Latest / Why We Do What We Do / Mini: Musings and Prognostications Continued (Immigration)
Transcript
- 0:03Speaker 1: You're listening to Why we do what we do? Welcome
- 0:15Speaker 1: to Why we do what we do many I'm your host,
- 0:18Speaker 1: Abraham and I'm Shane. We are a psychology podcast. We
- 0:22Speaker 1: talk about all of the things that people do, and
- 0:24Speaker 1: sometimes we just speculate on the future. And this is
- 0:28Speaker 1: kind of a very specially weird version of this discussion
- 0:31Speaker 1: because this is a mini episode which we release as
- 0:35Speaker 1: a short form discussion on Mondays and then we do
- 0:38Speaker 1: our full length discussions that are usually closer to forty
- 0:40Speaker 1: five minutes or an hour on or more on Wednesdays.
- 0:44Speaker 1: And we just had more to say about one of
- 0:46Speaker 1: those full episodes, but not so much that we wanted
- 0:48Speaker 1: to do it in a full length episode, so then
- 0:51Speaker 1: we're we were recorded a mini and we decided that
- 0:53Speaker 1: was too long, so then we recorded too minis yes,
- 0:56Speaker 1: And so this is an expansion on the discussion we
- 0:59Speaker 1: have been had of our musings and prognostications following the
- 1:03Speaker 1: twenty twenty four presidential election. And today's topic will be
- 1:08Speaker 1: about immigration, yes.
- 1:09Speaker 2: And the conversation about immigration, I think is a complex one.
- 1:14Speaker 2: There are a lot of values to maybe unpack inside
- 1:17Speaker 2: of it. But today we are just going to kind
- 1:19Speaker 2: of talk about what we think is going to happen
- 1:21Speaker 2: when it comes to immigration as it relates to policy
- 1:24Speaker 2: inside of the United States government under the incoming administration.
- 1:30Speaker 3: Yes, so thank you so much for joining us.
- 1:33Speaker 1: If you'd like to support us after you've heard this discussion,
- 1:35Speaker 1: you can join us on Patreon, pick up some merch
- 1:37Speaker 1: at our merch store, leave us a rating and review, Liken, subscribe,
- 1:40Speaker 1: or tell a friend.
- 1:41Speaker 3: But yeah, let's get into today's topic.
- 1:44Speaker 1: The whole theme of the campaign was this gigantic, fear
- 1:48Speaker 1: mongering scare tactic about immigration as the cause of all
- 1:53Speaker 1: of our problems in the United States. How well that
- 1:56Speaker 1: resonated for people, I don't know, but it kind of
- 1:59Speaker 1: doesn't matter at this point because that was a huge
- 2:02Speaker 1: campaign platform, and so that has become a focal point
- 2:06Speaker 1: for what the new administration is gearing up to do.
- 2:08Speaker 1: And there is essentially four things to talk about that
- 2:12Speaker 1: are likely to happen here because they've been campaigning on
- 2:15Speaker 1: this idea of mass deportation. Now that is nearly impossible
- 2:20Speaker 1: to pull off, really if you think about how what
- 2:23Speaker 1: would take place, But essentially they'd have to identify who
- 2:27Speaker 1: is being deported. They have to collect them somehow, and
- 2:30Speaker 1: they have to get them on transport to deport them
- 2:32Speaker 1: to wherever they're going. And so the first step is
- 2:35Speaker 1: identifying the who. And this is a place at which
- 2:39Speaker 1: precision is not something that is in their wheelhouse and
- 2:43Speaker 1: is not even something they really care about, right, which
- 2:46Speaker 1: is to say, the people they identify as being illegal
- 2:49Speaker 1: immigrants might not be illegal immigrants. They could be asylum seekers,
- 2:53Speaker 1: they could be people who are here with visas and
- 2:55Speaker 1: green cards. They could be legal citizens, naturalized citizens of
- 2:59Speaker 1: the United States. But the way that they're going to
- 3:03Speaker 1: try and determine whether or not they're legal citizens is
- 3:06Speaker 1: by looking at their skin color mostly and asking can
- 3:10Speaker 1: I see your papers? And if it just so happens
- 3:12Speaker 1: you don't have them on you, you might end up
- 3:14Speaker 1: in a detention camp. And again they might not ask,
- 3:18Speaker 1: they might just say, they might just see you and say, like,
- 3:22Speaker 1: you look like you don't belong here. I'm going to
- 3:24Speaker 1: detain you. I'll try and sort this out later, maybe
- 3:26Speaker 1: if I get around to it.
- 3:27Speaker 2: And that's actually a significant problem because when that happens,
- 3:31Speaker 2: then you've got situations that are reminiscent of early World
- 3:35Speaker 2: War Two. You've got internment camp concerns. I mean, and
- 3:38Speaker 2: you know, we can bring that up and we can
- 3:40Speaker 2: draw the parallels specifically about those types of situations where
- 3:43Speaker 2: you have got groups of people who are being profiled
- 3:46Speaker 2: as a result of a specific rhetoric or language and
- 3:49Speaker 2: stuff like that. And a lot of times people do
- 3:51Speaker 2: point to things like internment camps, which we will talk
- 3:53Speaker 2: about detention camps in a second. That example of identifying
- 3:57Speaker 2: somebody as other and creating that kind of enemy as
- 4:02Speaker 2: a result of the language that this administration is using.
- 4:04Speaker 2: Now you're creating like this happened after nine to eleven. Yes,
- 4:08Speaker 2: anybody who could be remotely considered Middle Eastern, all of
- 4:12Speaker 2: a sudden they were an enemy the state, they were
- 4:13Speaker 2: a suspect, and it became a There was a huge
- 4:16Speaker 2: increase in hate crimes as a result of that. So
- 4:19Speaker 2: this is this is not just about you know, dispelling
- 4:22Speaker 2: mets around immigration. This is also about people safety and
- 4:25Speaker 2: the rhetoric that's being used is very, very very dangerous
- 4:28Speaker 2: to people who could be identified as quote unquote as
- 4:32Speaker 2: Mexican immigrants and they may not even be from Mexico
- 4:36Speaker 2: very much.
- 4:36Speaker 1: So, yes, exactly right. Another example you mentioned the hate
- 4:39Speaker 1: crimes following nine to eleven was the hate crimes that
- 4:42Speaker 1: increased among Asian Americans at the beginning of COVID. People
- 4:45Speaker 1: already do not do this with precision. This government does
- 4:49Speaker 1: not necessarily do things of this nature with precision, and
- 4:53Speaker 1: the incoming administration could not care less about precision and
- 4:58Speaker 1: how this is implemented. Right, So, like, there are going
- 5:01Speaker 1: to be people who are incorrectly identified as flagged for deportation,
- 5:07Speaker 1: who are going to end up in these camps and
- 5:10Speaker 1: will be deported even though they are legal citizens here.
- 5:12Speaker 1: That's going to happen, maybe not often, but it will happen.
- 5:15Speaker 1: There are going to be people who die in these camps.
- 5:18Speaker 1: And so let's actually talk about the camps here. Is
- 5:20Speaker 1: already the government of the state of Texas has already
- 5:24Speaker 1: guaranteed the incoming administration that Texas will set aside a
- 5:29Speaker 1: gigantic chunk of land to house detention camps for people
- 5:34Speaker 1: they identify for deportation, and so like, that means that
- 5:38Speaker 1: they're going to be taking these people, putting them in
- 5:40Speaker 1: these camps that are not super different from camps you
- 5:44Speaker 1: might have found in Nazi Germany in the nineteen thirties.
- 5:48Speaker 1: And people are going to suffer there. They're going to
- 5:51Speaker 1: have to feed them, bring them water, and sure that
- 5:53Speaker 1: they've got access to some kind of toilets. And what's
- 5:55Speaker 1: that going to look like by a group of people
- 5:57Speaker 1: who don't care whether the people they have in turned
- 6:00Speaker 1: or live or die. It's going to look ugly, is
- 6:02Speaker 1: how that's going to work. So they're going to be
- 6:05Speaker 1: filling up these camps with people, some of them who
- 6:07Speaker 1: don't belong there at all, and some of them who
- 6:09Speaker 1: are not Mexican, people who they flag to return to Mexico,
- 6:12Speaker 1: or return to Mexico, send to Mexico, I guess. And
- 6:15Speaker 1: so that's a thing that's already happening. That seems like
- 6:18Speaker 1: a good point at which to interrupt with an advertisement. Okay,
- 6:28Speaker 1: we are back. The next part of this is where
- 6:31Speaker 1: are they getting those people? Because most people who come
- 6:34Speaker 1: into the United States, however they choose to come here
- 6:37Speaker 1: when they're immigrating, they come here for work, right And
- 6:40Speaker 1: the people who come here who do so illegally, who
- 6:43Speaker 1: tend to work jobs where they get paid under the table,
- 6:46Speaker 1: they're working in sectives of our economy that are massively
- 6:50Speaker 1: critical to our survival as a country. The vast majority
- 6:53Speaker 1: of our park and forestry system is actually populated by immigrants.
- 6:57Speaker 1: But they're not the place where you have as many
- 6:59Speaker 1: illegal immigran It's where you find a lot of them
- 7:01Speaker 1: is in the farm sector and in agriculture. That they
- 7:05Speaker 1: are out there working in those places. And I get
- 7:08Speaker 1: that it is not an ideal system that our economy
- 7:11Speaker 1: depends on paying people below minimum wage, like a not
- 7:16Speaker 1: living wage, to perform crazy difficult labor for long periods
- 7:21Speaker 1: of time, and that that's how our economy survives. I
- 7:24Speaker 1: get that that is a massive problem that we need
- 7:26Speaker 1: to fix. It is the current system. And if you
- 7:29Speaker 1: pull all of that labor out of that system, what happens.
- 7:33Speaker 1: That means the farms do not have enough workers to
- 7:36Speaker 1: produce their product. That means they might have to hire
- 7:39Speaker 1: a whole bunch of workers who don't want those jobs.
- 7:42Speaker 1: By the way, pay them significantly more, which means that
- 7:45Speaker 1: the cost of their overhead is way higher than they were,
- 7:48Speaker 1: Which means that if they can fill those jobs, if
- 7:52Speaker 1: they can continue to produce their products at the rate
- 7:55Speaker 1: they're producing them, they're going to have to charge a
- 7:58Speaker 1: lot more. And if they're charging a lot more, then
- 8:03Speaker 1: people are going to buy more imported goods which are
- 8:06Speaker 1: being taxed by tariffs, which means they're paying a higher
- 8:09Speaker 1: tax on those goods. So either way, the prices go
- 8:13Speaker 1: up substantially, like they could go up way beyond what
- 8:17Speaker 1: you thought was possible from the worst parts of inflation.
- 8:21Speaker 1: The alternative, though, is that those businesses just die. That
- 8:24Speaker 1: those farms collapse because they cannot produce at a rate
- 8:27Speaker 1: that they can sustain, and the other businesses that are
- 8:30Speaker 1: not farms, that are largely employing people who are here
- 8:34Speaker 1: illegally who just came for work, those businesses will lose
- 8:37Speaker 1: a huge chunk of their workforce. That means they can
- 8:39Speaker 1: no longer afford to stay open, which means they close,
- 8:42Speaker 1: which means that everyone who was hired there who is
- 8:44Speaker 1: a natural born US citizen also is out of a job,
- 8:47Speaker 1: and that place is no longer participating in the economy,
- 8:51Speaker 1: and neither are their employees. Is a thing that research
- 8:53Speaker 1: has found also happens. And the people who are here
- 8:57Speaker 1: for work, they have to buy groceries while they're here,
- 9:01Speaker 1: They have to pay utilities while they're here, They have
- 9:04Speaker 1: to like by gas while they're here. They are participating
- 9:08Speaker 1: in our economy. And so when you're trying to excize
- 9:11Speaker 1: literally millions of people who are participating in our economy,
- 9:16Speaker 1: our economy is going to take a pretty substantial chunk
- 9:19Speaker 1: out of it by the virtue of that workforce being gone.
- 9:22Speaker 1: So I just think that's one thing to prepare for
- 9:26Speaker 1: is I think this is going to dramatically and drastically
- 9:29Speaker 1: change the nature of.
- 9:31Speaker 3: Businesses in our economy.
- 9:32Speaker 1: And we're going to see prices go up, probably pretty
- 9:35Speaker 1: quickly and pretty aggressively, and we're going to see some
- 9:38Speaker 1: businesses collapse, which will overall hurt particularly some rural towns
- 9:42Speaker 1: where there aren't very many people.
- 9:43Speaker 3: That might be the end of some of those towns.
- 9:45Speaker 2: Yeah, and that makes perfect sense. I mean, when you
- 9:47Speaker 2: start thinking about like the balancing any sort of equation
- 9:50Speaker 2: that has to do with money, you go, Okay, removing
- 9:53Speaker 2: a chunk of people who are spending money in economy
- 9:56Speaker 2: will already cause a deficit. Removing the people that are
- 9:59Speaker 2: doing the work and replacing them with folks that are
- 10:02Speaker 2: going to require a higher level of pay because of
- 10:05Speaker 2: the way our system works is going to increase those
- 10:07Speaker 2: goods on top of the imported goods, like you are
- 10:10Speaker 2: creating these deficits on both ends. It's burning the candle
- 10:14Speaker 2: at both ends effectively, right, right, It is absolutely it
- 10:18Speaker 2: is like pure destruction on both sides of this issue.
- 10:21Speaker 2: That it just doesn't make any sense for people who
- 10:24Speaker 2: are trying to vote for lower prices. It literally is
- 10:27Speaker 2: the antithesis of that.
- 10:29Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, this will not work.
- 10:31Speaker 1: They will not be able to remove the people they
- 10:34Speaker 1: think that they're removing, not with any level of precision.
- 10:36Speaker 1: They're going to remove people they shouldn't be removing. People
- 10:38Speaker 1: are going to die, people are going to get hurt.
- 10:41Speaker 1: The economy is going to take a huge gut punch
- 10:43Speaker 1: to the stomach and maybe the jugular. We'll see how
- 10:46Speaker 1: that all shakes out, but those are very likely going
- 10:48Speaker 1: to if it comes to pass that they act on
- 10:51Speaker 1: this mass deportation thing, and they are working hard to
- 10:55Speaker 1: make it come to pass, so it seems very likely
- 10:57Speaker 1: that at least a version of it will. The outcome
- 11:00Speaker 1: is not going to be what people think it is
- 11:02Speaker 1: because crimes are not being committed by immigrants. They're being
- 11:05Speaker 1: committed by people here, and when their economies start to decrease,
- 11:09Speaker 1: crimes get worse. So like we're going to see an
- 11:13Speaker 1: increase in crime and increase of prices, a decrease in
- 11:17Speaker 1: the economy, and a bunch of people who we want
- 11:19Speaker 1: here anyway will no longer be here. It is something
- 11:23Speaker 1: that I think people do not have a lot of
- 11:25Speaker 1: critical thinking around the implications of this. And again, I
- 11:29Speaker 1: get that the system isn't working super well, and I
- 11:31Speaker 1: just want to have a quick aside. I know we're
- 11:32Speaker 1: like way past our normal time length on this, but
- 11:34Speaker 1: I want to have a quick a side of Like
- 11:36Speaker 1: people who constantly say, like, I'm cool with immigrants, They're
- 11:40Speaker 1: great as long as it's legal.
- 11:43Speaker 3: I have a problem with is illegal immigrants. Okay, fine,
- 11:45Speaker 3: I get what your argument you're coming from there, But in.
- 11:47Speaker 1: My mind, the next logical solution then is make it
- 11:51Speaker 1: as easy as possible to become a legal immigrant. Like,
- 11:55Speaker 1: if that's your concern, then make it easy. But that's
- 11:57Speaker 1: not actually the concern. The concern is people who don't
- 12:01Speaker 1: look like me are coming into this country, people who
- 12:03Speaker 1: don't speak a language I speak are coming into this country.
- 12:06Speaker 1: That's what their actual concern is. And so rather than
- 12:09Speaker 1: embracing the benefits of diversity that come with people who
- 12:13Speaker 1: look different and speak a different language. They're choosing to
- 12:16Speaker 1: shoot themselves in the foot by getting rid of that
- 12:19Speaker 1: amazing group of people that we benefit from having them
- 12:22Speaker 1: in our country to begin with. And ideally we should
- 12:25Speaker 1: just make it easier for them to come into this
- 12:26Speaker 1: country and work or live or do whatever. If your
- 12:29Speaker 1: concern is illegal immigration, that making it easier to do
- 12:33Speaker 1: legal immigration should be the next logical step.
- 12:36Speaker 2: And the concerns that people typically bring up about illegal
- 12:38Speaker 2: immigration is totally untrue. They argue that illegal immigrants are
- 12:42Speaker 2: burdening the healthcare system and what we have to pay
- 12:45Speaker 2: for them, which is all false, right, Like, so none
- 12:48Speaker 2: of that is true. The majority of the healthcare system
- 12:52Speaker 2: that is being burdened is due to citizens and also
- 12:55Speaker 2: the healthcare system overcharging.
- 12:57Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a whole engaging.
- 12:59Speaker 2: In predatory practice. So that's a system that's a whole
- 13:01Speaker 2: different thing on its own. People will argue immigration and
- 13:04Speaker 2: welfare issues false. The majority of people who are on
- 13:07Speaker 2: welfare are or like any sort of like social program
- 13:11Speaker 2: like that are US citizens who are mostly white. So
- 13:15Speaker 2: like you're going to find that they've demonized a group
- 13:18Speaker 2: of people when the actual issue is really of their
- 13:22Speaker 2: own creation. Like it's really a wild it's a really
- 13:24Speaker 2: it's the amount of cognitive dissonance that has to occur
- 13:28Speaker 2: and the hurdles that have to be jumped to make
- 13:30Speaker 2: those those arguments is astounding to me.
- 13:33Speaker 1: And because when so long quick hurdle, another ad break,
- 13:43Speaker 1: All right, well we'll wrap this up real quick because
- 13:45Speaker 1: we're so far over time.
- 13:45Speaker 3: But you're exactly right.
- 13:46Speaker 1: And that it's counterproductive, like it's people who are accomplishing
- 13:50Speaker 1: the opposite of what they accomplished because they're believing incorrect
- 13:54Speaker 1: information that is demonstrably false. And there are people who
- 13:57Speaker 1: will point out, like, we don't have enough housing to
- 13:59Speaker 1: let that many people into the country right now, and
- 14:02Speaker 1: they're kind of right, there is a shortage of housing.
- 14:04Speaker 1: But the solution to that is build and sell more houses.
- 14:07Speaker 1: And I guarantee you people who are developers who want
- 14:10Speaker 1: who are like real estate moguls, they have no problem
- 14:13Speaker 1: with that as a solution. They are very happy to
- 14:16Speaker 1: build and sell more houses and apartments.
- 14:18Speaker 3: Yeah, and you.
- 14:19Speaker 2: Can repurpose abandoned buildings. There are plenty of abandoned buildings
- 14:22Speaker 2: that can be broken up into small apartments that can
- 14:24Speaker 2: be that you use for like transitionary periods. Like or
- 14:27Speaker 2: student housing. There's a lot of Like if you go
- 14:30Speaker 2: to Jacksonville, Florida and you go to downtown, like there
- 14:33Speaker 2: are so many abandoned warehouses and buildings that if you
- 14:35Speaker 2: spent a little bit of money bringing it up to code,
- 14:37Speaker 2: you can make it. And they actually did this project
- 14:39Speaker 2: in Jacksonville where they actually took unhoused people, they got
- 14:42Speaker 2: them into these buildings and the workforce increased, The amount
- 14:46Speaker 2: of arrests decreased in the area, the amount of drug
- 14:49Speaker 2: charges decreased. Like it's there are solutions to these things
- 14:52Speaker 2: that are creative solutions that people just don't want to see.
- 14:55Speaker 3: Yeah, that's awesome.
- 14:56Speaker 2: Yeah, it was really great that data were really promising
- 14:58Speaker 2: and it was a really cool pilot. But ultimately the
- 15:01Speaker 2: problem is people don't they see a price tag and
- 15:04Speaker 2: they don't want to deal with that.
- 15:05Speaker 1: That is essentially what we wanted to say about this.
- 15:07Speaker 1: Like we got more down the sort of rabbit horn
- 15:10Speaker 1: immigration than I thought that we would. But I think,
- 15:12Speaker 1: you know, we discussed immigration on here and people continue
- 15:15Speaker 1: to bring this up as an issue, and like our
- 15:18Speaker 1: country exists because of immigration.
- 15:20Speaker 3: That's the only reason it exists.
- 15:22Speaker 1: For better or for worse, there are a lot of
- 15:24Speaker 1: problems that came with the immigration that happened where we were, like,
- 15:27Speaker 1: let's move a good chunk of Europe in here and
- 15:29Speaker 1: then have all the babies and kick out.
- 15:31Speaker 3: All the people who lived here before us.
- 15:33Speaker 1: Like, obviously huge amounts of problems, but like, our country
- 15:37Speaker 1: has the highest GDP in the world by like a
- 15:40Speaker 1: comically large margin, right, And part of that has to
- 15:43Speaker 1: do with the fact that we have a lot of
- 15:45Speaker 1: people here and a lot of immigrants choose to come here,
- 15:48Speaker 1: and being a place that is a popular place for
- 15:51Speaker 1: people to come makes it a good strong economy. So
- 15:55Speaker 1: kicking people out is the opposite of trending in the
- 15:57Speaker 1: direction toward a good strong economy. So the people out
- 16:01Speaker 1: there who don't have this information, they're not listening to us.
- 16:04Speaker 1: So again this is mostly to arm our very smart
- 16:07Speaker 1: listeners with information that can go out and share with others.
- 16:11Speaker 1: Because I realized that a lot of times I feel
- 16:14Speaker 1: like I'm talking to you and you're not the problem.
- 16:17Speaker 1: You found your way to a podcast to learn more things,
- 16:19Speaker 1: So like, you guys are already on probably the people
- 16:22Speaker 1: doing the right thing. So maybe this is you can
- 16:24Speaker 1: share this podcast or just share the information with the
- 16:27Speaker 1: people who need to hear it.
- 16:28Speaker 3: But it's I feel like I just wanted to get these.
- 16:30Speaker 1: Talking points out there because there's just so much drastic misinformation.
- 16:35Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely one percent.
- 16:37Speaker 1: All right, Well that went long, although maybe it's short
- 16:39Speaker 1: depending on whether we split this into two minis, which
- 16:41Speaker 1: would be very strange but probably the thing we're going
- 16:44Speaker 1: to do.
- 16:45Speaker 3: So I think we'll end it there.
- 16:47Speaker 1: If you'd like to reach out to us about anything
- 16:48Speaker 1: we talked about here today or in any of our discussions,
- 16:50Speaker 1: you can email us directly info at WWD wwdpodcast dot com,
- 16:54Speaker 1: join us on social media platforms and over on Patreon,
- 16:57Speaker 1: leave us a rating and review, like, and subscribe to
- 16:59Speaker 1: a friend, all those things, and I think that is
- 17:01Speaker 1: all I have to say. Is there anything you like
- 17:03Speaker 1: to add or anything I forgot before we wrap this
- 17:05Speaker 1: one up?
- 17:05Speaker 3: Shane, I got nothing on my end?
- 17:07Speaker 1: All right?
- 17:08Speaker 3: Then, this is Abraham, This is Shane. We're out the YEP.
- 17:12Speaker 3: You've been listening to Why we do what we do.
- 17:15Speaker 1: You can learn more about this and other episodes by
- 17:18Speaker 1: going to WWDWWD podcast dot com.
- 17:22Speaker 2: Thanks for listening, and we hope you have an awesome
- 17:24Speaker 2: day