Pretty good. I will add that I expect the increasing wages to begin almost immediately, ie not AFTER teh deportations are complete, but as soon as the supply of labor is tightened.
I will try, based on what I have heard from the Open Border crowd....
1. These are jobs that Americans don't want to do/automation will replace those jobs soon enough anyways.
2. Employers need them to function.
3. Rising wages will cause inflation, so no real gain.
4. And it's racist.
How do you feel I did? Anything to add or subtract.
Number 4 isn’t really relevant to your stated criterion, so let’s set that aside.
I also want to point out that you’ve proposed two related but distinct policies, and they may have different effects relative to your criterion:
-Deporting undocumented immigrants
-Restricting legal immigration
Those are not identical in economic impact, so let’s start with one.
Americans, in general, are less likely to work certain blue-collar jobs. Your assumption is that as labor supply tightens, employers will increase wages to the point that Americans will take those jobs.
There are a few issues with that.
First, the jobs undocumented workers tend to do aren’t evenly distributed across the country. There isn’t necessarily a one-to-one replacement available. For example, even if someone in Arkansas is willing to work, that doesn’t automatically replace a fruit picker in Florida. Labor markets are geographically constrained.
Second, many of these jobs are physically demanding or otherwise undesirable, which further limits the pool of willing replacements, even if wages rise.
You also mentioned automation. As wages increase, investment in automation becomes more economically attractive. That could reduce labor demand rather than shift it toward American workers.
That leads into your second point.
Yes, employers need workers to function, whether American or not. Under your proposal, businesses effectively face three options:
-Raise wages enough to attract American workers (assuming they are available).
-Automate to reduce labor needs.
-Reduce operations or shut down if neither is viable.
Now this connects to inflation.
There are two potential inflationary channels here:
-Higher wages increase production costs, which may raise prices.
-If some firms can’t operate profitably and close, reduced supply may also push prices up.
So the argument, as it relates to your criterion, becomes this:
The wage increases for American blue-collar workers would need to be large enough to offset the inflationary pressures caused by higher production costs and potential supply reductions, such that real middle-class income still rises.
That’s the key question. And the only way I see this even having a chance off happening is that the wages offered for those jobs will be middle class jobs.
To put it bluntly. What do you think the chances are that a person working the line in a meat packing plant will be offered enough a year going by your lowest number to make the household he's or she is a part of qualify for middle class? (A number I realize is an average and can vary, and across sectors so meatpacking is only one job.)
But the point stands.
Is the elasticity of wages in low-skill labor markets strong enough that deportation would raise wages into middle-class territory without generating higher offsetting inflation?
The sectors that employ illegals, (food production, transport, construction, hospitality tend to work under slim profit margins as is.)
Under your own criterion, the policy only succeeds if real middle-class income rises. So can you explain the mechanism by which wage gains outpace inflationary pressures in low-skill sectors? What evidence makes you confident the elasticity is strong enough?
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