Early large-scale human migration is the story of dispersal, spreading out as resources were used up and populations expanded past sustainability. The Agricultural Revolution brought greater inter-community trade and migration, including significant migration from rural areas to cities. Empires created the most widespread intercultural migration yet, but it wasn’t until the Age of Exploration that migration and trade increased dramatically. Falling travel costs brought millions of (mostly free) migrants to the New World and other European colonies for employment. Economic liberalism reinforced this trend toward globalization, but world war, nationalism, and more effective bureaucratic states ended this free system.
Humanity’s great migration began in Africa around 80,000 years ago when the human population seems to have dwindled to a few thousand. Richard Klein—author of The Human Career—has argued that genetic mutations in this small population gave rise to abstract thought and perhaps other capacities that led to rapid growth thereafter. In any case, the human population quickly expanded beyond the savannahs of eastern and southern Africa to the northern savannah between Ethiopia and Senegal.
Around 60,000 years ago, humans crossed the strait of Bab el Mandeb into Arabia, and they “quickly” dispersed along the coasts, and by 40,000 years ago, humans lived along the coasts from West Africa to Australia (the first movement out of the tropics). After Australia, people moved into colder climates in Eurasia and China. By 20,000 years ago, people had entered North America, and by 10,000 years ago, migrants lived on every continent in the world, except Antarctica. Although long-distance, cross-culture trade began as far back as 40,000 years ago—based on seashell jewelry found far inland and stone tools constructed from nonlocal materials—most inter-community migration was local, the most important being migrant brides who transferred customs between tribes.
The Agricultural Revolution saw these divergent communities begin to reconnect. The Revolution was brought on by the end of an ice age and a warmer, but more volatile climate. Sedentary communities began to appear and gradually adopt agriculture. Urbanization created epidemics that wiped out huge portions of the Sumerian working population, only to be replaced by Akkadians from rural areas. So great was this rural to city migration that Akkadian became the official language of the empire. As trade between communities increased, immigration also increased. Clay tablets, for example, record that Assyrian traders had established commercial communities in modern Turkey by 2000 BCE. At the same time, large-scale trade networks emerged from Mesopotamia to Asia Minor.
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America — the world’s most recent great civilization — faces a demographic problem that calls for a solution from the dawn of civilization. When civilization began in ancient Sumer over 6,000 years ago, city life increased trade and wealth, but also created the perfect environment for diseases to spread. Epidemics wiped out much of the working age population, but help soon arrived. Akkadians from neighboring rural areas traveled to the Tigris and Euphrates river basin to build Sumer’s irrigation canals, roads, and other infrastructure. The first great civilization survived, not by social isolation, but thanks to a constant supply of migrant workers.
Unlike Sumer, America has so thoroughly subdued disease and prolonged death that it has produced the opposite demographic situation — an aging population supported by a shrinking workforce. America’s over-65 demographic grew three and a half times faster than the general population during the 20th century. By 2050, it will have increased from 13 percent — a historic high — to over 20 percent, according to the Census Bureau. Meanwhile, America’s fertility rate has fallen from 3.7 births per woman in 1960 to barely replacement levels at 2.05.
All this adds up to fewer workers to pay for more retirees’ public benefits. Workers per Social Security beneficiary have fallen from 42 in 1945 to under three, and it’s only going to get worse. By 2050, there will be down just two workers. According to Social Security and Medicare Trustees, the unfunded liabilities for these programs exceed $18.7 trillion over the current generation’s lifespan plus $24.4 trillion from general revenues for Medicare Parts B and D.
Fewer workers will also mean less production, which equals less economic growth and innovation. As the European Commission has concluded, “ageing populations over the coming decades at the global level will [cause] not only a slowdown in the growth rate of output and living standards but also… falling rates of capital accumulation and a slowdown in productivity growth.” This slowdown means growing public services will rest on a shrinking tax base.
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An Immigrant Worker in Idaho
“Our immigration problem’s not going away.” That was the title of my article for Real Clear Policy this weekend. While the Pew Hispanic Center’s conclusion that “the net migration flow from Mexico to the United States has stopped” has some declaring immigration a “non-existent problem,” the reality is that America’s immigration system is as broken as ever. Running near-double digit unemployment in a weak economy may drive a few undocumented workers out of the country, but it is not a solution to America’s immigration problem. The only solution is an immigration system that allows immigrants to come to the U.S.
One response to my article was that there is already a legal way for workers to come — the H-2A visa program. But even Labor Department officials recognize that this program has failed. As President Bush’s U.S. Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao said in 2008:
There are 1.2 million hired agricultural workers in the United States today. Estimates show that between 600,000 and 800,000 are undocumented. There simply aren’t enough U.S. workers to fill the hundreds of thousands of agricultural job openings in this country. Farmers can hire temporary foreign workers to harvest their crops through the H-2A visa program… Yet despite the fact that this program is uncapped, agricultural employers hired only about 75,000 H-2A workers in 2007… Farmers report that the H2A program is burdensome, duplicative and riddled with delays. And many who have tried it report such bad experiences that they stopped using it altogether.
As the brother of Idaho’s Lt. Gov. Jim Little, who is also a grain farmer, recently told The Idaho Statesman, “It seems like they take great joy in piling on minutia and things we have to do.” As Little’s daughter who raises sheep told the Statesman, “we needed four new workers from Peru. I started the paperwork in July and our workers didn’t arrive until February. It’s really hard to depend on a program that takes that long to get workers here. We had to sell most of our sheep last year and this was one of the driving factors. It was just getting too hard to manage the labor situation.”
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Russell Pearce with white supremacist J.T. Ready
“As a civil libertarian… I don’t want a police state. I want a reason to do something.” That was SB 1070 author Russell Pearce at a Senate hearing on the controversial immigration law in Arizona. As an actual civil libertarian, I laughed when I heard his comments. SB 1070 is about as far from a civil libertarian law as possible. The law was written, not to stop illegal immigration, but as an all-out assault on the Hispanic community. If you don’t believe me, just read the law, which I’ve summarized here.
The law requires that police officers check immigration status during “any lawful contact” if “reasonable suspicion” exists that the individual is undocumented. What is reasonable suspicion? Well, according to the Arizona Police Training Manual, reasonable suspicion includes factors like “difficulty speaking English,” “dress,” locations where ”unlawfully present aliens are known to congregate,” and “demeanor” including “unexplained nervousness” and “refusal to make eye contact.” What exactly does an undocumented immigrant dress like? What would constitute “unexplained nervousness”? Is there any doubt that Hispanics would be more nervous than non-Hispanics in such a situation?
Why might a legal resident be nervous? Consider that while the U.S. Constitution protects the rights of citizens from having to carry their papers — as in a police state — Arizona’s immigration law is a de facto “papers-please” law, which requires aliens to “carry an alien registration document” under fear of arrest. A local CBS News affiliate reported the case of an Arizona commercial truck driver’s detention, even before the law was technically supposed to take effect. Abdon who has some difficulty speaking English well was detained at a truck weight scale and asked for his papers, and despite handing over his driver’s license, he was taken to a federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement center and forced to show his birth certificate. Abdon isn’t alone — other Hispanic Americans report similar treatment in Arizona.
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Arizona’s controversial immigration law — SB 1070 — heads to the Supreme Court this week. One can only hope that the Justices do a better job reading the law than much of the media. False claims about the law abound, so here’s an overview directly from the law’s text. Recognizing that this is an artificial distinction, I’ve divided my summary in half by “anti-immigrant provisions” and “anti-business provisions.”
Anti-Immigrant Provisions
SB 1070’s intent is “to make attrition through enforcement the public policy of all state and local government agencies in Arizona… to discourage and deter the unlawful entry and presence of aliens and economic activity by persons unlawfully present in the United States” (Section 1). To that end, the law expressly forbids any state or local agency from adopting “a policy that limits or restricts the enforcement of federal immigration laws to less than the full extent permitted by federal law” (Section 2(A)).
In application of these goals, police must make “a reasonable attempt when practicable to determine immigration status” during “any lawful contact” if “reasonable suspicion” exists that the individual is undocumented. This provision expressly forbids police from considering “race, color, or national origin” and allows individuals to use “any valid United States federal, state or local government issued identification” (Section 2(B)). The same section allows local governments to maintain immigration databases for the purposes of “determining eligibility for any public benefit,” “verifying any claim of residence,” and “determining whether [an alien] is in compliance with federal registration laws” (Section 2(E)).
If any “political subdivision” or “official” “adopts or implements a policy or practice” that violates these provisions, any legal resident “may bring an action to challenge” (Section 2(I)). Police officers are specifically “indemnified by the officer’s agency for costs incurred in connection with any action” (Section 2(J)). The penalties for violation are $1,500 “for each day that the policy has remained in effect after the filing of an action” for “the entity” (Section 2(I)). The section concludes ironically with the assertion that “this section shall be implemented in a manner consistent with federal laws regulating immigration, protecting the civil rights of all persons and respecting the privileges and immunities of United States citizens” (Section 2(K)).
The following section makes the “willful failure to complete or carry an alien registration document” (Section 3(A)) a class 1 misdemeanor with a $500 fine (plus jail costs)—it is considered a class 4 felony for a second offense or if within five years, the individual “has been removed from the United States” (Section 3(D, H)). Section 6 adds to this provision by allowing police “without a warrant” to make an arrest “if the officer has probable cause to believe that the “person to be arrested” has committed a deportable offense (Section 6(A)).
Section 4 outlaws “human smuggling,” and allows police to “stop any person who is operating a motor vehicle if the officer has reasonable suspicion to believe that the person is in violation of any civil traffic law and this section” (Section 4(D)). Section 5 also makes “transporting or harboring” undocumented aliens or “encouraging” them to enter the state a class 1 misdemeanor or a class 6 felony for more than 10 undocumented aliens. Similarly, Section 10 allows police to seize any vehicle that is “transporting” an undocumented alien. Section 11 creates a “gang and immigration intelligence” fund that consists of fines on businesses and immigrants to be “used for gang and immigration enforcement and for country jail reimbursement” (Section 11(A)).
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In his famous letter to the Danbury Baptists, Thomas Jefferson declared the Constitution erected a “wall of separation between church and state.” The Father of the Constitution James Madison agreed. “Religion and government will both exist with greater purity, the less they are mixed together,” he wrote in an 1822 letter. “It is impossible to deny,” he continued, “that Religion prevails with more zeal, and a more exemplary priesthood than it ever did when established and patronised by Public authority.”
Two centuries later, a new wall of separation must be built, this time between government and business. It is becoming clearer everyday to all parts of the political spectrum that business and government will, as Madison wrote of religion, “both exist with greater purity, the less they are mixed.” The animating cry of the Tea Party — that government has become too meddlesome and intrusive, not to mention unfair and unequal, in its dealings with business — is now echoed by Occupy Wall Street.
Yesterday, Occupy Portland called for “a national day of action” to challenge corporate power in America. “Corporations,” they write, “place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and domination over equality.” But to profit, private corporations must place themselves under people — they must serve them and cater to their needs. Far from domination, even self-interested CEOs must appeal to their customers’ interests or face bankruptcy.
But unfortunately, the relationship between business and consumers is changing. In the last four years, government’s involvement in the private sector has escalated to unprecedented levels. Bailouts have sunk billions of taxpayer dollars into failed banks, corporations, and other private organizations since the financial crisis began in late 2008. At the same time, corporate subsidies have increased dramatically as policymakers have attempted to stimulate the economy.
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While pro-life Americans march on the U.S. Capitol today to protest abortion, it is worth reflecting on conservatives’ fight in April of last year to defund America’s largest abortion provider—Planned Parenthood.
At the time, Senator Harry Reid said, “As a legislator, I’m frustrated. As an American, I’m appalled. As a husband, father and grandfather, I’m personally offended.” But liberals have no sense of irony. On the one hand, they claim that conservatives must be forced through taxes to pay for Planned Parenthood. Yet with the other hand, they voluntarily sign donation checks to Planned Parenthood.
In fact, liberals dramatically proved that the abortion provider doesn’t need federal funding. Once Republicans announced their intent to defund the organization, donations shot up 500 percent. Liberals touted this as thwarting the Republican plan to, as Harry Reid put it, “sacrifice my wife’s health, my daughter’s health and my nine granddaughters’ health.”
One can only imagine what would happen if Congress defunded every welfare program. Liberal donations might just “thwart” Republicans right into a libertarian utopia.
It’s not every day that the front page of The New York Times has two articles that highlight the importance of limited government, but today’s edition does exactly that. The first article describes how the Citizens United Supreme Court decision to allow corporations and unions to spend unlimited amounts on political causes has actually benefited free-speech and the political process.
Under the old political rules, Mitt Romney arrived in South Carolina this week the prohibitive Republican front-runner: flush with cash, awash in endorsements from a party establishment starting to coalesce behind him and buoyed by victories in Iowa and New Hampshire.
But as Mr. Romney is quickly learning, those rules no longer apply. Mr. Romney’s carefully tended network of Republican donors has been rendered functionally less important by “super PACs,” through which a handful of wealthy individuals are financing a multimillion-dollar advertising barrage to assail his record and prop up his opponents….
As a result, Mr. Romney’s remaining opponents have little incentive to drop out, knowing that their support from super PACs and Internet contributions from grass-roots supporters can keep them in the race long after they would have remained viable in earlier eras…
In other words, Republicans are actually getting more time to make a decision, more information about the candidates, and more debate about the issues as a result of the Citizens United decision. As John Samples shows in his book The Fallacy of Campaign Finance Reform, the motto “more money = more speech” does, in reality, hold true.
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Greece is rapidly degenerating into third-world status. The UK’s Daily Mail reports:
Youngsters are being dumped by their parents who are struggling to make ends meet in what is fast becoming the most tragic human consequence of the Euro crisis. It comes as pharmacists revealed the country had almost run out of aspirin, as multi-billion euro austerity measures filter their way through society.
If you only read this much of the article, you would assume that the country’s “austerity measures” are responsible for the medicine shortage, but if you’ve ever opened an economics textbook, you’d know this can’t be the case. Shortages occur when prices aren’t able to readjust to higher demand. Why aren’t prices able to adjust? Keep reading.
Further evidence of Greeks feeling the pinch of austerity measures is the lack of aspirin and other medicines now available in the country.
Actually, that’s more inaccurate information. Keep reading further.
Pharmacists are struggling to stock their shelves as the Greek government, which sets the prices for drugs, keeps them artificially low. This means that firms are turning to sell the drugs outside of the country for a higher price – leading to stock depletion for Greeks. Mina Mavrou, who runs one of the country’s 12,000 pharmacies, said she spent hours each day pleading with drug makers, wholesalers and colleagues to hunt down medicines for clients. And she said that even when drugs were available, pharmacists often must foot the bill up front, or patients simply do without.
Finally, the Daily Mail gets to the actual cause after repeatedly stating the wrong cause. Shortages can happen anywhere the government fixes prices — or artificially restricts supply. Shortages are not a third world problem or a first world problem — they’re a government problem.
President Obama’s Department of Justice (DOJ) has waged a hostile war against online gamblers including federal arrests and asset seizures of major Internet poker sites. Nonetheless, he has opened up a small opening for states to license their own gambling sites, and states are beginning to take advantage. New Jersey and Nevada — already traditional gambling states –have rushed to legalize Internet bets within state borders. The Associated Press reports:
Rushing to take advantage of a U.S. Justice Department ruling that in-state Internet gambling does not violate federal law, a New Jersey lawmaker is pushing for his colleagues to pass a bill legalizing online gambling within the state’s borders. State Sen. Raymond Lesniak told The Associated Press on Monday he’ll try to get a bill through the Legislature and on Gov. Chris Christie’s desk by next week. The goal is to make New Jersey the national leader in online gambling, now that the federal government says in-state bets do not violate the law.
Other states are looking into it as well. ABC News reports:
Washington D.C. and Nevada are already poised to start online gambling, mostly poker. Kentucky’s Gov. Steve Beshear is pushing for expanded gambling in his state. And in Illinois, there are hopes that online tickets will increase sales for the lottery.
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