This sounds like a problem for which causal discovery would be a good solution. Is there a way to download a clean comprehensive dataset including all the variables of interest?
Generally, I just go to OWID for the variables, which usually has a time series dataset from good sources. Then you can convert to growth (first diff) or whatever format you want for time series models.
"In reality, the wealth and general development of a country has not much to do with the population size at all but with the distribution of human capital."
In reality, the wealth and overall development of a country have little to do with population size at all, but rather with the quality of human capital.
The argument works even poorer in Europe than in the U.S. because unemployment rates are quite high among non-Western European migrants relative to Europeans (at least our Mexicans actually pick tomatoes), so they’re literally contributing nothing at all, not even filling up a job “no native wants to do”.
Another reason to be suspicious of the argument: the people who make this magical hand-waving hypothetical where migrants make natives more productive through indirect channels and are therefore a net positive regardless of their direct net effect and are HBD-aware will concede that the two waves of the Great Migrations of American blacks were bad for American cities. But at the same time, they’ll insist that with Hispanics or Arabs, it will be good. But surely, labor specialization would be *larger* the more different in average ability the two groups are. After all, specialization occurs only if the two groups are predominantly complements in ability rather than substitutes because they don’t overlap so much and therefore fill different occupational niches. The fact that this argument relies on using Hispanics, a group with about half the racial gap in intelligence with whites (at least the migrants) compared to blacks, should mean that labor specialization is relatively smaller, and yet this is also “better”. Clearly, whatever additional specialization blacks provide then is nowhere near good enough to offset every other problem that they cause, most of which is just a function of low IQ.
> The argument works even poorer in Europe than in the U.S. because unemployment rates are quite high among non-Western European migrants relative to Europeans (at least our Mexicans actually pick tomatoes), so they’re literally contributing nothing at all, not even filling up a job “no native wants to do”.
This varies considerably between European countries as well. E.g. in Malta non-EU immigrants have a 6.4 percentage point higher employment rate than natives, at 86.7%, about as high as employment gets in any EU country, whereas in Belgium they are 13.1% lower, at an abysmal 59.4%. https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/databrowser/view/LFSA_ERGACOB__custom_19091449/default/table
I believe that these differences are driven primarily by immigration policy (asylum-based vs employment-based migration) and secondarily by labour-market differences, e.g. unemployment benefits.
Thank you for an providing an interesting and informative article. It would seem to put it in layman's terms, that its more about the ability, and effective use of capital than the amount of capital available. Obviously, inefficiency and parasitic behaviour plays a part in this too.
..that said, a big country has overwhelming advantages over a smaller one. Does anyone think the US would be the US with 30M inhabitants, or 3M? GDP per capita is nice and all, but it's definitely not the primary factor in a country's success.
Do I have to repeat that I am not interested in empire stuff, but regular metrics of how well countries are doing, that aren't about hypothetical empire building etc.
This sounds like a problem for which causal discovery would be a good solution. Is there a way to download a clean comprehensive dataset including all the variables of interest?
Generally, I just go to OWID for the variables, which usually has a time series dataset from good sources. Then you can convert to growth (first diff) or whatever format you want for time series models.
"In reality, the wealth and general development of a country has not much to do with the population size at all but with the distribution of human capital."
In reality, the wealth and overall development of a country have little to do with population size at all, but rather with the quality of human capital.
I suspect that whatever modest benefit there is to specialization is more than offset by all the negative externalities that low ability groups bring: https://www.aporiamagazine.com/p/externalities-from-low-skilled-migration
The argument works even poorer in Europe than in the U.S. because unemployment rates are quite high among non-Western European migrants relative to Europeans (at least our Mexicans actually pick tomatoes), so they’re literally contributing nothing at all, not even filling up a job “no native wants to do”.
Another reason to be suspicious of the argument: the people who make this magical hand-waving hypothetical where migrants make natives more productive through indirect channels and are therefore a net positive regardless of their direct net effect and are HBD-aware will concede that the two waves of the Great Migrations of American blacks were bad for American cities. But at the same time, they’ll insist that with Hispanics or Arabs, it will be good. But surely, labor specialization would be *larger* the more different in average ability the two groups are. After all, specialization occurs only if the two groups are predominantly complements in ability rather than substitutes because they don’t overlap so much and therefore fill different occupational niches. The fact that this argument relies on using Hispanics, a group with about half the racial gap in intelligence with whites (at least the migrants) compared to blacks, should mean that labor specialization is relatively smaller, and yet this is also “better”. Clearly, whatever additional specialization blacks provide then is nowhere near good enough to offset every other problem that they cause, most of which is just a function of low IQ.
> every other problem that they cause, most of which is just a function of low IQ
It should be noted that the extreme crime rates of blacks are not driven by low IQ; they are driven by race directly.
I’m not referring to just criminality but yes criminality is one of those race differences that’s more than just IQ.
> The argument works even poorer in Europe than in the U.S. because unemployment rates are quite high among non-Western European migrants relative to Europeans (at least our Mexicans actually pick tomatoes), so they’re literally contributing nothing at all, not even filling up a job “no native wants to do”.
This varies considerably between European countries as well. E.g. in Malta non-EU immigrants have a 6.4 percentage point higher employment rate than natives, at 86.7%, about as high as employment gets in any EU country, whereas in Belgium they are 13.1% lower, at an abysmal 59.4%. https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/databrowser/view/LFSA_ERGACOB__custom_19091449/default/table
I believe that these differences are driven primarily by immigration policy (asylum-based vs employment-based migration) and secondarily by labour-market differences, e.g. unemployment benefits.
Thank you for an providing an interesting and informative article. It would seem to put it in layman's terms, that its more about the ability, and effective use of capital than the amount of capital available. Obviously, inefficiency and parasitic behaviour plays a part in this too.
..that said, a big country has overwhelming advantages over a smaller one. Does anyone think the US would be the US with 30M inhabitants, or 3M? GDP per capita is nice and all, but it's definitely not the primary factor in a country's success.
I am interested in per capita metrics. Having the biggest empire is mostly a matter of population size, and not so interesting.
Sure, but being conquered tends to decrease gdp/head, or are you counting on the reduction in head count to offset the effect?
Do I have to repeat that I am not interested in empire stuff, but regular metrics of how well countries are doing, that aren't about hypothetical empire building etc.
Not empire building, security. Arguably the primary function of a state. Ignoring it seems unserious.
One more dumb comment = banned.
Ultima ratio it is, then. Have a great life!