Latin America: like the French, they're there when they need you

Tony Saca, el presidente of El Salvador, wants the U.S. to create a "Marshall Plan" to invest massively in South America. There's only one phrase to describe what he and other Latin Americans want of the United States: wealth redistribution. Free trade is one thing, but when other nations bring up the Marshall Plan and "investment," Americans had better watch out for their wallets.

WASHINGTON -- El Salvador's President Tony Saca, a close U.S. ally, can scarcely contain his frustration.

He calls U.S. politicians "shortsighted" for failing to reform U.S. immigration laws. He says Latin American populism is "a pendulum swing towards disaster" that deserves more U.S. attention.

"The United States, in my judgment, should invest enormous resources in Latin America, along the lines of a Marshall Plan," he said in a recent interview. "Generally speaking, when you want to have a neighborhood that gives you peace of mind, you have to invest in that neighborhood."

"Extortion" is the only word to describe this. If you Americans don't appease us, he's saying, we're going to make you very sorry. It's no different than American citizens demanding that the government "invest" money in poor neighborhoods, with the implied threat that it prevents riots. Real, voluntary investment is one thing, when entrepreneurs realize a profit opportunity and seize upon it. But when government "invests" in American neighborhoods, or Latin American countries, it's as voluntary as a mugger stealing my wallet to give to Greenpeace (or any other organization I would never willingly give money to).

Saca isn't even to the level of being a "mojado." At least illegal immigrants from Latin America make the effort to come to the U.S. Saca wants to stay at home and receive American dollars.

I'm pretty open on immigration, believing the United States should welcome people who yearn for real freedom, but what I do not believe in is the redistribution of wealth -- whether it's by my neighbors "voting" to seize my property, by "Pablo" and "Maria" coming across the border so my tax dollars can pay for their health care and their children's education, or Latin Americans who feign "friendship" just so the U.S. will tax me to send them more money. American governments are as stupid and naive as a schoolboy who considers classmates his "friends" when they're merely taking advantage of toys and treats he gives them. It's worse with government, though, because the schoolboy's parents can realize his errors and put an end to it. Government, with its usurped power to lay its hands upon any and all tax dollars it can, has no such limitation.

There may be little the United States can do for Saca. President Bush has increased aid to Latin America by record amounts and visited Latin America more than any of his predecessors, but he remains unpopular and unable to pass initiatives that Latin Americans want, like immigration reforms and free-trade pacts. His legacy may be the biggest loss of U.S. influence in the Western Hemisphere in recent memory.

This is no different than schoolyard "friends" who are never satiated with what they're given, complaining "I thought you were my friend!" when the schoolboy in fact has already given much.

"Requiem for the Monroe Doctrine" is how academic Daniel Erikson put it in an article for Current History, referring to the 1823 declaration by President James Monroe that put the Western Hemisphere off-limits to outside powers.

Erikson is the latest demonstration that "academics" tend to not know what the hell they're talking about. The Monroe Doctrine wasn't about the United States continually taking from American citizens to give "aid" to Latin America. The Doctrine was a warning to European nations that they were to cease colonization in the Americas and henceforth not interfere in the affairs of nations in the Americas, and that the United States would forcibly defend them against European incursions. Unfortunately, this sense of "guardianship" bred such arrogance that the U.S. did plenty of its own meddling in Latin American affairs during the 20th century, but that's a topic for another time.

Trade between South America and China is booming. Governments from Canada to Iran are cutting deals in the region, and Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez has made challenging U.S. interests his foreign-policy mission, through everything from sweet oil deals to a TV news channel that rivals CNN.

If you read the rest of the article, the U.S. is still the most important trading partner of all Latin American nations. If they don't like what the U.S. is doing, fine, but the fact is that they need the U.S. a lot more than the U.S. needs them.

If Latin America can do so well without the U.S., why are economists worried that any U.S. economic slowdown will trickle south to Latin America?

Furthermore, why should the U.S. fear additional trade anywhere? "A rising tide lifts all boats," whether it's China trading with Mexico, or Canada importing ethanol from Brazil. This "news" article is employing the old liberal fallacy that if your neighbor grows more prosperous, it somehow "steals" or at the very least "competes" with your own prosperity. Nothing could be further from the truth. If China grows more prosperous, that's more real wealth flowing through the global economy. Everyone -- that is, everyone competitive -- can benefit from the increased wealth, which creates a greater capability to buy goods and services from others, and invest in others who provide goods and services.

What also couldn't be further from the truth is believing that Chavez is a threat to the U.S. For all his saber-rattling, as McQ noted at QandO, the U.S. is still his most important buyer of Venezuelan crude, and one of the few buyers who can actually do something with Venezuela's somewhat unique type of crude oil. And if you want to talk about Chavez's alleged competitor to CNN, playing along with the ludicrous notion that CNN is some gold standard of journalism, Chavez's "news" isn't based on competition, but shutting out the competition so it can control what's broadcast, including broadcasting soap operas so that the regular Venezuelan Jose en la calle ("Joe on the street") doesn't know about the anti-Chavez protests.

Think-tank specialists are debating whether Bush, globalization or both are to blame, and whether a change in the United States' unpopular position on Cuba might help. Democrats say the Bush White House has ignored the region. But the reality is that whoever wins the White House in November will confront a dramatically different geopolitical situation from the one that Bush faced when he was inaugurated in 2001.

The "reality," as the article admitted just a couple of paragraphs before, is that Bush has been throwing more money at the problem than anyone before ("President Bush has increased aid to Latin America by record amounts and visited Latin America more than any of his predecessors"), but his political opponents at home have prevented him from pursuing his desired policies toward Latin America.

"The world has changed in fundamental ways, and the big question is whether the next administration can understand that and adjust to that," Michael Shifter, with the Inter-American Dialogue think tank, told a recent gathering in Washington.

"The United States is not as important as it used to be. A lot of countries -- I'm talking about Brazil, Mexico, Venezuela -- have much more complicated international relations," he added. "There are much more options than there were before."

If the United States is so now unimportant, then let Latin Americans prove it. They can stop trading with the United States, and they can stop trying to immigrate here. Let's see who missed the other side first, shall we?

In the 1990s, most of Latin America and the United States shared a common purpose of promoting free trade, democracy and free-market reforms known as the "Washington Consensus."

But many Latin Americans became disenchanted with economic reforms of the 1990s and resented the Bush administration's focus away from the region after the Sept. 11 attacks. The Iraq invasion only angered Latin Americans more.

Naturally. They wanted to be the center of attention, and they looked at all the money being spent on Iraq and wished they could have the money spent on them.

"There was a rejection of Washington Consensus-era policies," says Geoff Thale, with the left-leaning advocacy group Washington Office on Latin America. "We haven't had anything to offer in its place."

Contrary to the article's implications (since it is, after all, talking about "free trade"), Thale is a socialist who doesn't care about free trade so much as he wants the United States to wave a magic wand and fix Latin America's self-induced problems of "poverty" and "income equality."

That's right: Latin America's problems are self-induced. Back in 1996, Peter Hakin wrote a piece for Foreign Affairs that half-blamed the U.S. but also pointed out that "The United States is not the only culprit, however. Latin American leaders have also performed badly. Most Latin American governments have only partially completed the political and economic reforms needed to sustain robust growth and healthy democratic institutions. They have mostly neglected the region's deep economic inequities and social tensions. Too often, Latin American governments have only grudgingly cooperated with the United States and one another. Some of the region's leaders have turned to populist and anti-American rhetoric to win supporters and votes."

Back to the Miami Herald's propaganda:

At the same time, other countries have stepped up their diplomatic and commercial outreach, with Europeans and Canadians pointing out that their foreign policy is more aligned with Latin America's preference for multilateral actions.

The same "multilateral actions" that failed to stop Hitler in 1938 are failing to control Chavez today. Just because several nations come together in agreement does not mean the agreement is correct or just.

The European Union has signed trade and investment agreements with Mexico and Chile, and is negotiating similar pacts with Central America and the Andean Community of Nations, which includes Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru and Colombia. The Europeans have also signed an "Economic Partnership Agreement" with the 15-member Caribbean Community.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, declaring Latin America a priority of his administration, last summer embarked on a week-long tour of Chile, Colombia, Barbados and Haiti.

As I said above, this is nothing to fear. My neighbors' prosperity does not steal from my own, and in fact may sooner or later help to increase my own.

He cast Canada, which is close to signing a free-trade agreement with Colombia, as a middle course between the United States' hard-edged capitalism and Venezuela's state-centered populism.

"Canada's very existence demonstrates that the choice is a false one," he said.

And in the time for Harper to say this, another Canadian went south of the border for American health care, rather than risk death while waiting at home in Canada.

Logically speaking, Harper's a moron, i.e. on par with your typical Canadian PM. There are always choices, good and bad, righteous and evil. Now as a matter of political philosophy, he's even more of a moron. The only choice is between freedom and coercion. It's still coercion, still tyranny, whether you call it "democracy," "socialism," "fascism" or anything else you want.

Canada is the region's second-largest investor, owning assets worth more than $96 billion. The Canadians are in free-trade talks with Caribbean nations and trade more than $1 billion a year with Cuba.

And why doesn't the article mention here who is the largest investor? Because it happens to be the United States.

Then there's China.

Bilateral trade between China and Latin America jumped from $200 million in 1975 to $47 billion in 2005. According to the U.N. Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, between 2000 and 2006 Brazil increased its imports from China six-fold, to $8 billion. China is Chile's second-biggest market.

It's not all Latin America, despite what the article would have you think. The main driver is China as an emerging export powerhouse. Still, it's wonderful that China and Latin America have grown so prosperous. What rational person wouldn't be happy that the Chinese are exporting so much to Brazil, and that Brazilians and Chileans have become wealthy enough to afford each other's products?

Even so, these statistics aren't as great as you'd think. For one, they're over thirty years, which is hardly a "jump." Now adjust the 1975 figure for inflation, and it becomes more like $790 million. You should experience no more surprise than looking at pictures of an 8-pound newborn, then pictures of it grown up to be 250 pounds at 30 years old.

While seeking raw materials for its industries, China has kept a low political profile, maintaining friendly ties with Cuba and Venezuela but not directly challenging U.S. interests.

China also has historic ties with big left-wing parties in Mexico, Peru and Argentina, writes Argentine scholar Sergio Cesarín in a recent Woodrow Wilson International Center report on China's rise in Latin America.

"When Chinese leaders speak out about their aims and goals in the region, they utilize concepts like growth, mutual benefits, non-interference in internal affairs and, most importantly, development," he writes. These are more palatable to left-wing leaders than free trade or free-market reforms recommended by Washington, he adds.

In 2005, Air China started weekly flights between Beijing and Sao Paolo, the first such route between China and Latin America by a Chinese carrier. Presidents Hu Jintao of China and Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva swapped visits in 2004.

The U.S., surprisingly, could take a real lesson from China here. China, at least not overtly, isn't looking to interfere with the governments; it's only looking to trade peacefully.

Since 2005, Chávez and Iran's President Ahmadinejad have visited each other seven times, signing deals on issues as varied as tractor manufacturing and oil exploration and establishing a direct flight between Caracas and Tehran, with a stopover in Damascus. Ahmadinejad and other Iranian officials have also visited Chávez's allies in Nicaragua, Ecuador and Bolivia.

Tyrants tend to ally with other tyrants. Why shouldn't we be surprised that a known terrorist like Madman Mahmoud wants to be friendly with the likes of socialist dictators Chavez, Daniel Ortega and Evo Morales, and terrorist ally Rafael Correa?

The United States, of course, remains the hemisphere's dominant power. Brazil imported six times more from the United States than China. Immigrants to the United States sent $45 billion in remittances to their families in the region last year.

Of course. Without the United States, the main economic engine of the world, where would Latin America be?

And Bush administration officials dispute the notion that they've ignored the region.

The State Department routinely lists achievements like a $3.4 billion debt-relief package for the hemisphere's five poorest countries, an ethanol-promotion deal with Brazil and a new $1.4 billion anti-drug-trafficking aid package for Mexico and Central America awaiting congressional approval.

Total U.S. aid to Latin America jumped from $1.2 billion in 2001 to -- if Congress approves a budget request -- $2.7 billion in 2009, according to the aid-tracking website justf.org.

But as I noted above, this is not about encouraging Americans to make true investments in Latin America. It's taking Americans' money against their will and giving it to Latin American governments. And as long as Latin American governments anticipate the steady stream of money continuing, they have no need to pursue necessary economic reforms, let alone be prudent about how they spend the "aid."

Bush has negotiated numerous free-trade deals and met his Brazilian counterpart Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva nine times. Bush's trip to Latin America last year was his eighth, more than any president in U.S. history.

The free-trade umbrella now includes Chile, Central America, the Dominican Republic and Peru, with Colombia and Panama waiting in the wings.

What would go a long way is if the U.S. government stopped the half-dollar tariff on Brazilian ethanol. For a couple of years, Bush has talked about reducing the tariff, but it's gone nowhere.

But all that doesn't impress the critics.

"Certainly, there is no consistent pattern of interest or concern in the administration for Latin America," said Riordan Roett, of the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies and an informal advisor to Sen. Barack Obama's campaign. "Maybe we can't expect this, but there's been no grand scheme, broader integration between the U.S. and Latin America. We're each kind of going our own way."

"Consistent" meaning what? Bush has gone above and beyond liberals' own standards of "foreign aid." Or does Roett use "integration" to mean even more forcible redistribution of Americans' wealth to Latin America?

Why should sovereign American individuals, let alone Brazilians and Colombians and everyone else in the Americas, be subjected to the U.S. and Latin American governments' "grand scheme, broader integration" of their lives?

Luigi Einaudi, a former U.S. diplomat and head of the Organization of American States, says the United States would generate more goodwill if it shuttered the Guantánamo Bay detention center in Cuba, passed a free-trade agreement with Colombia and stopped deporting 70,000 "criminal aliens" every year to countries in Latin America and the Caribbean ill-equipped to receive them.

Some critics say changing the Cuba policy also will help. A new Cuba approach, says Lawrence Wilkerson, a former chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell, would be a "superb opening toward refurbishing" the Latin America policy that he describes as "bordering on failure."

While it might "generate more goodwill" to shut down Gitmo, it's still fact that a lot of the "detainees" were captured on the battlefield. They're now being given opportunities for trial, albeit military trials, but most were, after all, taken prisoner while fighting American soldiers. It's true that some have been released after having been found innocent (typically turned over to Americans by neighbors with whom they've had feuds), but we've also released "detainees" only to fight and capture them again.

But that, "free trade with Colombia" and Cuba relations are red herrings. The main thing is that Latin America wants unfettered immigration to the U.S. It isn't out of some notion of "freedom," but because their own economies can't sustain the populations, and they need their people to head north and send American dollars back home.

One program initiated by Bush is seen as working: the Millennium Challenge Corporation, which gives aid to countries that pass a set of 17 development indicators, put together by outside watchdogs like Transparency International.

John Danilovich, who heads the program, says MCC is so popular that even Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega, an old Cold War foe and Chávez ally, had to admit as much when he visited an MCC program in the northern town of Chinandega.

Once more, it's government taking money from Americans and giving it to Latin Americans. And of course Ortega would be very pleased at the "success." Who doesn't like free money? Returning to the example of schoolchildren, a classmate will happily pretend to like someone, if it means candy and getting to play with toys.

With Danilovich at his side, Ortega ended his speech at a local plaza with the words "Viva Estados Unidos!"

While this sounds very friendly toward the United States, an examination of the Spanish reveals what Ortega really said. He was not referring to the United States. He said only "Estados Unidos," not "los Estados Unidos" or "los Estados Unidos del Norte de America." The latter is the United States' proper name in Latin American circles: "the United States of North America." Along the same lines, Mexico is officially "Estados Unidos Mexicanos," and what Ortega is actually referring to is a union of states, nations, across the Americas.

Time to deport the whining bitch ASAP

I have no sympathy whatsoever for Zoila Meyer, who has been voting in this country as if she were a citizen and even got elected to the city council of Adelanto, California. I'm pretty open on immigration, but her residential status is completely beside the point. She was never a citizen and broke the law twice, first by voting, then by misreprenting herself as eligible for public office.

How can a person not know if he or she isn't a citizen? Did it ever occur to this brainless woman that you're not a citizen until you take the oath? On a side note, something I read years ago still disgusts me today. Some Mexican family had come to the U.S. years before and were desperate to get their retarded son naturalized. They pleaded with all involved federal offices and eventually got all the testing requirements waived, but officials said he still had to take the oath. The young man, however, had no cognitive abilities at all and couldn't even repeat the words. Why was the family so adamant? It wasn't out of the "noble" purpose of making him an American. I smelled the bullshit from the start, and at the end they admitted it was so he could collect Social Security.

"To be honest with you, I'm scared. How can they just pluck me out of my family, my kids?" Oh, finally Meyer is being "honest," eh? And she can be taken away from her family because she broke a very serious law, one that's rightfully a deportable offense.

"If they can do this to me, they can do it to anybody," she whined. Actually, it can't be done to me, or any of my closest friends, for we were born American citizens. It can't be done to my mother, for she's a properly naturalized citizen. (I say "can't be done" in the lawful sense, not in terms of pure ability to do something despite law and justice.) So what is Meyer's problem? It's simple: she committed fraud.

"I see people writing 'this is my country.' It really isn't. It belongs to the government and they decide who stays and who goes...you think you're free; you're really not." While she has a point about the openness of our immigration policies, it's a red herring: the issue is that citizens have certain rights beyond that of mere legal residents, namely voting and being eligible to run for public office, and she tried to pass herself off as a citizen.

Rather than Canada, I suggest deporting her back to Cuba, the land of free health care (warning: VERY DISTURBING IMAGES) -- preferably with Michael Moore so they can whine together. Just make sure she recompenses Adenalto's residents for whatever salary and benefits she received.

How Calderon will drive more Mexicans to the U.S.

Felipe Calderon, the former energy minister who was sworn in last month as Mexico's new president, has a plan:

Mexican president launches jobs program

MEXICO CITY - President Felipe Calderon launched a program Monday to create jobs for young Mexicans and curb the flow of millions of migrants to the United States.

The program will give cash incentives to companies for hiring first-time job holders. Calderon, who took office in December, campaigned on promises to boost employment opportunities in Mexico, vowing to be the "Jobs President."

A conservative who narrowly won the July election, Calderon is under pressure from a strong leftist opposition to alleviate poverty affecting half the country's citizens.

While he has criticized U.S. immigration policies, such as a proposed border fence, he says Mexico must stem the tide of immigration by increasing opportunities at home.

"Employment is the biggest door to get out of poverty. It is the only path to substantially raise a family's quality of life," Calderon said as he signed a decree for the "National First Job Program" in the presidential palace. "To move Mexico forward, we have to create more and better jobs."

The government will also pay into social security for first-time job holders for one year. Calderon said some $300 million has been set aside for the initiative and that it will help millions of women who have never worked and struggle to support their families.

"Work is the only thing that guarantees women true liberty," he said.

Shades of FDR! So much for Calderon being an advocate of the free market. He's just a Nixon-in-Friedman's clothing, nothing more than a Keynesian who gives lip service during the campaign. Like any good interventionist, he's confused himself that economic progress means creating more jobs. That is as far from the truth as you can get: economic progress is based on creating real wealth, not giving everybody a job. As Caroline Baum of Bloomberg once reminded us so long ago: if you want 100% employment, institute a hunter-gatherer society, in which everyone struggles to make a living.

Good lord. What his plan will actually do, apart from any true stimuli like desperately needed foreign investment in Pemco, is encourage more Mexicans to leave for El Norte as employment prospects at home grow worse! Keynesians never seem to have understood that, though their central banking gods may inflate the money supply at will, money is still finite at any given time. If you recall from Bastiat's "What Is Seen and What Is Not Seen," because government cannot spend a dollar without depriving a taxpayer of that dollar, there is no net economic gain. The same applies to "creating work."

Calderon will necessarily use tax money to create jobs, but if the taxpayers still had their money, it would have supported jobs anyway. They would have bought goods and services, or saved it, with no need for government to tell them how, but now here cometh Santo Felipe with his unholy gospel. Under his guidance, the Mexican government will soon start spending x to create a job paying y pesos a year, but in the end, the economy will lose x as deadweight loss. Before, the job would have come into being on its own. After, a job based upon artificial need will be created for someone, but at a cost to everyone else.

You might be thinking, "Deadweight loss, yadda yadda, so what?" Because that x is lost, because that x was money taken via taxes, there will be less x for the taxpayers to spend on goods and services. When that happens, the economy will necessarily suffer, which will encourage more and more Mexicans to head north for greener pastures. In a perfect universe, Calderon's plan would merely shift employment. Most likely, however, money will be lost from disincentives, and especially from bureaucracy. Like Harry Hopkins and Frances Perkins benefited from the New Deal, Calderon's Trato Nuevo will certainly create new work for "employment administrators." It amounts to a community earning $1000 but effectively having $990, because someone takes 1% to tell them what to do with it. I call that "economic friction," on the same principle that energy transfer always suffers some loss in the form of heat, not in the way that competing economic actors will bear certain emotions towards each other.

But, the interventionists argue, the job would never have existed without government "priming the pump." Nonsense! The argument is a hollow one, once we examine the circumstances and realize that it is Mexico's government that creates economic barriers in the first place. What will the graduated tax system do but drive more and more savings out of the country, depriving the domestic economy of investment capital and jobs? The barriers are also in no small part from the rampant corruption, which does not stem from any "disparity" in wealth, but rather from government's failure to enforce the rule of law.

The problem is not the mere fact that some people have more wealth than others, but that certain people use wealth and other influence to sway police, judges, bureaucrats and politicians, and that the rest of the people have no means of obtaining justice. I don't say "justice" as in the socialists' conception of economic equality, but to mean that the law is applied equally to everyone, and that crimes are suitably punished. Instead of promising to create jobs, Calderon should focus on the decades-old problem of corruption, and then the jobs will come. I suggest he start by executing bribed police officers and judges to put the fear of God in the rest.

Corruption need not be completely vanquished to have an effect. All it will take for Mexico to keep its investment capital (the fuel for job creation) is for wealthier Mexicans to become less quick to hide their money overseas. Also, some may have paid bribes out of extortion, and that money will instead be spent on honest jobs, or be saved so it can be invested in creating honest employment. At worst, with only the latter occurring, there will be a perfect transfer of employment. More likely, the total effect will be that wealthier Mexicans grow encouraged to keep more money at home, and more will be produced for the rest of Mexico.

Keep in mind, though, that even the best real stimulus for Mexican employment will not completely curb Mexican emigration. As long as the United States is doing better economically and politically, Mexicans will keep coming here.

Tell me what Tan Nguyen did that was criminal?

I'm not even sure that Nguyen or his campaign staff did anything improper. While I have no love for Republicans, I was appalled to read that California's jack-booted thugs have now raided his home and campaign office over this.

And what precipitated things? A "letter, written in Spanish, was mailed to an estimated 14,000 Democratic voters in Orange County." It simply said,

"You are advised that if your residence in this country is illegal or you are an immigrant, voting in a federal election is a crime that could result in jail time."

That's it. Having read it several times, I wonder how it is not true.

Every AP article on this has said smugly, "In fact, immigrants who are adult naturalized citizens are eligible to vote." So what? The first conditionality is "if your residence in this country is illegal," and as far as I'm aware, illegal aliens are by definition not citizens, so they therefore cannot vote legally. Also, a naturalized person is no longer an immigrant: "naturalized immigrant" is a contradiction in terms. The moment my mother took her oath, she became an American.

And now the Democrats, who I now think must have a gene compelling them to act like morons, are calling this letter a "hate crime." Here's some news: liberal assholes are the ones committing the hate crime. They hate that some people are successful and become wealthy, evinced in every tax increase they support.

Let's be more candid. The Democrats love this, not just because it hurts Republicans, not just because it solidifies their hold on the Hispanic vote, but because this will further encourage illegal aliens to vote in our elections, and illegals by far vote for Democrats. Why do you think Democrats consistently oppose requiring voters to show ID, even if the state will pay for people who can't afford a driver's license or state-issued ID card? "Racist" my natural-born citizen ass. I'm quite open on immigration, but good lord, what is the purpose of citizenship when we don't strictly enforce our election laws? "Only citizens have the right to vote" is the first and most important election law. When you're so lax that you accuse someone of a "threat" or a "hate crime" because a staffer reminded people of it, the rest of the election laws become meaningless.

Also, what "threat" was in the letter? How is it a "threat" to remind people of the law? If you don't realize that the letter doesn't apply to naturalized citizens, then flatly, you don't deserve to vote because you're not aware of your rights. There are too many idiots out there who think their "civil right" to vote means they can be part of 51%+ of voters who elect people to spend the money coerced from everyone else. Like Neal Boortz, the more they don't vote, the more I'm happy. It's not because I want to deprive them of their own inalienable rights, but because they deprive me of mine, specifically my right to my own property.

When you discard limited government, voting degenerates into what Bastiat described: "The state is the great fictitious entity by which everyone seeks to live at the expense of everyone else." It's bad enough when citizens screw each other over at the polls, but then throw in illegal immigrants who pay very little in taxes anyway, who'll illegally vote for a candidate who will give them more in social services. Great, isn't it?

The other day, a friend at work couldn't understand why taxes are theft. A head tax is one thing: as someone, a man I loved as a father, taught me many years ago, "It would be fair if they took a dollar from everybody." But it is theft when our progressive federal income tax collects nearly all the revenue from the top 25% and redistributes it to the bottom half, nearly all of whom pay nothing in taxes.

But, my friend said, there's no theft because "people vote for the politicians." Ho! Nothing could be more incorrect, mistaken or naïve. A mere plurality, or a majority as required in a few jurisdictions, is all it takes to elect a politician over the objections of the other voters. When my neighbors elect someone I would never vote for in a million years, how is it not theft when he raises my taxes? I didn't agree to it, nor did I ever sign some "social compact" bullshit.

My friend also denies that there is any "force" in taxation, ignoring that if I refuse to pay my taxes, I'll have even more of my wealth confiscated, and perhaps be jailed for the "impudence" of trying to keep my own property. How much does it take to be called "force," a SWAT team raid? As Bastiat laid out for us in The Law, government's powers come from the people, so lawful government therefore cannot do anything that individuals cannot lawfully do. Can my neighbors come to me every two weeks and demand a "cut" of my paycheck, threatening me with imprisonment? If they cannot, then by what right can they elect a government to do the same, acting as their agent?

Well, I suppose the same right by which illegal aliens vote in our elections.

Conservatives in need of an appointment with reality

I've been meaning to blog about this, but as I've indicated, my time has become more and more limited. Illegal immigrants have hardly done themselves a service with the rallies a few weeks ago, particularly with ridiculous claims like the U.S. is their land. However, they have company: conservatives are joining them in going off the deep end. I will criticize conservatives as readily as liberals, and so this is part one of a continuing series.

Mark Levin on his WABC radio show last Wednesday had another of his usual vitriolic nights. He accused illegal immigrants of taking jobs away from Americans, proving that, like Rich Lowry, conservatives need to shut up about economics and stick to pure politics. Levin's stupidest articulation was that illegal immigration labor is "redistribution of wealth." Wait a minute, who's redistributing? Certainly not immigrants, legal or otherwise. If I hire someone who will do a job for $5, instead of another who wants $10, that's not redistribution in the slightest sense. That's merely competition. There's no more "redistribution" than there is from Toyota to General Motors.

If anyone is redistributing, it's Levin and his new socialist bedfellows, namely the labor unions that Levin praised for being pro-American. That's a lot of crap, frankly. Like all other protectionist groups, labor unions don't give a damn about their country, only themselves. "Patriotism" is a nice disguise, though, for their desire to use government to force me to hire them, and at a higher wage than their competitors would offer. And now even a conservative like Levin agrees with them.

As I've said before, the true underlying issue in illegal immigration is freedom, but not the kind that people think. It's not the freedom of other people to come to this country. It's my freedom to hire whomever I want, free from coercion by government and labor unions. How can we call ourselves a free country when I can't hire someone of my own choosing?

Now if Levin was referring to government programs that use tax dollars to provide services to illegal immigrants (like public schools and emergency room care), that's a different matter. I've long since called for the complete abolition of the welfare state, not just for illegal immigrants, but for everyone. That way no one will have to worry about paying for the education of illegal immigrants' children, or their health care via emergency rooms. Likewise, no one will have to worry about paying for his neighbors either.

Levin kept repeating the phrase "the rule of law," but his usage does not fit its true meaning. He used it to mean that the law must be enforced, but "the rule of law" means no such thing. Levin is a lawyer and ought to know better. "The rule of law" means that the law is applied equally to everyone, as opposed to "the rule of men" where laws are applied arbitrarily. That's it. "The rule of law" does not require that a law must be enforced regardless, because cannot a law be a bad one, and hence need to be abolished straightaway? As Don Boudreaux so well put it:

Just because words are written on paper and subjected to hocus-pocus beneath a soaring marble dome does not mean that these words are truly "law," or even that the government officials who wrote and voted for them want them to be taken literally.

Like other conservatives, Levin appeals first to authority, not freedom. Yet he isn't calling for a universal application of the laws on the books. All he wants is that laws he likes are enforced, and laws he dislikes aren't. As a conservative, he'd oppose laws permitting gay marriage or abortion. And what if U.S. immigration law were changed to make it easy for people to enter? Would Levin be so gung-ho about enforcing the laws on the books?

I have believed in border security, by which I mean the regulation of people entering the United States, as a post-9/11 necessity. That is not mutually exclusive, though, with the entry of immigrants who merely want to work. Contrary to Levin's claims, there's simply no correlation between honest immigrants and the problems of terrorism and other crimes that do admittedly come from illegal border crossing. I've said before that if we issued ID cards and allowed people to come in who wanted to work, we can deal with the criminals and terrorists who'll still cross in the desert.

What of conservatives' new claim that 200 million people across the world want to come here? It is true on its face, but not in the way conservatives imply. Hundreds of millions do want to come here, but that doesn't mean they can. Even so, think of how rapidly the American economy would expand. Think of all the low-grade jobs that Americans would no longer have to do. Instead of mopping floors and digging ditches, they can design aircraft, develop software or design high-tech machines. Or are Americans really so uncompetitive that they want to hold on to the low-end jobs, because they aren't any smarter than foreigners?

Monica Crowley had a similar invective this past Saturday afternoon on her own WABC radio show. One description she used was "a class of people who shouldn't even be here in the first place." Who shouldn't even be here? Just who is she, or anyone else, to tell one person that he can be free, but the guy standing next to him cannot? Should not all people have an equal opportunity to immigrate? That would be the rule of law, not some bureaucrat's arbitrary decision that we want more immigrants who are engineers instead of dishwashers. And if we're so worried that an immigrant will consume more in tax dollars than he'll pay in, we wouldn't have to worry about that once we abolished the welfare state.

In the 19th century, many Americans felt the same way about the Irish and Italians as they do today about Mexicans. John Gambling xenophobically ranted on his radio show some months ago, "Go home! You don't belong here!" Citizens, even those whose own families immigrated only a couple of generations before, have always had the unfortunate distrust of foreign cultures "invading" and "taking over." It is a shame that so Americans believe that, because they only deprive themselves of what other cultures have to offer.

For a long time I defended conservatives against accusations of racism and xenophobia, but now I do think some really are racist. They're principally afraid of brown-skinned people who do back-breaking labor all day long for very little pay, scrimp and save every dollar, and live 10 to an apartment so they can support families back home. Conservatives are afraid of such people because they're willing to compete, and because they're so different from typical American culture.

Lately I have wondered just what is this "American culture" that Americans want to preserve. For example, one of my co-workers is originally from Missouri and lived in Oregon for a couple of years. She doesn't fit any cultural patterns that I can think of. What about the differences between various Caucasian ethnicities in San Francisco and New York? NASCAR fans in the south versus Yankees fans in the Bronx?

There is the problem that many immigrants really do refuse to learn English, but the fault lies with government that mollycoddles them. Government publications (like the White House website) in other languages only creates a moral hazard. Some immigrants have taken the oath of citizenship, as a news article once put it, "in their own languages" rather than English. This claptrap does no more than encourage illegal immigrants to forego learning English, thus depriving them of an improving future. Like it or not, English is the unifying language of the United States, and indeed much of the world.

Now there is also the very big problem with immigrant movements that seek to "reconquer" the Southwest. But so long as government does not steal from my paycheck, and as long as the Constitution is still in force throughout United States jurisdictions, it would not matter to me if Los Angeles became 100% Hispanic, no more than it matters to me that Harlem is predominantly black. It does not affect me while my rights to life, liberty and property (including the right not to have government coerce taxes from me) are intact.

Common sense and illegal immigration

Previous:
More on the true economics of illegal immigration
When conservatives don't get it about illegal immigration
Price-setting and illegal immigration
The politics and economics of illegal immigration

Alan Reynold's new column on illegal immigration is a real gem. Not only does he exhibit amazing clarity of thought, he demonstrates that he knows the real deal with immigration laws. Some highlights:

I never said we should not secure our borders. But border guards and immigration officers get no respect. The United States convicted 21,821 of immigration violations in 2003, and formally deported 202,842 in 2004. If anyone really hopes to deport 12 million, there aren't enough buses....

What I most object to is self-righteous pontificating by people who have no idea how our immigration laws work, or why they don't. I keep hearing radio talksters and cable newsters being outraged about how unfair it is for illegal aliens to "jump to the head of the line." They should wait their turn, too, just as legal immigrants do. But there is no such line. Waiting lines are for relatives, not workers....

Forget the silly idea that there are only so many jobs to go around. We are aging fast, and the country will soon run short of younger workers who can take a load off our creaking backs....

Those who talk tough about enforcing our immigration laws need to first understand just how ridiculous those laws really are. Then they need to explain just how they would go about enforcing those ridiculous laws and why tough enforcement would not simply increase the incentive to hide.

The House wants to declare illegal immigration a felony. Did the House actually expect law enforcement to attempt arresting an estimated 5.4 million men and 3.9 million women and sending them to federal prisons? What would we do with their 1.8 million kids?

Many illegal immigrants can hardly imagine a more luxurious life than a federal prison. If Congress invited Central America's poorest young men to a prepaid vacation at Club Fed, they'd gladly volunteer by the millions.

Should we slap big fines on businesses caught hiring illegal immigrants? Do we really want a lot of young Latinos wandering the street without work? Many work in the cash economy as migrant workers at small farms, casual day laborers for marginal construction companies, maids, nannies, lawn maintenance workers and the like. They are employed by households or very small businesses, making the cost of enforcement much higher than any likely benefit.

I am not offering easy solutions -- at least not before someone explains just what the problems are and which ones need to be solved first, second and third. Those who offer easy solutions are fooling you, fooling themselves or both. Whenever Congress is so obviously befuddled as it is on this issue, the safest thing for it to do is absolutely nothing.

I do disagree with something he wrote, mostly because of his particular choice of phrasing:

President Bush insults our intelligence when he says illegal immigrants are needed to fill jobs that legal residents won't do. There is no job that can't be filled at a price. If that price is too high, consumers will simply take on more do-it-yourself projects -- mowing their own lawns, cleaning their own homes, growing their own vegetables, cooking their own meals and taking care of their own children or elderly parents. We would not pay any more for fruit and vegetables because the price is set on world markets -- we'd just import more fruit and vegetables from Mexico.

There are jobs Americans won't do, not at the maximum wages that other Americans would be willing to pay. Thus, as I pointed out before, the jobs would not exist for legal domestic labor. Some jobs would still exist, but I would pay for it by having less money to spend on other things, or less free time. Whether I pay more for fruit or I mow the lawn myself, my standard of living goes down. Similarly, we hire illegal immigrants to pick our domestic produce, because it's cheaper than importing equivalents, which improves our standard of living. On the other hand, the only people who would benefit from restricting illegal immigrant labor are union members and their fellow protectionists whose jobs are threatened by cheap, willing immigrant labor.

A lot of conservative commentators push a panacea that Reynolds warned about. I once heard one erroneously (and foolishly) ask, "Isn't it worth paying $1 more for a pound of strawberries to have less violent crime?" -- as if the two were linked! Fixing the problems with illegal immigration is not just a matter of accepting a higher price for produce, or tightening borders. Crime is a lot more profitable than picking fruit for $2 per hour, so when you see an illegal immigrant in the field doing back-breaking work that even Americans won't do for $8.50 per hour, he's not the criminal type you should worry about. And as Reynolds pointed out, how will you have such security that you can deport all "illegals"?

Ah, but what if that illegal immigrant is receiving more in social services than he benefits Americans? I've pointed out many times that abolishing the welfare state for everybody, citizens and non-citizens alike, will take care of conservatives' complaint that illegal immigrants use so many social services. Once that happens, the government-created distinction between legal and illegal immigrants will disappear. Maybe that's a too-easy solution, but should we be surprised that big government is the cause of the principal problem with illegal immigrants?

Someone recently commented on my blog,

illegal aliens almost by definition can not pay taxes. in order to work they use false document under false names and often documents of other people. They also use our public health care system to have babies. Then they lend their babies to legal hispanics who file taxes and get thousands in earned income credit. I suppose that is also a job Americans won't do.

I have asked before, is that why we should welcome immigrants, so we can tax them to hell and back? The comment is fair to point out the abuses of the welfare state, but it doesn't go far enough and call for the abolishment of all government social programs. Besides, and I'll have to look for the statistics later when I have time, while illegal immigrants consume a lot each year in per capita government spending, American citizens in fact consume more. And no offense to the reader, but only a naïve person would believe that only illegal immigrants cheat on taxes. Besides, if it deprives big government of money that it tries to coerce from anyone, then good!

I recently asked in a comment on Difster's blog, "Ultimately, though, what's the difference between a legal immigrant and and an illegal one?" To my pocketbook, there is none. Several years ago, I was moving and needed help with my furniture. I didn't want to impose on my friends, who'd feel obligated to help for no pay (it was a Monday, anyway, when they'd be working). Professional movers would have charged a mint, however, I knew that many Central Americans congregated in the heart of Brewster. There are various spots in Westchester and Putnam Counties where "day laborers" wait to be hired off the street, usually for odd jobs, and they'll work hard for less than Americans will pay.

There were two that morning, and though neither spoke any English, I remembered enough Spanish (and could effect enough of a South American accent so I didn't sound too gringo). "Necesito un hombre para trabajar, mover muebles. Diez dólares por cada hora." ("I need a man to work, move furniture. Ten dollars for each hour.") The elder, a thin 40-ish man whose hair had a little gray, accepted. And during several hours of lifting and driving, the fellow worked incredibly hard, never complained and never asked for so much as a coffee break. We didn't learn so much as each other's name, let alone where we were born, but it didn't matter. The only important thing to him was earning money when he'd otherwise earn none, and the only important thing to me was hiring a hard worker for the least possible cost.

Did I deprive an American of an employment opportunity? You betcha...and so what? Did he commit a crime? Not that I am aware of. Therefore, what business is it of anyone's that I hired him instead of a professional mover or even Big Bird?

There you have my confession; I guess I can say goodbye to any hope of holding a Cabinet position. Right, Linda Chavez? I'll never get over the bruhaha regarding her hired "domestic help." For heaven's sake, what kind of a society crucifies a woman whose employee voluntarily accepted the work? By looking out for her own self interest (hiring someone for the least possible cost), Chavez nonetheless provided a better living to a woman who would do far, far worse in her native country.

More on the true economics of illegal immigration

Previous:
When conservatives don't get it about illegal immigration
Price-setting and illegal immigration
The politics and economics of illegal immigration

The very purpose of labor unions is to protect their members from competition, particularly immigrants (legal and otherwise) who will do the same work for less. So as expected, the AFL-CIO today came out strongly against the "guest worker" program now working its way through Congress. It announced it would oppose such "reform" last month, which still did not dissuade certain Democrats from embracing "guest worker" status.

While we might think this spells trouble for Democrats, who depend on union money as much (if not more) than union voter turnout, unions really have little choice but to endure the strained marriage. In all likelihood, albeit reluctantly, they still will give money and votes to Democratic candidates. Who will they otherwise support, Republicans? Green Party candidates or other socialists with no hope of winning? It was a calculated move by the Democrats, and arguably a good one. Democrats know labor unions won't abandon them just for this, and meanwhile, advocating a "guest worker" program will secure much of the Hispanic vote (critical because "even" George W. Bush made large gains among Hispanic voters in the 2004 election). Especially to make a move in 2006 and 2008, Democrats can't take minority voters for granted. Hillary has now emphasized she's pro-immigrant, hoping Hispanics she started to alienate will forget her previous tough talk on securing the southern border.

But immigrants don't just do the jobs Americans won't do. They do the jobs Americans shouldn't do, as I explained in my entry on when conservatives don't get it about illegal immigration. Any economy, no matter how advanced, will have jobs that "somebody's gotta do." A household isn't as simplistic a representation as it might initially seem. Like the low-grade jobs in a sizeable economy that we'd prefer not to do, there are chores to be done like vacuuming carpets, cleaning bathrooms and yardwork. But why should a parent have a skilled son mow the lawn, when he could earn $10 an hour elsewhere, and an immigrant is willing to cut the grass for $5? It's win-win for everyone. So what opponents of immigrant labor are arguing is the most absurd facet of protectionism: that the hired worker "takes away" the son's low-grade job, when in fact the son could do so much better.

Immigrants, legal and not, tend to replace Americans in low-grade jobs. That means Americans no longer have to mow lawns, bus tables, mop floors, or do construction. Instead, we can go into drafting, IT, accounting/finance, and so on. In other words, immigrants easily fill the demand for low-grade labor, allowing more Americans to go into high-grade occupations. It's a rare case that white-collar professionals lose their jobs to illegal immigrants, but that's not the type of illegal immigrant that conservatives fear.

Michelle Malkin recently hailed a reader's comment as "E-mail of the day," which it was, but for an entirely different reason. It was a complete non sequitur. The person criticized Bush for using the "jobs Americans won't do" phrase, bringing up "West Virginia miners." Yes, and...? Are certain conservatives so desperate for anti-illegal immigration talking points that they'll seize upon any argument or example, no matter how illogical? Miners aren't an occupation commonly (if at all) "threatened" by illegal immigrant labor, so I fail to see any relevance here. If anything, Americans should want illegal immigrants to take those jobs, so that we can go into white-collar jobs with a greatly smaller risk of death.

One thing I have wondered is why construction workers are so protective of their jobs. Now, I admit the most physical labor I've ever done is carting several monitors around, back in my IT days. Still, I would think people would prefer to type on a keyboard inside an air-conditioned office, instead of sweating out in the sun and risking serious injury. If the construction workers aren't intelligent enough to improve themselves and get the better jobs, then that's direct evidence of their protectionism. They can't compete with others who will do the same work (perhaps better) for less, so they appeal to the power of government to make themselves artificially competitive. As I'll explain later, that infringes on my freedom to choose.

The substitution of illegal immigrant labor in low-grade jobs is no different than the controversy of "jobs exported overseas." China and India use their comparative advantage in labor to produce labor-intensive goods, which allows more American workers to move into jobs that produce capital-intensive goods. Americans shouldn't bother making inexpensive plastic or metal parts, or mass-producing semiconductors, not when we can produce Boeing jets, Caterpillars and high-level computer software. The Chinese and Indians could probably make whole aircraft, heavy construction machinery and computer software, but far less efficiently. I could possibly learn make my own shoes, too, but it's a better use of my time to buy them.

Also, as I explained in my previous entry, if federal laws forced Americans to replace illegal immigrants with "legal" domestic labor, certain goods and services would become sufficiently expensive that we wouldn't buy them. So by working for such low wages, illegal immigrants make it possible for middle-class Americans to hire landscapers and fence builders, and enjoy several pounds of strawberries instead of just one. Let's say I can hire a "day laborer" for $5 per hour to mow my lawn or repair a fence. A legal resident might want $20 per hour to do it, and at that price I might just do it myself. But the illegal immigrant makes it possible for me to spend $5 an hour and gain so much more by having free time. Meanwhile, nothing is preventing the legal laborer from seeking a job where he has a comparative advantage -- or is he so uncompetitive that he must use government to force me to pay him what he wants, like with minimum wages?

Briefly, a lot of conservatives like to complain that illegal immigrants don't pay taxes. That is true, but it's offset by the lower prices we pay. That's like complaining about Wal-Mart's everyday low prices because, per item, that means reduced sales tax revenue. Besides, what kind of sadistic person makes taxation an issue, especially a conservative who is supposed to follow the principles of limited government and low taxes? Or is immigrating to the United States like that "Night Court" episode? As a judge, Harry administered the oath of naturalization to a group of people. One was so excited and stuttered, "I'm a, I'm a," to which Harry replied, "Yes! You're a taxpayer."

I will say again that the fundamental issue with illegal immigrants is freedom, but not (at least primarily) about their coming to the United States. Ayn Rand would probably like how I examine it from a very self-centered perspective: I want the freedom to transact peacefully with whomever I choose, whether it's buying from a grocer whose Florida oranges were picked by "undocumented" migrant workers, or hiring a "day laborer" to move furniture. I want the state to stay out of my business when I and the other party are harming no one, instead of forcing me to choose among limited options. In fulfillment of Adam Smith's "invisible hand," I improve others' condition merely by seeking to improve my own, but ultimately it doesn't matter to me whether the person is legal or illegal, of Czech descent or Mexican. My first concern is maximizing my happiness for the least cost to me.

Larry Kudlow really pleased me by emphasizing freedom as the moral facet of the immigration issue. I was glad that a prominent conservative finally criticized the utter stupidity of some people (including members of Congress) who want to criminalize any assistance to illegal immigrants, including churches giving food and shelter. Really, what kind of country are we that, even just for a moment, we consider making it a crime to feed hungry people who came here in search of a better life, in search of freedom? There's a big statue just outside New York City you may have heard about, the one with an inscription about "tired," "poor" and "huddled masses yearning to breathe free." Is that just lip-service, or was there a cut-off date I didn't hear about? Is freedom a scarce commodity that we must hoard it for ourselves?

And one more time, if we're so worried about illegal immigrants costing us billions in government services, let's abolish the welfare state for everybody. Once we do, none of us will have to worry about our tax dollars paying for an illegal immigrant's children, or our neighbor's children either. The only people trying to come to the United States, then, will be those who want to work honestly and not live off others, and criminals. And we can deal with the criminals if we'd stop playing catch-and-release. Let's start meting out appropriately harsh punishments for violent crimes, regardless of who (citizens, legal residents or illegals) committed them.

How's this for perspective: while we're fretting about illegal immigrants costing us billions a year in social services, we're sitting on a ticking timebomb of our own creation that has future underfunded obligations of $70 trillion. Which is the greater threat? If the latter, then why aren't people taking to the streets in mass protests about the need to fix (I prefer "abolish") Social Security and Medicare?

When conservatives don't get it about illegal immigration

Conservatives, whether "big government" Republicans or old-fashioned Reaganites, sometimes should stick to pure politics and refrain from discussing any economics. Take Rich Lowry's March 14th column as an example, which I read in today's New York Post. Instead of attacking illegal immigration from a legal standpoint, he brought up economics -- and showed he doesn't really understand that aspect of illegal immigration.

Like Michelle Malkin, Lowry brought up a myth by which anti-immigration pundits create irrational fear. In fact, he started off with it:

A core element of the American creed has always been a belief in the dignity of labor — at least until now. Supporters of a guest-worker program for Mexican laborers say that "there are jobs that no Americans will do." This is an argument that is a step away from suggesting that there are jobs that Americans shouldn't do.

Actually, and this is not being racist in the least, there are jobs Americans shouldn't do. As I wrote in my entry on price-setting and illegal immigration, Americans have incredibly high opportunity costs. Even without taxpayer-funded social safety nets, it's not worth our time to pick strawberries for $2 per hour, or do a lot of dangerous construction at low wages. Americans should be thankful that there are so many immigrants, legal and illegal, who can only do the most meneal of jobs because they lack education and/or English proficiency.

Even in the absence of minimum wages and other forms of government coercion regarding labor, a little unemployment is unavoidable. The reason is simple: imperfect information, which I wrote about last night. The unemployment rate depends on how quickly information spreads through an economy, and how much it costs. The unemployment rate is not just because of lag time from when a position opens and an applicant is hired. A bit of unemployment will result from search costs for both sides. An employer might not find the right person because the costs of advertising, time spent on interviews, etc., are too high for what the job is worth. Similarly, someone wanting that job might have to spend more than it's worth to get it. We have social safety nets (which I am only mentioning, not extolling) and very high wealth, so most Americans aren't desperate to take a job, any job. The wealth is in the form of personal savings that people fall back on, assistance from family and friends, and the ability to borrow. Credit lines are an indicator of wealth, because they reflect the borrower's expectations of his ability to repay, but more importantly, the lender's expectations too.

What does that paragraph have to do with illegal immigration? Everything. Americans have such high opportunity costs that we don't look as hard for work as illegal immigrants do -- and illegal immigrants have extremely low opportunity costs by comparison. They're the ones willing to "pound the pavement," going from shop to shop asking if there's any work to do, like Americans once did when we weren't as wealthy as today. Illegal immigrants are the ones willing to take jobs that, yes, Americans won't do, not at those wages.

I once lived in Brewster, New York, where Central American immigrants regularly hang out in the center of town. Exceedingly few are looking to cause trouble: nearly all of them are simply waiting to be hired. Employers looking for such "day labor" know where to look, so it's like a reverse taxi stand. For $8 or $10 an hour, they'll do the most backbreaking work that no American construction worker would do for less than $20. Does that take away jobs from Americans? Damned right. Do I care about an American losing work because of that? I'll be damned if I ever do. It only means some American is by definition uncompetitive by wanting more than what someone else is willing to accept. Meanwhile, the rest of us do benefit by getting immigrant-produced goods and services at lower prices.

Like any good consumer, my concern is getting the best value at the lowest possible cost, whether or not the guy is an American. Did it make a difference that the taxi driver this morning was Middle Eastern? Not a bit. When we talked about how he likes his job and makes a good living, did I even think for a nanosecond, "Oh, an American could be doing his job!" Not on your life. I didn't care about his physiognomy, accent, haircut, style of dress, religion or even immigration status. I only cared about whether he could safely convey me from Grand Central to work with speed and efficiency.

If it's such a good thing to restrict jobs to "legal labor," because citizens and legal residents can get paid better wages, then why don't we just command higher wages in the first place? Why not push the minimum wage to $20 per hour, or $100, or $1 million? I'm sure Lowry is familiar with the fallacy of minimum wages, but the same principle applies when government prevents illegal immigrants from working. A section of the population is perfectly willing to work for less, but they can't because that's been made illegal. Meanwhile, the rest of us pay in the form of higher prices for those same goods and services.

Laborers in the 18th and 19th centuries, particularly in France, feared foreign trade as much as (perhaps more than) industrialization. Many Americans today make the same appeal to government, and along with the usual lobbying efforts for tariffs and quotas, they demand protection from competitive immigrants (meaning immigrants who are willing to give the rest of us more value for our money). Such erroneous protectionist economics benefits them, but it harms everyone else.

Lowry might have had a point had some of his assertions been factual and from the real world. As McQ at QandO observed last December, after the crackdowns on illegal immigration, farmers in California and Arizona can't get enough legal labor, even offering $8.50 per hour! It's not necessarily that Americans are lazy; it's just that we place a much higher value on our non-work time. Our opportunity cost was not as high during the Great Depression, when it was so low that people would accept a dime an hour to pick cherries. American society has grown much wealthier since.

Lowry also said:

We are supposed to believe, however, that the work ethic does stop [at the Rio Grande] — it is only south of it that people can be found who are willing to work in construction, landscaping and agricultural jobs. So, without importing those people into our labor market, these jobs would go unfilled, disrupting the economy (and creating an epidemic of unkempt lawns in Southern California).

This is sheer nonsense. According to a new survey by the Pew Hispanic Center, illegals make up 24 percent of workers in agriculture, 17 percent in cleaning, 14 percent in construction, and 12 percent in food production. So 86 percent of construction workers, for instance, are either legal immigrants or Americans, despite the fact that this is one of the alleged categories of untouchable jobs.

This is a strawman. Nobody ever said that those industries function only or even mostly on immigrant labor (legal or illegal). His example of construction workers is laughable at best, because what's the stereotype? A middle-aged, hairy Caucasian male. If anything, an illegal immigrant may not necessarily work harder, but he has more incentive to. He's very replaceable, and his employer can turn him over to the INS at any moment, so he'll do everything to keep his job. An American citizen, however, is more likely to join a union that will give him job security and allow him to be a little more lax.

Now, there are significant percentages of those industries that are made possible by the low wages that illegal immigrants accept. Any industry would be devastated if it suddenly lost 24% of its workforce, or even 12%. Talk to a store manager who oversees 100 people, and ask him how the business would do if he lost 12 people and had to hire replacements for twice or three times the pay. Who would end up covering the higher wage costs? We, the consumers, would. The store would have to raise its prices to cover the higher costs, and if the higher prices are more than what consumers are willing to pay, then we simply won't have the items we wanted and otherwise would have had. Either way, we lose.

What's actually sheer nonsense is Lowry's other strawman assertion that anybody claimed there would be unkempt lawns without illegal immigrants. Instead of paying $5 per hour to illegals, people would have to pay, say, $10 or $15 to local teenagers. Since income is finite, people could afford to hire the teenagers only half or a third as often as illegal immigrants. The same money has been spent, but there has been a loss in value: the people have lost the full enjoyment of what should have been better-maintained lawns. They could do some of it themselves, but they lose there, too, because it cuts into their free time.

Oddly, the people who warn that without millions of cheap, unskilled Mexican laborers, this country would face economic disaster are pro-business libertarians. They believe in the power of the market to handle anything — except a slightly tighter labor market for unskilled workers. But the free market would inevitably adjust, with higher wages or technological innovation.

I guess he's talking about me, a "pro-business libertarian." I would sooner accept that than call myself an "anti-competition, pro-government-regulation conservative."

And since when did any libertarian economist claim the market could "handle" all that "except a slightly tighter labor market for unskilled workers"? Yes, the free market will adjust, as I explained in the two paragraphs above. It will adjust by higher wages that mean consumers must pay higher prices, or that consumers will no longer get those items because they've become too expensive. Now that is how the free market adjusts. Fulfilling what Bastiat said of bad economists, Lowry is only considering half of the story. He's looking only at what is seen, not at what is not seen.

Take agriculture. Phillip Martin, an economist at the University of California, Davis, has demolished the argument that a crackdown on illegals would ruin it, or be a hardship to consumers. Most farming — livestock, grains, etc. — doesn't heavily rely on hired workers. Only about 20 percent of the farm sector does, chiefly those areas involving fresh fruit and vegetables.

The average "consumer unit" in the U.S. spends $7 a week on fresh fruit and vegetables, less than is spent on alcohol, according to Martin. On a $1 head of lettuce, the farm worker gets about 6 or 7 cents, roughly 1/15th of the retail price. Even a big run-up in the cost of labor can't hit the consumer very hard.

If Martin really said this, he's a terrible economist simply because he considered only retail prices. A labor cost increase of 6 or 7 cents will have significant effect on what a deli or restaurant pays to wholesalers. Here are farmer's market prices from North Caroline. Let's assume the maximum price for head lettuce, 24 heads for $25, which will be about 48 pounds for $25, or 52 cents per pound. And while 6 or 7 cents may not do too much to the price per head of lettuce in a grocery store, it will impact prepared foods that use lettuce, like sandwiches in the deli section and pre-packaged salads. The latter is now a fast-growing business in the United States; bags of pre-cut iceberg or romaine are affordable by middle-class families who can now save time like only the very wealthy once could. Eliminating illegal immigrant labor means that a lot of those middle-class families will effectively find themselves poorer. Either they'll have to pay more for conveniently pre-packaged lettuce, or they'll have less free time because they must cut up lettuce themselves.

A dollar more per pound of strawberries may not seem like much, but what will it do to the price of ice cream, shortcake and anything else that uses strawberries? Their price will go up too, and if high enough, people will start buying substitutes. Instead of strawberry-based products, they'll buy chocolate chip ice cream, apple pie and bananas. But the strawberry farmers can adjust, right? After all, I'm the first one to say that people should adapt to changing market conditions. But they shouldn't have to adapt here. It's a government policy (namely a crackdown on illegal immigration) that changed the conditions, not natural shifts in the economy, so people adapting to new industries is a complete waste of resources.

Update: I was thinking this morning that, even if it's only $10 more per year that I spend on groceries, will Lowry personally reimburse me and everyone else? As far as I'm concerned, that's $10 that his government policies stole from my pocket. Do I not have the right to transact peacefully and voluntarily with whomever I choose? According to Lowry, no, and it does not matter that I harm him nor anyone. And what is the basis of his claim that the government should deny me that freedom? "Saving American jobs," which we have already debunked. So there must be another reason besides that tiresome, xenophobic excuse. Is Lowry really that afraid of super-competitive labor from people whose skin tone is darker than his, people who will work 12-hour days in the sun for $2 an hour because even that's better than the conditions back home??

Martin recalls that the end of the bracero guest-worker program in the mid-1960s caused a one-year 40 percent wage increase for the United Farm Workers Union. A similar wage increase for legal farm workers today would work out to about a 10-dollar-a-year increase in the average family's bill for fruit and vegetables. Another thing happened with the end of the bracero program: The processed-tomato industry, which was heavily dependent on guest workers and was supposed to be devastated by their absence, learned how to mechanize and became more productive.

This is just like President Bush's failed steel tariffs. The claim was that they would add just a few dollars to the retail price of a refrigerator, and perhaps $25 to the retail price of a car. What they actually did was destroy a lot of jobs that involved cheaper foreign steel, because a few dollars here and there became significant. As I noted here, one study calculated that over 200,000 Americans lost their jobs because of the steel tariffs. And why? Just like with lettuce and strawberries, the tariff advocates forgot about all the businesses that turned the base commodity into finished products. They forgot, or unscrupulously ignored, that the price increase is far more drastic on the wholesale level.

Lowry's claim that a government policy can force an increase in productivity is among the most absurd things I ever heard a conservative utter. It's so interventionist that, once upon a time, only a liberal (if not an avowed socialist) would claim such a thing. When will modern conservatives learn that when government intervenes, when it refuses to let the free market work unhindered, it only makes things less efficient? If the technological progress were such a good thing, it would have already taken place before government forced it. An entrepreneur would have seized upon the opportunity to deliver more goods to his customers at cheaper prices.

So the market will manage with fewer illegal aliens. In agriculture, Martin speculates that will mean technological innovation in some sectors (peaches), and perhaps a shifting to production abroad in others (strawberries). There is indeed a niche for low-skill labor in America. The question is simply whether it should be filled by illegal or temporary Mexicans workers, or instead by legal immigrants and Americans, who can command slightly higher wages. The guest-worker lobby prefers the former option.

Of course the market will manage. As I said, it will by higher prices or consumers being able to afford less. You can't have your cake and eat it too: you can't eliminate illegal immigrant labor and expect Americans to have the same standard of living, not when illegal immigrants provide so many of our least expensive food and services. And again, Lowry ignores the facts, particularly that California and Arizona farmers can't hire enough legal labor, at least not for wages that permit them to sell enough of their products to remain in business.

I'll state my position again: because of 9/11 and Muslim terrorists trying to sneak in through our southern border, I believe the U.S. must regulate immigration. But it should make it fairly easy for non-criminal immigrants to get approval, meaning anyone trying to cross anywhere but at checkpoints will be up to no good. And if we eliminate the welfare state, then conservatives will no longer have to worry about illegal immigrants costing the states billions in school and hospital expenses. With those changes, the only immigrants coming will be those who just want to work hard and honestly. Who could possibly object to that?

If this debate is presented clearly, there is little doubt what most conservatives — and the public — would prefer. In his second term, President Bush has become a master of the reverse-wedge issue — hot-button issues that divide his political base and get it to feast on itself with charges of sexism, xenophobia and racism. The first was Harriet Miers; then there was the Dubai ports deal; and now comes his guest-worker proposal, making for a trifecta of political self-immolation.

There is still time for Bush to make an escape from this latest budding political disaster, but it has to begin with the affirmation that there are no jobs Americans won't do.

And Lowry ended with the myth with which he began. He had better be careful about invoking what "the public" prefers. Which presidential candidate did they prefer in 1992 and 1996? What "the public" wants can often be wrong, especially when their tendency is to vote for the guy who promises them the most government services on someone else's dime.

A tale of two Hillarys

A few days ago, the headline "Sen. Clinton Slams GOP Immigration Bill" and its subtitle "Sen. Clinton: GOP Immigration Bill Would Require 'Police State' for Enforcement" nearly made me choke on my morning coffee.

WASHINGTON Mar 8, 2006 (AP)— Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, a potential White House candidate in 2008, said Wednesday some Republicans are trying to create a "police state" to round up illegal immigrants.

Clinton, D-N.Y., spoke out on the U.S. immigration policy after largely staying away from an issue that has roiled Congress in recent months and spurred a number of conflicting proposals.

Speaking at a rally of Irish immigrants, Clinton criticized a bill the House passed in December that would impose harsher penalties for undocumented workers.

"Don't turn your backs on what made this country great," she said, calling the measure "a rebuke to what America stands for."

The House measure would make unlawful presence in the United States, which is currently a civil offense, a felony.

Clinton said it would be "an unworkable scheme to try to deport 11 million people, which you have to have a police state to try to do."

She called instead for immigration changes "based on strengthening our borders in order to make us safer from the threat of terrorism."

The senator also sent a four-page public letter to constituents outlining her views on immigration. In the letter, she shied away from specifics but said she does support allowing at least some of the estimated 11 million undocumented workers to earn citizenship.

Such changes should include "a path to earned citizenship for those who are here, working hard, paying taxes, respecting the law, and willing to meet a high bar for becoming a citizen," Clinton wrote....

President Bush has argued for a temporary worker program that would allow illegal immigrants to keep their jobs in hotels, restaurants, nurseries, agriculture and other businesses that depend on low-wage laborers....

Was she replaced by a clone or a twin? (I would say "evil twin" but that would be extremely hard to imagine.) This is not the Hillary Clinton we've seen in recent months, specifically the one who's harped on how the U.S. must tighten security along our southern border.

And she's completely wrong, anyway, about the White House's proposed bill. If anything, as Michelle Malkin and other conservatives have pointed out, the bill makes it even easier for immigrants to get legal status. The bill will not suddenly begin deporting illegal immigrants, but it will require them to register and make it easy enough to do. Hillary is up to her old trick of rhetoric and scare tactics, and unfortunately people tend to believe her.

So what happened? Did Hillary get visited by the three ghosts of immigration? That's not far from the truth, really. She needed to backtrack somehow from her "border security" hawkishness, trusting in voters' generally poor memories, because her advisors realized that she may be alienating too much of the Hispanic electorate. Recent polls show her not doing very strongly in a 2008 presidential race, and she can't afford to throw away any support. Democrats are finding that they can no longer count on very high percentages of the black vote, and is the Hispanic vote next?

I wrote in my entry on the politics and economics of illegal immigration that I support very liberalized immigration. And when federal agencies "crack down" on illegal immigrants, too often it's on the wrong people. However, in the wake of 9/11, with many terrorists trying to sneak into the U.S. through the southern border, I believe immigrants must be regulated and documented. If we make it easy enough for the honest ones who merely want to come here and work hard (and not take advantage of social services), then we'll know those trying to cross the border illegally will be up to no good.

Previous on HillaryWatch:
A tale of two hypocrites
The queen of state-worshippers, part II
The queen of state-worshippers

Price-setting and illegal immigration

(Don't miss the follow-up entry, "When conservatives don't get it about illegal immigration.")

The labor theory of value, theorized by Adam Smith, David Ricardo and Karl Marx, states that an item's value is based on its cost of production. Hence, the selling price of an item is based on the cost of creating it.

The theory of subjective value, however, counters that the selling price is only what the buyer believes it is worth. While Adam Smith said that diamonds are more expensive than water because diamonds cost more to produce, subjective value explains it is simply because people value diamonds more. Subjective value also explains why, if someone has many carats of diamonds but no water, one will be happy to trade a great value of diamonds in return for a relatively small amount of water (and at a ratio people would usually consider "unreasonable").

Still, the costs of production are a factor. A business will not continue operating if marginal revenue (profit margins) falls below marginal costs, so when it incurs increased costs (not just from supply and demand with raw materials and wholesale costs, but taxation too), then it must pass the increased costs onto its customers in the form of higher prices. Perhaps marginal revenues are still positive after falling, but if they are too low, they may no longer be enough for the business to bother with its current inventory; it could make more by offering something else. In both situations, if customers are unwilling to pay the higher prices, they will simply not have the product.

This should seem axiomatic and evident, yet many Americans consumers don't recognize it when it happens in real life. A week ago, McQ at QandO noted that, thanks to the crackdown on illegal immigration, California and Arizona farmers can't hire enough people to pick their crops. Regular Americans won't take the jobs, even though the farmers have offered $8.50 per hour. McQ said, "I promise, the right wage will work. Two problems with that a) farmers don't want to pay it and b) consumers don't want to pay for the added cost. And there might be a (c) as well ... imported produce doesn't have the high labor cost that produce in the US has."

Before discussing a) and b), I'd like to promote an entry I made on the subject of c). Last August, I confronted a couple of Larouchers who were outside a midtown Manhattan post office. They were passing out fliers, hawking books and promoting their socialist agenda to anyone passing by. When one of them claimed the U.S. imports most of its own food, I called him on it. It's simply wrong, but as I explained in my entry detailing the encounter, it's not a bad thing for the U.S. to import food, either.

Now, it's not that the California and Arizona farmers don't "want" to pay higher wages. They can't, not if they want to stay solvent. They would be perfectly willing to pay higher wages if it meant attracting enough workers to stay in business, and if they could continue to sell enough strawberries to stay in business. Reality sets in when we see how true McQ's b) is. If the farmers paid Americans what the latter demanded in pay, the farmers must charge higher prices to continue with the same profit margins, and the produce would become too expensive to retain as much of its customer base. The reduced sales volume might force strawberry producers to raise their prices even higher to cover certain fixed costs (which because of reduced sales would become a greater percentage of total business expenses).

Just how much sales fall depends on the individual products' elasticity (demand's responsiveness to price changes). Take strawberries as an example. Some people would continue buying strawberries as they did before; some would cut back but still buy some; others would no longer buy any strawberries. I myself buy strawberries infrequently, and I just realized I can't explain why, or tell you when I last bought some. Even if they rose to $3 or $4 per pound instead of the usual $2 at my local grocer, I would probably still be in the first group.

So, out the window goes the claim of many conservatives, that illegal immigrants take jobs away from Americans. On the contrary, this shows that illegal immigrants -- the ones who come here with perfectly peaceful intentions of hard, honest work and not harming others -- do take many meneal jobs that few, if any, Americans will. These jobs are available, but Americans today don't want them, even at $8.50 per hour. Americans have such high opportunity costs today that it's not worth their while to pick berries. They would have seventy years ago. Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath was fiction but certainly accurate in its depiction of Americans traveling to California from Oklahoma and other parts of the Midwest, searching for any kind of work. Because they had low opportunity costs, there was an abundant labor supply, and thus low wages, for tiring work.

As I explained in my entry on the politics and economics of illegal immigration, I am very open on immigration. I support the ability of people to come into our country and become part of the workforce, but I also believe we need to register them as a matter of pure national defense. It's not just Tom Clancy fiction that Islamic terrorists are trying to sneak in through our border with Mexico, which is why I disagree with Don Boudreaux, who supports fully free immigration. He recently criticized the Minutemen, some of whom probably irrationally fear immigrants as a threat to American labor.

The Minutemen are a two-edged sword. Are they restricting the flow of cheap immigrant labor that makes it possible for us to enjoy cheap and abundant? Unquestionably, but if we make immigration easy (which does not require it being unrestricted) for honest people who simply want to work, then the Minutemen would become irrelevant insofar as the immigrant labor that keeps our produce affordable. On the other hand, they would still be valuable for the other two services they also provide: spotting violent criminals (especially drug traffickers that more than a few times have turned some border towns into shooting galleries) and defending private land from trespassers. Last August, I was one of an apparent few to note illegal immigrants trespassing on someone's ranch and eventually winning the ranch in a court ruling. It was private land. The immigrants had no right to be on it.

If illegal immigrants become legitimate workers, will they demand higher wages? Certainly. They would not have to take any old job picking fruit, afraid of being caught and deported. However, I doubt they would get more than minimum wage, certainly not $8.50 per hour. Their opportunity costs would still not be very high, because their job opportunities elsewhere would still not be that great. There would still be a language barrier, making it difficult for those who cannot speak conversational English (let alone those who are uneducated and lack special skills) to get more than minimum wage jobs in fast food or cleaning services, and there are only so many of those jobs to go around. Also, making it easier for immigrants to achieve "legitimate" status would encourage more to come to El Norte. I can foresee a tremendous supply, perhaps an oversupply, of cheap labor for our most meneal jobs, especially because the alternatives in their home country are generally deep poverty and no rule of law.

Why should we not want to welcome people who are simply seeking honest work? What should it matter that they will send much of their money to their home countries? As we've seen, they don't really take jobs away from Americans, and as a matter of economics, it's no more relevant what they do with their savings or consumption spending than what I do with mine. The dollars they export must return to us in one form or another, and in addition to the cheap agricultural products they help supply, their own consumption spending is very much a part of our economy.

There are valid concerns about our welfare state luring illegal immigrants, to which I have always had a simple answer. If we abolished our welfare state, for everyone and not just immigrants, then the only people who would want to come here are honest workers and criminals. And we can deal with the criminals. If we set harsh penalties for the crimes they commit, penalties that they deserve, they will think twice about coming. Execute them for murder. For other crimes, throw them in jail for 10, 20, or 30 years, as befits the severity of the crime, then deport them. With a free-but-regulated immigration system, they'll not bother going through checkpoints, so if we manage to catch someone at the border, we'll have a pretty good idea that he's up to no good. If criminals return and are caught again, if their previous crime was a felony, send them back to prison for life -- real life, with no parole and no deportation. Let's stop the Dukakis-like "catch and release" games.

On a side note: I've mentioned being born overseas in the Philippines and not coming to the U.S. until I was seven years old. In case anyone was wondering: I was born a U.S. citizen, not naturalized. I would not trade it for any other citizenship.