March 22, 2013

Gallup: 138 million foreign adults want to immigrate to USA

The Gallup organization just released the results of a poll of 500,000 people worldwide. It turns out that America is the first choice destination for 138 million adult would-be immigrants. (Their children would no doubt add scores of millions more, bringing the total up to around, say, 200,000,000.)

And America Jr. (i.e., Canada) is the first choice of 37 million adults, and America's nephew Australia is the first choice of 26 million. Most of those would likely go to America instead if they could get in.
About 13% of the world's adults -- or about 630 million people -- say they would like to leave their country and move somewhere else permanently. For roughly 138 million people, that somewhere else would be the U.S. -- the No. 1 desired destination for potential migrants. The U.K., Canada, and France also rank among the top choices for potential migrants.
top desired destinations.gifThese findings are based on a rolling average of Gallup interviews with 501,366 adults in 154 countries between 2010 and 2012. The 154 countries represent more than 98% of the world's adult population; 3% of that population would like to relocate to the U.S. permanently. 
Approximately 19 Million in China Want to Move to the U.S. Permanently

Potential migrants who would like to move to the U.S. are logically the most likely to come from some of the most populous countries in the world. Roughly 10 million or more adults would like to move to the U.S. permanently from China, Nigeria, and India.
countries from which the most migrants to the US would likely come.gif
However, other populous countries such as Iran and Pakistan do not have large groups of people who say that they would like to move to the U.S. permanently. Instead, Pakistanis most desire to relocate to Saudi Arabia and the U.K. and Iranians would prefer to move to Jordan or Lebanon. This is not surprising, as Iranians and Pakistanis have some of the lowest U.S. leadership approval ratings in the world. 
The percentage of people in each country who would like to move to the U.S. permanently is perhaps more interesting. A staggering 37% of Liberians say that they would like to relocate to the U.S. permanently. One in four adults or more in Sierra Leone, the Dominican Republic, and Haiti would also like to move to the U.S. permanently. Three countries with the highest percentages of people who would like to relocate to the U.S. permanently are in Africa, seven are in Central America and the Caribbean, with the remaining country, Cambodia, in Asia. 
countries from which the highest percentage of population would like to move to the US.gif
Back in 2005, during Bush's Housing Bubble when their were lots of jobs in the Sand States, Pew found that 22 million Mexicans would like to illegally immigrate to the U.S. and about twice that many would come legally. But, convergence between Mexico and America has, at least temporarily, reduced the desirability of life in America to Mexicans. The way Mexicans look at the situation today, America is just too damn full of Mexicans to bother with.

So, even though it looks like about, say, a quarter of a billion foreigners and their kids would like to move here, that wouldn't actually happen even if America's immigration policy was as ethically sophisticated as our moral exemplars, taxpayer-supported libertarian economic theorists, suggest. Pretty quickly, the advantages of the U.S. as a place to live over even Liberia would start to wash away and the foreigners would go pester, maybe, New Zealand instead.

48 comments:

  1. To be fair, the countries with the largest fractions of people who want to come to the US are all really awful places, where you would probably also see a large fraction of the population wanting to move *anywhere* decent.

    The only surprise in your list was Japan--that's a pretty decent first world country, not some godforsaken third world hole.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. How many Americans would like to move i wonder? And of course we have North Dakota, to where multitudes are fleeing now. But interesting poll - open immigration advocates should be forced to confront it. At least discuss it - how many of the 138 million do we want?

      Delete
  2. This what I don't understand:

    How do white lefties and the anti-white crowds reconcile the fact that so many non-whites from full non-white societies want to come and live in white-majority societies - where they will surely be exposed to white racism.

    I seriously don't get their thinking on this subject.

    It just goes to show what a racket anti-racism is for the most part and how it's all primarily a squeeze the whitey game and the rest is just for suckers.

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  3. "This is not surprising , as Iranians and Pakistanis have some of the lowest U.S. leadership approval ratings in the world."

    And yet you oppose just those measures and actions that help reinforce this.

    Features not bugs.

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  4. and the powers that be, the rich, they want every single one of those potential immigrants here in the USA, ASAP.

    The more laborers, the more consumers, the mo' money, mo' money, mo' money for those with fat wallets, those who own the shares of the corporations that use labor and that sell products.


    Wages go down, sales go up, and our living standard goes down.

    Moo, baa, oink, moo, baa, oink!

    Make room, citizen, make room, make room at the trough. By the way, Wednesday is Soylent Red Day!

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  5. In other words, if you leave America wide open to the world, things will keep getting worse until this country is no better than the worst place on earth. Somalia, anyone?

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  6. Look for "progressives" to step up their demands that Americans reduce their family sizes event further, to make room for these folks, who can be expected to continue to have large families. Call it population replacement. And you can count on virtually all of them voting Democrat.

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    Replies
    1. At least until the money runs out. Then they will move to the next better place and drain them dry.

      Delete
  7. So, even though it looks like about, say, a quarter of a billion foreigners and their kids would like to move here, that wouldn't actually happen even if America's immigration policy was as ethically sophisticated as our moral exemplars, taxpayer-supported libertarian economic theorists, suggest. Pretty quickly, the advantages of the U.S. as a place to live over even Liberia would start to wash away and the foreigners would go pester, maybe, New Zealand instead.

    The taxpayer-supported libertarian economic theorists have to be aware of this, since they teach "factor price equalization" in their economics classes, which says that free trade is sufficient to equalize factors like wage rates across countries, even without factor (eg capital, labor) mobility. Factor mobility will accelerate the equalization:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Factor_price_equalization

    So the taxpayer-funded libertarian economic theorists apparently think this is a swell idea.

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  8. The main argument I use against open borders people is to simply ask when the immigration would finally stop. The obvious answer is that it would stop when even the poorest, most wretched person on Earth would look at the U.S. and decide he had nothing to gain by moving there. That's not a country I would want to live in.

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  9. Thanks for what you are doing, Steve.

    You are doing better work than just about anyone in opposing and ridiculing these nation-destroying fools.

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  10. OT but I'd like to see Steve comment on the Adria Richards dust-up. It has all the elements: female mulatto feminist tech worker (!) overhears a couple of geeky male techies sharing an off-color joke, gets VERY upset, reports the "incident" and underhandedly tweets a picture of the jokers to the world, causing one of them to ACTUALLY GET FIRED. In a somewhat happy development, a geeky backlash ensues, and Richards then loses HER job (supposedly).

    It's the American Comedy, 2013.

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  11. mouse:

    Well, maybe instead of spending billions we don't have to bomb Pakistanis so they won't want to come to the US, we could hire some clerks to stamp REJECTED on their visa applications? If nothing else, it's got to be cheaper.

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  12. Ted's Bender3/22/13, 7:32 PM

    Nearly 40% of Liberia's population wants to move to the US. That's interesting- it certainly says something about black rule. This people descended from freed blacks that couldn't wait to get away from the white man and govern themselves. They came with knowledge of the advancements of the US at the time, as well as a nice bit of support from the US American Colonization Society, and some investments along the way after that by the US. And still, here we are. Haiti also had some advantage of former association with the white man, and yet, both countries are still basically indistinguishable from the other all-black African countries. I guess we're not supposed to notice that pattern, though.

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  13. Federal Mike3/22/13, 7:37 PM

    "This what I don't understand:

    How do white lefties and the anti-white crowds reconcile the fact that so many non-whites from full non-white societies want to come and live in white-majority societies - where they will surely be exposed to white racism.

    I seriously don't get their thinking on this subject.

    It just goes to show what a racket anti-racism is for the most part and how it's all primarily a squeeze the whitey game and the rest is just for suckers."


    The lefties get to publicly pretend they care about noblesse oblige while living as far away from them as possible, and increasing their base of Dem voters who will support their big govt schemes.

    The NeoCons are 'inviting the world' while increasing cheap labor for big businesses who want to pass on their costs to the taxpayer.

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  14. Meanwhile - Rahmbo has learned from Buddy Bloomberg. The ethnic bleaching of Chicago continues..

    CHICAGO (CBS) – The Chicago Public Schools’ plan to close 53 schools and 61 buildings, mostly in black neighborhoods, has some West Side residents vowing to fight the Emanuel administration until the end.

    As WBBM Newsradio’s Mike Krauser reports, to hear some tell it on the West Side, Mayor Rahm Emanuel is a racist liar who doesn’t care about the kids. And they’re just getting started.

    “I don’t see any Caucasians being moved, bussed, or murdered in the streets as they travel along gang "lines, or stand on the steps of a CPS school,” said activist Wendy Matil Pearson as opponents of the school closing plans protested outside Horatio May Elementary Community Academy in the Austin neighborhood.
    -------------------------
    NO YOU DON'T

    “I don’t see any Caucasians being moved, bussed, or murdered in the streets as they travel along gang "lines, or stand on the steps of a CPS school,”

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  15. Off topic, but of interest to the Sailerites:

    This weeks BBC podcast "In Our Time" covers Alfred Russel Wallace, a contemporary of Darwin. One of the better podcast by the In Our Time group.

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/iot

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  16. China has a booming economy yet people don't want to go there? Why? Why don't people want to go to Japan, Korea, Taiwan or China? I guess for all the talk of East Asians being psuedo-white they really aren't. It's plain to see though. Last year, a bust of illegal immigrants in shipping containers found among others Japanese.

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  17. Its a paradox really. The BETTER a country is, the more people want to immigrate to it. The more people immigrate to it, the WORSE a country it becomes.

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  18. What is really crazy is how many liberals think everyone should move to North Western Europe. Have they ever looked at it on a map compared to the rest of the world? It is a very small sliver of the land mass of the earth.

    I've had the though recently that we should start websites encouraging mass immigration to show how ridiculous these ideas really are. Say a website encouraging all the people of the third world to go to the UK and go on welfare, and say anyone who disagrees is of course "evil", esp the working class.

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  19. "Three countries with the highest percentages of people who would like to relocate to the U.S. permanently are in Africa,..."

    It must be because of all the white racists here. Black people really dig white racists.

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  20. Matthew said...
    if you leave America wide open to the world, things will keep getting worse until this country is no better than the worst place on earth.


    Hold on. Several people have made a similar remark...

    Y'all do realize this is exactly what Peter Singer (Earth's best-known philosopher) promotes as an active good; that Folks Like Us should share what we have up to the point that there's little difference remaining between Us and Them. "To the point of marginal utility" is how he put it.

    What to us is a reductio ad absurdum is to these folks a guiding star.

    To paraphrase Popper, it is impossible for us to joke in such a way that some lefty would never take it seriously and say "Hey that's a great idea!"

    -Fluffy

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  21. Lest you think I demonize Singer, to his credit he does want the left to wise up to the implications of evolution.

    Okay, that's not much, but still...

    -Fluffy

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  22. People of color wanna be people of dollar.

    And white cons are on the leash. They are the people of collar.

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  23. Those numbers seem low to me. There have got to be way more than 138 million people who would move to the USA if they could. To take one place I have actually been to, Guyana in South America, I honestly think the entire population except for some of the Amerindians would move to the USA or Canada if they could. And, they'd prefer the USA to Canada because it's warmer, and the USA to Australia because it's blacker/browner.

    It's also not just about impoverishment. Look at how China's richest spend serious money to move to the USA or Canada, or at least have boltholes there in case of emergency. That has to tell you something about China.

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  24. 19 million is 1.5% of China's population.

    10 million is 0.8% of India's population.

    4 million is 3% of Japan's population.

    3 million is 4.7% of the UK's population.

    So according to this survey, significantly higher percentages of Japanese and British than percentages of Chinese and Indians want to move to the US?

    Is this accurate?

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  25. Imagine, if you will, that people like Steve and Vdare, actually gave up the ghost and stopped kicking back against the madness. Imagine that they stopped their daily haranguing, insulting and bullying of economists and politicians. Imagine if the political class actually truimphed and got their way ie they made themselves feel 'clever' by listening to a bunch of sub moronic economists.
    Open borders (as strongly recommened by these jurnals of the political class, the WSJ and The Economist), were actually instituted - as it happens the UK Labour Party almost pulled off this feat 10 years ago by simply lying about it -. Well those 'ballpark' figures issued by Steve are a massive underestimate. Many, many more would come. Rest assured once those untold millions have moved in, they'll drag another untold million in behind them, auntie Maria, Granny, the knife-grinder, the rest. That's ALWAYS but ALWAYS the story.

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  26. Indonesia, the worlds 4th most populous nation, is surprisingly absent despite being poor by world standards. On the other hand they have great climate, great food, hot women and it's an exceptionally beautiful land.

    BTW Indonesia would fit the Sailerian meme of short, brown people that punch below their weight.

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  27. Amren has a vid from Vice, on Liberia. After watching that, you understand why 37% want to leave to come to the US but also after watching that you will not understand why 63% want to remain.

    http://www.amren.com/features/2013/03/into-the-heart-of-darkness/

    Interestingly enough in the beginning of the vid they said back in President Monroe's day, 10,000 slaves took up the offer to return to Liberia. They returned to Liberia and immediately enslaved the native Liberians, setting up a plantation system in which the returning American slaves were the masters and Black Betty whip crackers.

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  28. The customer is always right.

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  29. How do white lefties and the anti-white crowds reconcile the fact that so many non-whites from full non-white societies want to come and live in white-majority societies - where they will surely be exposed to white racism.

    I seriously don't get their thinking on this subject.


    Oh, that's easy enough to reconcile. White countries are rich and pleasant because they stole all the goods and labor of the hard-working people of color, doncha know, and they can tolerate the (temporary) presence of lazy racist whites for the purpose of getting their stuff back. Like the quote I came across the other day: some Indian in Britain claiming that everything nice there was really "the wealth of India". Same as how black slaves and Chinese coolies, like, totally built America.

    It's easy to get their "thinking", as long as you remember that it's "thinking", not thinking.

    But that's just the dumb ones. I assume the smart ones know what they're doing.

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  30. I lived in the USA for over a decade, studied and worked there, many people from USA returned back to India call USA an Golden Cage, Life is expensive in the USA.

    Cost for the same items I used to use in USA is almost very cheap, We get less expensive consumer goods from Middle-East, Singapore, Thailand, we have all the amenities available in the USA now.

    Population is a problem in India, I have found a work around it, I work in High Tech area. I get up at 2:00 AM, till 10:00 AM its your own city with no one to bother you.

    Life in the East coast was always Lawn Moving, Racking, and Snow-Plowing. I call Winter in USA a Cold Hell. Life in Bangalore 95% of the days is great.

    I work from 11:00 AM through afternoons on my laptop at several 2000 year old temples amongst Cows, Monkeys, Birds and sacred chants. its very surreal. Sporing for the last one month amazing feeling.

    We got international food also, and cheap broad-band, and wifi so never feel lost.

    So far life is good, may have water problems.

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  31. So Pakistanis dream of moving to the UK.
    I can give you a 100% gold-plated, cast-iron guarantee that there is nothing but nothing that the *real* English people would HATE to see more.

    ReplyDelete
  32. "138 million foreign adults want to immigrate to USA"

    Only 138 million! There are 7 billion people in the world. They must not all love us!! What, oh what are we doing wrong?

    Surely they all pine for the American Dream and to live surrounded by Americans who know the American Way? There can be nothing better for them all than to come here, leave their backward ways behind, and live under our benign tutelage!

    Only 138 million is scandalous and reflects badly upon us. The government must get to work on this problem right away.

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  33. rec2man wrote:

    "I lived in the USA for over a decade, studied and worked there, many people from USA returned back to India call USA an Golden Cage, Life is expensive in the USA."

    Congratulations, rec2man, best of luck to you. Tell your story to all those young grads in Bangalore and Pune. There's probably a lot of good they can do in India if they can pass up the chance at quick Big Bucks. That can ruin you!

    I know a number of Indians who have returned from silicon valley to India. Probably raising their kids Indian, and not exposed to the perhaps toxic US educational system, is one reason. Another reason I know for a fact has motivated some is first-hand experience with Mexican petty violence, things such as young gang-agers keying cars after an exchange of words over simple things such as sitting on parked cars.

    (Along the lines of another of Steve's recent themes, there might be some black violence, but most of the blacks in the area seem to have become segregated in particular areas, in the others they are completely outnumbered by the Mexicans and don't stand much chance.)

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  34. *"So Pakistanis dream of moving to the UK.
    I can give you a 100% gold-plated, cast-iron guarantee that there is nothing but nothing that the *real* English people would HATE to see more."*

    ~I'm not sure about that, many english : "would rather be a paki than a scouse." as the chant goes. Though I guess it is debatable if scousers are 'real' english. :)

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  35. FAO rec2man:

    My parents immigrated to the US from India in the 80's and have the exact opposite view of yours (they go back to india ever other summer for a few weeks so they are aware of the developments). They are middle-middle class in a small town in the mid-atlantic and they have zero desire to move back to india. For all of the faults you list regarding the US, the corruption, lack of rule of law, lack of cleanliness, disorderly courts, ridiculous population density, lack of clean water, air, and lack of consistent electricity weight too heavily against the ability to afford a fulltime house-keeper or two if they went back.

    Mind you, coming to the US was not their first choice. Australia by far was.

    If it were up to me (i'm a US citizen) I would move to Switzerland, Benelux, Germany, or even Austria tomorrow.

    ReplyDelete
  36. "Anonymous said...

    Y'all do realize this is exactly what Peter Singer (Earth's best-known philosopher) promotes as an active good;"

    That Peter Singer is considered to be the leading philosopher of our time is all the evidence one needs of the complete moral debasement of our society.

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  37. The study says immigration to L.A. county peaked in 1990 and has slowed since then, with the projection that two-thirds of these new comers will have more than 20 years worth of experience on United States soil by 2030.
    A little good news, the Queen City of illegal immirgants La has slowed down since 1990. People notice more because a lot of the native born left and during the past 20 years still more illegals came.

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  38. When a US citizen wants a spouse to be able to stay in the US permanently with a green card (and the potential for citizenship later), they have to go through some significant hurdles for a spousal visa. It can take years, can cost thousands in fees for lawyers, over a thousand to the govt, time spent having to drive to distant cities for interviews, biometrics waiting around in govt offices, etc.

    Even then, its not guaranteed- you have to demonstrate you can take care of this person, so having a good education, good job, decent salary, clean record, good credit, etc. seem to be needed, and you even have to sign a statement indicating you will support this person if something goes wrong, like a divorce or they are unable to work.

    It goes without saying that the spouse must also demonstrate that they will likely not be a burden, have a clean record, etc.

    Even after getting a green card, the spouse is only allowed a temporary green card, and additional follow up is needed after a couple of years to prove that they are in a viable marriage, that they are still a self-supporting couple, etc. All of which requires additional headaches, time spent with paperwork, fees, etc.

    I think a given citizen is only allowed to bring in a maximum of 2 people this way over the course of their life (if they had a divorce), but I could be wrong.

    My point here is not criticism of the system at hand for spousal visas, but rather to wonder why, if for an average citizen, this much is required of both the sponsor and the foreigner to bring over a foreign national,why don't we have similar hurdles for educational institutions, etc that bring over large numbers of foreigners or for that matter, make elites, whether businessmen clamoring for cheap labor, college administrators, etc who are so adamant about supporting illegals or others to gain citizenship or visas, have to bear personal responsibility for them in this way, bear costs if they don't cut it, bear what are to them high fees, etc? Why aren't we demanding this of them? Why aren't we demanding the same level of scrutiny that we demand of legal immigrants who want a green card, to
    illegals that we are considering handing citizenship to (especially since citizenship entails bigger reward)? And why is this topic verboten to even discuss in public?









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  39. "For all of the faults you list regarding the US, the corruption, lack of rule of law, lack of cleanliness, disorderly courts, ridiculous population density, lack of clean water, air, and lack of consistent electricity weight too heavily..."

    An honest question for you or your parents. Why does the US not have these problems, or at least seems to have them to a lesser degree? This is not a rhetorical question, though I know a handful of theories.

    Do you or your parents think these problems in India are tractable, something that can be overcome? Or are they insolvable, something that can only be overcome by emigration? If they are insolvable, why is that? Some elements of the society that will never change? Things that will change but it will take a long time? Population density? Or what? As someone who has insight into both societies I'd be interested in hearing your opinion.

    One reason these are important questions is that another natural question is: do you think, if we took in enough Indians, we'd have these problems as well? Would it depend on the Indians we took in? Education? Language? Religious practices? Or what?

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  40. I think the world over will have a huge problem, we are running out of all resources, Oil being the most important. Over population, etc. There is need for conservatism on many fronts.

    I live in a well-off neighborhood, so I occasionally see huge crowds. Indian government is a US puppet. India was well-off before the liberalization, True a lot of people have modern amenities, but greed, cheating all have increased, the old "brotherly love" between people is no longer there.

    US I think has a bigger problem, its energy dependent, I read somewhere USA is a Salad Bowl and not a Melting Pot.

    As long as one [USA] has Money its OK, one cannot survive without Money in the USA.

    A lot of people in India will starve to death when things go wrong, huge violence etc. Problem may be lack of population control, endemic corruption, improper resource utilization.

    I think in the US case it will be like total Anarchy, even poor people own guns. Total mess.

    I hope I am wrong, only time will tell.

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  41. "Mind you, coming to the US was not their first choice. Australia by far was.

    If it were up to me (i'm a US citizen) I would move to Switzerland, Benelux, Germany, or even Austria tomorrow."

    More white countries I see. Don't worry those countries are going to be ruined too because they are almost as stupid as we are with immigration.

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  42. "More white countries I see. Don't worry those countries are going to be ruined too because they are almost as stupid as we are with immigration."

    There may well be a biological basis for such "stupidity":

    "How Natural Selection Can Create Both Self- and Other-Regarding Preferences, and Networked Minds", T. Grund, C. Waloszek, D. Helbing, Nature, 19 March 2013.

    Also interesting applications of game theory and perhaps relevant to the "A Farewell to Alms" question.

    Abstract:

    "Biological competition is widely believed to result in the evolution of selfish preferences. The related concept of the ‘homo economicus’ is at the core of mainstream economics. However, there is also experimental and empirical evidence for other-regarding preferences. Here we present a theory that explains both, self-regarding and other-regarding preferences. Assuming conditions promoting non-cooperative behaviour, we demonstrate that intergenerational migration determines whether evolutionary competition results in a ‘homo economicus’ (showing self-regarding preferences) or a ‘homo socialis’ (having other-regarding preferences). Our model assumes spatially interacting agents playing prisoner's dilemmas, who inherit a trait determining ‘friendliness’, but mutations tend to undermine it. Reproduction is ruled by fitness-based selection without a cultural modification of reproduction rates. Our model calls for a complementary economic theory for ‘networked minds’ (the ‘homo socialis’) and lays the foundations for an evolutionarily grounded theory of other-regarding agents, explaining individually different utility functions as well as conditional cooperation."

    Some points:

    "In social dilemma situations, caring about others can reduce individual success."

    "... the tendency to share is often attributed to other-regarding preferences. But how did such other-regarding preferences evolve and spread? It was suggested that group selection would solve the puzzle, but it only works when groups do not mix."


    Idealist and friendliness here has a specific meaning in their mathematical model:

    "... idealists will normally get miserable payoffs and have very small reproduction rates. They tend to die without reproducing..."

    "... co-location of mutation-borne ‘idealists’ by coincidence after a long time. This would lead to the formation of a cluster of cooperators of ‘supercritical’ size. Such clustering would dramatically increase the relative fitness of other-regarding agents in the cluster and create sufficiently high reproduction rates to spread friendliness."


    But I imagine cluster size is relative and modern transportation has thrown everything awry.

    "The significance of local reproduction for the evolution of other-regarding preferences is striking and may explain why such preferences are more common in some parts of the world than in others."

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  43. Hey, Steve,

    What do you make of this Zogby poll three years ago that found that about 40 million Mexicans would live in the U.S. if they could?

    http://www.cis.org/ZogbyPoll-EffectsOfAmnesty

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  44. "The significance of local reproduction for the evolution of other-regarding preferences is striking and may explain why such preferences are more common in some parts of the world than in others."

    A central problem of our time, quite ironic, is that the very property of large-group mutual cooperation that likely contributed to the extreme (and unusual, perhaps freak) historic success of the nations of Western Europe, led (almost incidentally due to advances in transport) to these very nations being in danger of being submerged beneath waves of immigrants that do not engage in mutual large-group cooperation (most certainly not with the core populations of those very same countries).

    Current ruling elites, in particular, seem to have attracted people who really do have innate "other-regarding preferences", the type that really always "want (us) to give back..." no matter what. Probably the horrors of WWII and the desire to eliminate conflict between nation-sized highly-cooperative high-trust groups played a role. Perhaps in times past these people would have joined religious orders.

    Here's an interesting recent insight into such elite other-regarding preferences:

    "Why we on the Left made an epic mistake on immigration",
    David Goodhart, 22 March 2013.


    "Our instinctive reaction has been... that the only decent policy is to throw open our doors to all and that those with doubts about how we run our multi-racial society are guilty of prejudice."

    "For 30 years, the Left has blinded itself with sentiment about diversity. But we got it wrong."

    "Those in the race lobby have been slow to recognise that strong collective identities are legitimate for majorities as well as minorities, for white as well as for black people."

    "For a democratic state to have any meaning, it must ‘belong’ to existing citizens."

    "The fault lies with our leaders... a very senior civil servant, said: ‘When I was at the Treasury, I argued for the most open door possible to immigration [because] I saw it as my job to maximise global welfare not national welfare.’"

    "... mass immigration makes big demands on host communities, too... politics and law cannot concern themselves only with the problems of minorities."


    The author is a liberal (Steve recently wrote about the Democrats possibly being in for a surprise if they keep playing this game). Liberals are in danger of losing much of what they see as their success:

    "... it becomes more difficult to sustain the legitimacy of the welfare state.

    "... we need at least some sense of ‘emotional citizenship’, the belief that, despite many different interests, we’re also part of the same team."


    Simple common sense truly is rare.

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  45. If it were up to me (i'm a US citizen) I would move to Switzerland, Benelux, Germany, or even Austria tomorrow.

    And this is the problem with current US immigration. We are taking in passport holders but not persons who want to be Americans. His parents appreciate America over India, but want Australia. He wants central europe. He is a passport holder, not an American. Sad.

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  46. Hey, what's up with the proliferation of dudes using chick pictures around here? Oh, BTW I guess after 6 years I should show y'all what I look like.

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