American Politics

[ninjabot]

Elon Musk slams ‘wrong-headed’ economics, backs Sriram Krishnan’s skilled immigration push in US - Times of India

Times of India brings the Latest & Top Breaking News on Politics and Current Affairs in India & around the World, Cricket, Sports, Business, Bollywood News and Entertainment, Science, Technology, Health & Fitness news & opinions from leading columnists.

timesofindia.indiatimes.com

Elon Musk combats anti-immigration sentiment in posts decrying 'dire shortage' of tech talent | Fox Business

Elon Musk decried a "dire shortage" of engineering talent in the U.S. in social media posts advocating for increased high-skill immigration.

www.foxbusiness.com

--- Double Post Merged, Dec 26, 2024, Original Post Date: Dec 26, 2024 ---

 

[shionoro]

I have no doubt that, at the end of this discussion, businesses will get the workers they want in form of cheap, foreign labor. The consensus will be to be extra cruel to any foreigner or racial minority without a job.

 

[kkck]

In fairness, Musk is not wrong about US' need of skilled workers. And it's also true that due to improving contions in other places along with US not being THAT great anymore foreign students that in the past would have worked their butts off to simply stay in US now simply go back home. Any place that has a net positive amount of sanity would make a priority of keeping that talent... But with how the market has changed from international students basically fighting for the chance to stay to the US actually needing to compete for them I can't imagine this not being outrageous to magaheads.

 

[shionoro]

In fairness, Musk is not wrong about US' need of skilled workers. And it's also true that due to improving contions in other places along with US not being THAT great anymore foreign students that in the past would have worked their butts off to simply stay in US now simply go back home. Any place that has a net positive amount of sanity would make a priority of keeping that talent... But with how the market has changed from international students basically fighting for the chance to stay to the US actually needing to compete for them I can't imagine this not being outrageous to magaheads.

The big question here for me would be how it is a sustainable model to drain the talent from other places while being unable to fill the necessary jobs with US citizens even tho productivity increased a lot due to digitalization.

I think one should be sceptical of the talk about the job market "needing" people from abroad. The Job market wants them, because they are cheaper than Americans, either by salary or by the cost you have to pay for their education. And it does need them because it grew into that direction since a long time.

What Musk and his ilk want here is to have Americans compete with Indians that work 60 hours a week with little protection.

 

[kkck]

The big question here for me would be how it is a sustainable model to drain the talent from other places while being unable to fill the necessary jobs with US citizens even tho productivity increased a lot due to digitalization.

I think one should be sceptical of the talk about the job market "needing" people from abroad. The Job market wants them, because they are cheaper than Americans, either by salary or by the cost you have to pay for their education. And it does need them because it grew into that direction since a long time.

What Musk and his ilk want here is to have Americans compete with Indians that work 60 hours a week with little protection.

It's probably more sustainable than letting the competition get workers you might want or need at least. Granted that this is a bigger issue than just the segment of workers companies would fight over (the rest is as you say cheaper labor) but it doesn't make this less important.

Even if musk wants that, that doesn't necessarily align with the realities of the market. The simple reality that international students aren't staying at US as often as before will mitigate this. Hence my comment on the US being a destination where international students fought to stay at (on the threat of them losing their work visas if they were fired- which is a not a comment on the fairness of the practice) in contrast to the US being just a choice among other viable ones.

 

[shionoro]

It's probably more sustainable than letting the competition get workers you might want or need at least. Granted that this is a bigger issue than just the segment of workers companies would fight over (the rest is as you say cheaper labor) but it doesn't make this less important.

Even if musk wants that, that doesn't necessarily align with the realities of the market. The simple reality that international students aren't staying at US as often as before will mitigate this. Hence my comment on the US being a destination where international students fought to stay at (on the threat of them losing their work visas if they were fired- which is a not a comment on the fairness of the practice) in contrast to the US being just a choice among other viable ones.

I just do not see how the people in the US benefit from competing with foreign workers. It is true that your businesses benefitted from foreign students staying in the US (and the countries they came from often suffered), but does that really help the population? If all immigrants left the country, you would not have enough doctors, nurses and so on. But that just means you are not educating enough of them and chose to instead attract them from the world market, which means they are missing elsewhere.

And Elon doesnt even mean doctors here. Doctors are necessary. He talks about big tech. Silicon Valley just had massive layoffs. In a sector with massive layoffs, who really benefits from more cheap labor flowing in? That rather looks like wnating to replace the people they laid off cheaper.

 

[ninjabot]

 

[kkck]

I just do not see how the people in the US benefit from competing with foreign workers. It is true that your businesses benefitted from foreign students staying in the US (and the countries they came from often suffered), but does that really help the population? If all immigrants left the country, you would not have enough doctors, nurses and so on. But that just means you are not educating enough of them and chose to instead attract them from the world market, which means they are missing elsewhere.

And Elon doesnt even mean doctors here. Doctors are necessary. He talks about big tech. Silicon Valley just had massive layoffs. In a sector with massive layoffs, who really benefits from more cheap labor flowing in? That rather looks like wnating to replace the people they laid off cheaper.

The point here is to give a country's industry an edge over other countries because in the end they are all competing against one another. And I am not saying the US should be aiming to keep all international students nor to favor them over local workers (if anything in the past the system as you said allowed for international students to serve as cheaper labor where the primary incentive was to stay in the US). There's nothing wrong with a country having an immigration policy that serves its interests and goals.

 

[shionoro]

The point here is to give a country's industry an edge over other countries because in the end they are all competing against one another. And I am not saying the US should be aiming to keep all international students nor to favor them over local workers (if anything in the past the system as you said allowed for international students to serve as cheaper labor where the primary incentive was to stay in the US). There's nothing wrong with a country having an immigration policy that serves its interests and goals.

I think my gripe here is that i suspect that Democrats will react by simply calling Trump a racist and claim that every gripe someone might have with the overreliance on migrant workers is a racist. They are not going to adress the very legitimate, very working class problems that exist with this practice. Obviously, Laura Loomer does not have these legitimate problems in mind, but still democrats should.

There is more to be said about this issue, starting witht he question WHY America would not function without migrant workers and what companies are trying to use migrant workers for.

 

[ninjabot]

--- Double Post Merged, Dec 28, 2024, Original Post Date: Dec 28, 2024 ---

Feels good to see Cenk kicked in the dick by everyone on the Left for his bullshit MAGA outreach, no matter how far left they are. Super funny that he refuses to talk with Destiny about things though. I wonder why.

Here's hoping he ends up on a Piers Morgan panel with him again so Steven gets his turn at him.

EDIT: Also, that leak from Francesca about wanting to come on TYT to debate progressivism but being turned down is pretty telling, I think. She says Cenk told HER that TYT was "moderately progressive", and she wanted to debate what that means, which he rejected.

 

[kkck]

I think my gripe here is that i suspect that Democrats will react by simply calling Trump a racist and claim that every gripe someone might have with the overreliance on migrant workers is a racist. They are not going to adress the very legitimate, very working class problems that exist with this practice. Obviously, Laura Loomer does not have these legitimate problems in mind, but still democrats should.

There is more to be said about this issue, starting witht he question WHY America would not function without migrant workers and what companies are trying to use migrant workers for.

Yeah, probably. That's the go to move for a party that's all empathy and bleeding hearts but entirely devoid of anything resembling workable policy.

It's clear the US needs immigrants. But folk there are just not having a discussion on what immigration that serves the country and it's people look like. You only have democrats crying rivers of worthless empathy and republicans that are way too keen to inflict as much pain and agony on immigrants as deterrent to keep them out. It's clear one is worse than the other but both neither contributes anything to a functioning government.

 

[shionoro]

Ideally, I'd love if the discussion not only includes what benefits America the most but also about what is ethical when it comes to the poorer nations that the immigrants come from.

America has long benefitted from basically outsourcing its primary education to other countries that were often poorer and would need these doctors and tech workers that emigrate. Workmigration is not bad per se, but attracting well-educated workers and students that are needed elsewhere just because it is cheaper and easier than to educate these workers domestically is one of the many fascets of capitalism that hurts the global south and, ultimately, only really benefits very few people.

So bottom line is, if these Bangladeshi doctors are increasingly deciding to be a doctor in Bangladesh, I think that is a good thing.

The reason democrats just paint this discussion as racist is because they want to appear more business friendly to powerful industry people while at the same time appearing like good people to their liberal voters. They also know exactly what they are doing (the green party is doing it here, too) when they always couple the immigration debate with how "useful" immigrants are. And what they are do ing does not come from the best interest in mind for american or foreign workers.

 

[M3J]

I'm still frustrated at how badly Dems and their voters messed up and gave the election to Trump, and even after doing that Biden hasn't done much to protect people from republicans or give republicans a good "fuck you."

To make things worse, Democrat voters have possibly cost themselves a lot of future elections because of the way they exposed themselves as being shitty people. An election that Dems should have won, just handed to Trump. Makes me wonder if it was deliberate.

 

[shionoro]

Republicans are the party of big business the hard way.
Democrats are the party of big business the nice way.

There are of course exceptions and very respectable individual politicians or groups (and as i repeatedly said I have a lot of respect for joe biden), but the party profiles are that way. That is why democrats have a hard time tapping into the winning topics, because a lot of their politicians are on paroll of people who do benefit from high prices and low regulations.

It is no be all and end all question who "wins". Trump winning will mean a lot of horrible things, but the real question is whether Americans of all political leanings are able to find ways to protect their interests. That does not even have to be via politics, it can be via strikes or other forms of protest.

If Trump keeps on being a let down to the many union members that voted him, that might mean we are looking at a huge strikewave by 2028, right when the next election happens. And then Dems have another chance to come clean and support that energy.

 

[kkck]

Ideally, I'd love if the discussion not only includes what benefits America the most but also about what is ethical when it comes to the poorer nations that the immigrants come from.

America has long benefitted from basically outsourcing its primary education to other countries that were often poorer and would need these doctors and tech workers that emigrate. Workmigration is not bad per se, but attracting well-educated workers and students that are needed elsewhere just because it is cheaper and easier than to educate these workers domestically is one of the many fascets of capitalism that hurts the global south and, ultimately, only really benefits very few people.

So bottom line is, if these Bangladeshi doctors are increasingly deciding to be a doctor in Bangladesh, I think that is a good thing.

The reason democrats just paint this discussion as racist is because they want to appear more business friendly to powerful industry people while at the same time appearing like good people to their liberal voters. They also know exactly what they are doing (the green party is doing it here, too) when they always couple the immigration debate with how "useful" immigrants are. And what they are do ing does not come from the best interest in mind for american or foreign workers.

The main issue with that is that regardless of good intentions pretty much everything works with money. If the system doesn't make money then it crashes regardless of the amount of empathy (add to that, immigration is an issue that over the past 15 years has made people in both EU and US lose their damn minds). In practice obviously the US needs to train it's own workers and even give those preference over foreign ones (as any country should). But at the same time not all workers are equivalent to one another and brilliant minds can come from anywhere. Sane countries will over compete for those brilliant minds. The US not doing this and other countries doing it is an inherently losing position.

 

[shionoro]

The main issue with that is that regardless of good intentions pretty much everything works with money. If the system doesn't make money then it crashes regardless of the amount of empathy (add to that, immigration is an issue that over the past 15 years has made people in both EU and US lose their damn minds). In practice obviously the US needs to train it's own workers and even give those preference over foreign ones (as any country should). But at the same time not all workers are equivalent to one another and brilliant minds can come from anywhere. Sane countries will over compete for those brilliant minds. The US not doing this and other countries doing it is an inherently losing position.

If your productivity declines under a certain limit, the system breaks down. But that is not the same statement as saying that america's braindrain against other countries is necessary for America (or other places) to function in principle (as a cold turkey, it is obviously true).

I also really don't buy the "brilliant minds" argument. It really isn't like low immigration countries such as Japan, South Korea or China are lagging so far behind in key sectors because they miss out on some super geniusses.

There is nothing wrong when one country has workers without a job and the other has jobs without workers. That is a win win. But this system of braindrain has America as its biggest driver and beneficiary. While other countries do that, they usually do not do it as much and as organized (and of course they deserve the same cricism if they do not care for the country that it drains people from).

So we gotta be clear here: The Braindrain is committed by first world nations, America first and foremost, against everybody else. And it is not done out of necessity but out of the drive for more profit, just as slavery was not done out of necessity even tho it was lucrative. It does not risk breaking down if it does not pull indian tech workers, but it risked damage to poorer and less stable nations for all the decades that it went through with this.

 

[M3J]

Republicans are the party of big business the hard way.
Democrats are the party of big business the nice way.

There are of course exceptions and very respectable individual politicians or groups (and as i repeatedly said I have a lot of respect for joe biden), but the party profiles are that way. That is why democrats have a hard time tapping into the winning topics, because a lot of their politicians are on paroll of people who do benefit from high prices and low regulations.

It is no be all and end all question who "wins". Trump winning will mean a lot of horrible things, but the real question is whether Americans of all political leanings are able to find ways to protect their interests. That does not even have to be via politics, it can be via strikes or other forms of protest.

If Trump keeps on being a let down to the many union members that voted him, that might mean we are looking at a huge strikewave by 2028, right when the next election happens. And then Dems have another chance to come clean and support that energy.

yeah but that doesn't excuse Democrats losing because while they care about big businesses more than people, they're still willing to do things for people as well. Biden Admin put in protections for consumers that'll likely get removed under Trump Admin, like instant refund if flights get cancelled or whatnot.

I don't think Americans of most political leanings can find a way to protect anything as long as republicans don't want them to. Strikes? Republicans can get cops to stop it and get scabs in to work. Allow businesses to dock pay and whatnot and help them increase prices of things.

 

[shionoro]

yeah but that doesn't excuse Democrats losing because while they care about big businesses more than people, they're still willing to do things for people as well. Biden Admin put in protections for consumers that'll likely get removed under Trump Admin, like instant refund if flights get cancelled or whatnot.

I don't think Americans of most political leanings can find a way to protect anything as long as republicans don't want them to. Strikes? Republicans can get cops to stop it and get scabs in to work. Allow businesses to dock pay and whatnot and help them increase prices of things.

They would have to blow a lot of political capital to do that, tho. To change the national labors relations act, republicans would also need Democrats to help in order to overcome the filibuster. It isn't easy to take away legal rights from unions, at least not that quickly.

And of course, openly taking the right to resistance away might fuel resistance. That is why usually, rights are taken away silently.

 

[ninjabot]

It is no be all and end all question who "wins". Trump winning will mean a lot of horrible things, but the real question is whether Americans of all political leanings are able to find ways to protect their interests. That does not even have to be via politics, it can be via strikes or other forms of protest.

Well, uterus-having people will get their abortions however they can. Trans people will get ahold of their bathtub HRT (Not a joke. Keffals used to help ship it to kids that reach out to her through her twitch channel).

Brown folk? It'll be like 2016. Everyone'll know which bar is the MAGA bar and they'll avoid it as necessary. Or they'll avoid talking politics at work with their MAGA coworkers (except me, I want the smoke).

But this is all talking on individual person to person cases. If you're talking big stuff with protests and stuff, it depends on what's being protested and how big it gets. Kids'll just be gassed doing any of that protesting in red states under a Trump presidency.

--- Double Post Merged, Dec 31, 2024, Original Post Date: Dec 31, 2024 ---

 

[M3J]

They would have to blow a lot of political capital to do that, tho. To change the national labors relations act, republicans would also need Democrats to help in order to overcome the filibuster. It isn't easy to take away legal rights from unions, at least not that quickly.

And of course, openly taking the right to resistance away might fuel resistance. That is why usually, rights are taken away silently.

They don't have to blow much of anything, nor do they have anything to lose by this point. Wouldn't be hard for republicans to set it up so that they benefit for the next decades or so, I assume, given they have all the power.

I mean, we had cops taking away pro-Palestine activists' right to protest and do nothing to help when they were being doxxed and chemically terrorized by ZIonists, All they had to do was frame it in a way to make the activists look violent, and they can do the same for strikers. I mean, at this point of certain groups of people don't understand that the wealthy and businesses are the problem, they likely never will.