Geoff wrote:
> I'd like to think there's some consilience between idealism in social
> policy and idealism in environmental policy. Of course, there are
> obviously limits - there are ultimate limits to how many immigrants
> our country (or any country) can absorb in an ecological sense. But
> we are still the richest country on earth, and we should try to take
> "some" immigrants, because that's an im****tant part of our history and
> tradition. In other words, we should try to do both - to a degree and
> for a while, at least. We haven't reached the end yet.
>
> And yes, multiculturalism and biodiversity can be seen as
> complementary.
>
The only immigrants we need are the H-1b, who have been ranted against.
But every engineer who comes here creates 5 more jobs of ordinary folks-
secretaries, janitors, ****pping clerks, lab techs. Instead, we kept them
out, so they formed startups in Bangalore or wherever, creating the jobs
there, and the competition for American innovation.
But we are where we are, and as middle class incomes decline, expect to
see a dramatic increase in racism to drive out those perceived as taking
jobs Americans think other (lower class) Americans should have.
While America is rich, what really counts is the organization to manage
the resources... which has been reliant on cheap oil. Trying to adjust
it so that it will function on high fuel costs is risky, and the whole
thing could slide into economic panic at any time. The risk is made a
lot worse because, while previous generations had savings to tide them
over while they adjusted their careers, very few have savings now, and
will be reliant on entitlements.
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