Some Libertarians want a constitutional amendment along the lines of, “There shall be open borders.” IOW, no controls or restrictions on immigration at all. No green cards. No U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, no Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Anyone from anywhere could come here, live, and work, and eventually apply for citizenship.
If we adopted that policy, what would happen America’s economy and society?
In less than ten years, we’d be a third world country. We’re going down that slope now with the flood of illegals ignoring the border.
Funny, I haven’t noticed us going down any slope toward being a third world country. I don’t think that we could economically withstand a totally open border though. Maybe an European Union like arrangement with Mexico, Canada, and the US. But I think nationalism in all three countries would prevent that.
You’ve obviously never been in a Third World country. The U.S. could absorb fifty million Mexicans in ten years and still not even be close to Third World status.
Oversimplify much? Libertarians, if they want to open the borders, also want to end all government assistance programs, the minimum wage. etc, etc, etc. There wouldn’t be much incentive to come here if you wouldn’t be making any more than you were in Mexico. If you’re going to play “what if”, at least outline all the parameters that would change.
And your proof that that they are an economic drain is . . . ?
My prediction is, not much would happen - people who really want to come, come now anyway. Oh, we’d probably have more immigrants, but they’d be the less desperate, the ones who presently aren’t willing to take the risks and efforts to get in now. The biggest change would be better treatment for immigrants, as they wouldn’t have to deal with the problems of being illegal.
Nothing compels us to adopt their entire platform, especially in a hypothetical.
Actually, the biggest change would probably be a huge increase in cross-border shopping in the spots where the border is densely populated.
Just by looking around, it looks to me like everyone who wants to get here can, and all the laws are accomplishing is to make it a little harder for them to get here and get work. So the practical effect would likely be confined to the above.
Well, that and you’d kill the whole business of the coyotes, which wouldn’t be a bad thing. Kind of like drug prohibition: the illegality of immigration creates a lot of problems, but doesn’t solve anything, really, other than to give the usual demagogues talking points.
One hundred and sixty years after it began, the United States would lose the Mexican-American war. 
This is tantamount to saying current immigration controls are completely ineffective.
My own experience suggests that there would be a massive wave of immigration for at least several years. I’d estimate that at least one in ten Poles, Indians, and Slovaks I’ve met on my travels want to come to the U.S. A significant number of them had the means to get here, but were stopped by the impossibility of getting a visa.
This was particularly true of Poles; a huge percentage of Poles already have relatives in the US. Plenty of these visit the US already and would like to stay, but are not willing to overstay their tourist visas and go underground to do it.
I’m asking a question focused on that particular issue, and mentioned the Libs only because they are best-known for proposing open borders (but they are certainly not the only ones who favor that). What the U.S. would be like under a consistently Libertarian policy regime would be a very different debate.
But one worth having, come to think of it. So . . .
Pretty much, yes IMHO.
You clearly haven’t been to Alabama. We ARE a third world country.
At any rate. Our current inmigration policy lets in the least law-abiding and keeps out the more respectful. Opening the border could improve the quality of inmigration.
Worse than Miami?
I can’t advocate completely open borders. A ‘sign-in’ book/registry at the minimum, so we can know who is coming in and from where, and they must agree to a criminal background check and testing for any communicable diseases such as tuberculosis, AIDS, malaria, etc. Even then I would only grant them a visa conditional on employment similar to Singapore*, i.e., you have six to twelve months to find employment. If you find work, you can stay as long as you like. If not, you have to leave. And you can only apply for welfare or other government assistance after a certain period of residency and proof of filing taxes.
I think the number of people willing to accept those conditions are great enough without having to open the gates completely wide open. The job market would absorb what it could and then immigration would fall to ‘natural’ levels. If potential immigrants know the possibility of finding work is slim to none, then the incentive of uprooting oneself and moving here greatly diminishes.
I think there would be an initial increase in inflation caused by wage increases as current illegals could then demand fair wages and working conditions. Business would no longer be able to exploit that labor market.
The welfare burden may increase a bit, but that may be offset by allowing workers to obtain better health care and thus increasing productivity, as well as increased tax collections as less employees would work ‘under the table’.
I think the benefits of a more open immigration policy definitely outweigh the costs involved though.
I will always find it ironic that so many economic conservatives advocate free trade when it comes to products, services and capital, but not labor.
*Singapore’s main program is for skilled labor only, but unskilled workers can be sponsored by employers.
How so?
I think the next computer conference would look like the taxi stand at the San Jose airport.
Again? No thanks. Who is the poster that keeps a list of all the Libertarian threads? Maybe we can just reference them. They always end up nothing more that rantings from the anti-libertarians, and a descent into some rat hole about one particular policy-- pollution or police or something like that.
Mr. Tancredo is a racist. He is just pissed that he doesn’t know how to order an empanada de carne mechada. Miami works just fine, thank you very much (as much as I disliked it and moved out of it). Look at Alabama, its poverty, its infrastructure, public services, social injustices. That is what makes a world third.
There is a ton and a half of people who would like to be here and have no legal recourse to apply for residency. They understand that, choose not to be here illegaly and stay out with their skills and funds.
OTOH, people with nothing to lose, jump the border day and night and flood the job market and the service infrastructure.
If you open the border, all those people with better skills and attitudes would be able to come in and pressure out the fence-jumpers.