You can pretend that this is about human rights, but it’s really economics, with a healthy dose of politics.
“Life isn’t fair” is one of the least effective arguments I have ever heard, though it is a great example of naturalistic fallacy (this thing is better because it’s natural / don’t try to mess with the way things are meant to be). I also said why I thought unfairness in this particular case is bad, so I’m down voting.
You said “I find laws that discriminate based on national origin to be unfair, in the sense that they limit good outcomes arbitrarily.” Good outcomes for whom? Often a good outcome for one person is a bad outcome for another. What are the reasons you would prefer one person over another?
Society is thankfully not a zero sum game. In many cases, an immigrant having the option to move to a new country is gaining a significant amount of utility, and the citizens of that country do not lose as much as the immigrant gains (they usually even benefit from the immigrant’s presence). And in the cases where the immigrant is taking too much, there already laws in place to counteract antisocial behavior such as stealing or fraud. We already have laws to limit bad outcomes, so restrictions on immigration should tend to cause more harm than good by blocking outcomes regardless of utility. This is in the case where I do not give any advantage to the citizens already in the country by valuing their happiness more, and I don’t see a reason why I should.
Tragedy of the commons. On the margin, what a first world society loses and what the immigrant gains from coming to a vastly better country are unbalanced in the favor of the immigrant. On the other hand, unrestricted immigration can lead to cultural shifts, more crime, etc. Eg, if I live in a mansion by myself, and I let someone move in from out on the street, I’m a little worse off and they are vastly better off. If I let every homeless person into my mansion, it very quickly becomes its own slum, I am vastly worse off and on margin each homeless person is slightly better off. Not only do I now not have the use of all that space for my own pleasure, I have to deal with more crime, smelly housemates, and drugs and alcohol. Maybe I don’t want to raise a family there anymore. It’s easy to argue that a nation should take a small loss to its citizens to greatly improve the life for a non-citizen, but a lot harder to argue that it should screw itself over to make life better for a lot of non-citizens.
On your account I am worse off with one person in my house, albeit marginally, and I am vastly worse off with lots of them in my house. In other words, on this account people are negative-value, and I am best off living alone in my house while the homeless people stay outside.
At some point it seems worth asking under what conditions (if any) an additional person in my house provides positive value (for example, if they can provide valuable labor or entertaining company).
It also seems worth asking whether and how we can make those conditions obtain more generally, and whether the cost of doing so offsets the value obtained by doing so or not.
I think the most popular solution is rent but it’s hard to generalize to nations
Rent is a popular solution, yes. So is an exchange of labor (e.g. spouses, household servants, children). The latter is easier to generalize.
It refers to aspects of behavioral symmetry that the speaker prefers and is willing to use power to enforce in his or her environment of interest. (At very least via an attempt at moral persuasion.)