Study predicts $1.5 trillion increase in GDP if undocumented immigrant are legalized.

[DavidDvorkin]

A new study by University of California at Los Angeles professor Raúl Hinojosa-Ojeda suggests that comprehensive immigration reform, which includes an earned path to legalization for undocumented immigrants, could generate at least $1.5 trillion in added U.S. gross domestic product over 10 years.

http://thinkprogress.org/2010/01/07/hinojos-immigration/

I suppose many will dismiss this study because the man's name is Hispanic.

[Taitertots]

1. Did it work when Reagan did it? n/t

[galileoreloaded]

2. I don't know..I get the feeling this is the new third rail in politics.....

if I was an elected official, I wouldn't touch immigration with a 10 foot pole.

[blondeatlast]

3. More eye-opening might be a study that would measure the impact of

an absolute zero-tolerance policy against migrants.

Arizona would come to a grinding halt without illegal crossing. The facts ain't pretty, but without tourism and golf courses, we'd be sunk in short order.

[earthside]

4. What jobs?

The study assumes that there will be all these good-paying jobs for the newly legal immigrants to work -- that is certainly not on the foreseeable horizon.

It also assumes that immigration "reform" will mean an absolute end to all illegal immigration, something unlikely unless a fence/barrier is constructed on the border, patrolling is vigorous and employers that hire illegals are put in jail.

We have an unsustainable population now in this country given our present lifestyle -- the inconvenient truth is that we need to stop almost all immigration and encourage a population decrease to no more than 200 million humans.

But it is one of the few taboo topics left: overpopulation and what to do about it.

So, nothing will happen.

[Igel]

5. A piercing economic analysis, no doubt.

By a person with a PhD in political science, a masters in "social science-anthropology", and a bachelor's in economics.

I don't care what his last name is. He's a political science professor in an advocacy program making an economic point that just happens to agree with his politics.

He might be right. He might not be.

I would think that what you'd get is a rather messy set of equations that you'd have to solve before you could say much interesting: You formalize the immigration status of those here illegally and you have to deal with whether their education level merits increase in pay, whether increase in pay causes greater productivity (or the other way around), and whether continued in-migration would undermine the process. You'd have to account for different patterns of nativization and education among recent immigrants versus older immigrants. Diff eqs, anyone?

However, this is not likely to be intelligently critiqued. People in his field, in my humble experience, tend to have few to no critical thinking skills when it comes to things they agree with. What we'll here is loud-mouthed criticism on intellectual par with cheerleading from his allies. Much sound and fury signifying, in all likelihood, very little (at the most).

I go with C.S. Peirce on this one. He made the point that there is no end to possible hypotheses that could be subject to testing, but the resources for testing hypotheses are finite. I will use my finite resources elsewhere. For example, I hypothesize that the turkey pot pies I made about an hour ago are done, and it's a hypothesis I'm willing to commit resources to test. (And, dang, I just remembered I was supposed to pick up frozen peas today to add to the filling.)