1/I reviewed @reihan Salam's "Melting Pot or Civil War?" for Foreign Affairs:https://www.foreignaffairs.com/reviews/review-essay/2018-10-11/should-america-cut-low-skilled-immigration?gpp=LIdllm9bW3aj3/NdALeqADp1VU0zOS9kaldqMjViQ0xmWUMvRy9Ob2tiaElqMjFJR0Vwcm5rbUtCTEttTVFIT3BUaHpDT3dnUnBOSnlGaGxIOmY1N2FhMTFlNGVhNDE4Njk1YzFjYWIxY2MwMjM1YzA1ZTk1NTc3OWExOWI4N2VlMzhkZTk5YWM1NWU5NGFhNDQ%3D …
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4/Salam's solution: Stop low-skilled immigration and let in high-skilled immigrants instead. They and their descendants will get good jobs and make plenty of money, thus easing their integration with the rest of America and creating a melting pot.pic.twitter.com/xZbKoOZEbr
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5/Salam's argument has three big advantages over the typical restrictionist case: 1. It's not based on racism, overtly or covertly. 2. Salam is extremely well-informed about the facts of the issue. 3. Shifting toward skilled immigration is good policy.pic.twitter.com/ekIcJVrSYZ
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6/BUT, I have some problems with Salam's case. First, the idea that low-skilled immigration will lead to increased racial tensions seems to contradict the experience of anyone who has seen the changes in L.A., San Diego, NYC, Houston, or other immigration-heavy cities.pic.twitter.com/SmUGoyp4aC
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7/Second, low-skilled immigration to the U.S. has already collapsed. Immigrants are increasingly well-educated. So this just doesn't seem like an urgent problem. We took in lots of low-skilled immigrants in the 90s and early 2000s, and what's done is done.pic.twitter.com/nemp14KIuj
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8/Like Reihan, I favor a skills-based immigration system that also allows family reunification, like the one Canada uses. But my case for it relies a lot more on direct economic benefits, and less on prophecies of race war! (end)
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Oh, and you can buy the book here:https://www.amazon.com/Melting-Pot-Civil-War-Immigrants/dp/0735216274 …
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Do we have income data on children of low-skilled immigrants? Not sure if because your parents are low skilled you are likely to remain low skill.
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Yes, we have a lot, and no, they don't always. There is a correlation, though.
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Do they become an underclass though? I thought immigrants are more likely to make sure their kids get an education so they could move up the economic ladder.
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Yep. I don't think they do. Catch-up is about 75%, which is decent.
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I’d also say he should interrogate his belief high skilled immigrants with high incomes wouldn’t create racial tension. The experience of Tulsa, and the prevalent justification for anti-Semitism as anti-elitism suggests income isn’t a guard against xenophobia.
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Yep, I touched on this later in the review (but didn't want to tweet the whole thing)! I think that's right.
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that's not "making a case", that's making a bunch of wild ass assumptions about what the world will look like.
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I mean, when you're dealing with stuff like this, that's really all you can do.
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i think it's pretty wild to say "there will be a permanent underclass who's existence will cause race war" based on some pretty hazy (and lazy) assumptions about what the world will look like. That's about as unserious as it gets.
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Funny I know quite a few highly educated, high-skill high-tax paying people around here whose parents were low-skill immigrants. Still recall when one told me his parents worked in a "chips factory", I thought, "Intel?" But no, actual potato chips factory in East Bay.
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