Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Free market ≠ Open borders

Here is a nice, clear explanation of why support for free markets does not require support for open borders. In fact quie the opposite,

31. bogie wheel

The ruling class is open borders. This is NOT necessarily the same thing as being a hard-core principled believer in free markets. It could be that. OR it could be (1) the progressive tactic of trying to “get a new people” (ie Dem voters) via massive waves of immigrants looking for social programs and government handouts, or (2) businesses looking for ridiculously cheap labor, nevermind the nation’s immigration laws or the social or political consequences of massive waves of immigrants driving down labor prices and destroying the ability of the marginally skilled to get entry-level jobs to improve their skills (not to mention pay the rent, eat, etc).


Related to what I mentioned in the last thread, a free market is not an anarchic market, is not a lawless market. Just because the government shouldn’t intrude into, say, minimum wage practices is not the same thing as saying the government shouldn’t enforce our border laws. Limiting immigration to manageable (assimilate-able) levels, and especially stopping the tide of illegal immigration, is (1) a duty of the federal government, which is charged with maintaining national sovereignty via our borders and stop us from being invaded, (2) a matter of national security these days, and (3) a socio-political issue, preserving order also being a governmental duty.


To say that a staunch believer in the free market is therefore obliged, out of intellectual consistency’s sake, to advocate open borders, is balderdash. There are three very good and important reasons to control the borders and restrict immigration. All three are related to primary duties of the government. All three involve one of the few things that the government is Constitutionally charged with actually DOING, as opposed to keeping its grubby paws off of.


Only when, and not until, the nation’s workforce is composed of American citizens and legal residents, does the actual free market of domstic labor negotiations begin. When the government fails to stop illegal immigration and/or bungles legal immigration levels, and most especially when government does this intentionally, it is in essence putting its thumb on the scale of the domestic labor market. And it is weighting the scale AGAINST several subsets of American workers.


As far as NAFTA and free trade agreements are concerned, once again you have to check definitions. Is it *really* “free trade” if American businesses are, from the outset, smothered in costly regulations that drive the unit price of producing a widget up to five or ten times what less regulated (and frequently subsidized) Chinese or Mexican widgets cost? IOW the issue of the government’s role in whether free trade is genuinely free or not begins loooooong before Congress deliberates a tariff bill on Chinese & Mexican widgets. It begins with the laws Congress drafts regarding environmental impact statements, the permitting process for the American widget factory, the umpteen czars and their bureacracies and the myriad regulations they impose on the American business owner.


Clinton signed NAFTA but he’s not a principled free marketeer. He had/has other reasons for wanting Chinese & Mexican widgets to flood American store shelves (actually, the flooding of American store shelves is incidental to his real aims), and those reasons have virtually nothing to do with Adam Smith’s invisible hand.

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