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naraburns  nihil supernum  2yr ago (text post)   35888 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022

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First I’m picking up elsewhere that the illegals in NYC are largely people who did not leave when their visa expired. So people who had jobs and functional lives. I don’t know enough to verify the truth of this. But therefore a different type of illegal than the completely homeless no job type showing up in Texas.

This article gives some numbers. 2 million illegal encounters so far at southern border this year. No clue how many are getting in but at that rate then 75k would be fair (though to date NYC only gotten 14k….75k was just my estimated run rate off Adams saying 4-6 buses a day)

https://news.yahoo.com/number-illegal-migrants-entered-us-155908676.html

I agree Florida doesn’t have the same issue. More similar to NYC that the illegals are a few by boat from Cuba, Visa expired illegals, or those with enough funds family to come to Florida.

I don’t know the true number of refugees but I’m fairly certain there are not 2 million agricultural jobs available in Texas. And NYC has a lot of restaurants in need of labor etc.

This is worth consideration, and if you want to calculate a fair share based on visa-expiration vs. border-hoppers, I'd be interested in reading it.

It is also possible that this year real is bucking the trend, and I am wrong to generalize from the last 15 years of stable population. If there are 2 million more illegal immigrants in the US next year, then shipping 51K to NYC would be proportional.

But we have been told about border crises year after year. Caravans, surges, whatever. And yet the population has been stable. Those 2M encounters are before any decisions--the article says 920K were already deported under Title 42. This chart suggests that >1M have been expelled, and that the remaining group includes detainees and deportations, too. It's not clear how many of those are released into the US until a hearing, or how many migrants are dodging the CBP entirely.

I don't think that it's obvious NYC is shirking its fair share, so I find it pretty defensible for them to complain.

Overstays are definitely the largest group of illegal immigrants in the US, but the vast majority are tourists and business visitors, not workers (it is very difficult for an unskilled person to get a work visa). So, not people with jobs. See overstay reports here

Re the 2 million encounters, the vast majority were immediately expelled or detained. It looks like 25-30 pct have been released.

Overstays are definitely the largest group of illegal immigrants in the US, but the vast majority are tourists and business visitors, not workers (it is very difficult for an unskilled person to get a work visa). So, not people with jobs.

But... how do you imagine they survive if they don't have jobs? Do you imagine they are all wealthy retirees, that they are economic parasites on the welfare state, or does the legal category not reflect the underlying reality?

The OP said:

So [visa overstayers are] people who had jobs and functional lives. I don’t know enough to verify the truth of this. But therefore a different type of illegal than the completely homeless no job type showing up in Texas.

My point is that a person who becomes an illegal immigrant by overstaying his tourist visa is also jobless when he becomes an illegal immigrant. He also is effectively homeless, in the same sense that an illegal entrant is. eg: From the perspective of the job market, or whether they are parasites on the welfare state, it does not matter whether an illegal immigrant entered illegally or overstayed a tourist visa. The distinction is not nearly as stark as the OP assumes.

The difference is that visa overstayers generally do not start out destitute and homeless. They arrive on airplanes with papers in hand, and they either have finances arranged such that they can live here in reasonable comfort without a job, or they choose to overstay once they have procured a job. They are apples and oranges to migrants who cross the border on foot and then claim asylum.

  1. And many, if not most, border crossers have relatives and friends in the US and can also live in reasonable comfort. It is not as if visa overstayers are particularly well off; if they were, they would not be seeking to illegally immigrate.

  2. I don't know what you mean by "papers in hand"; the only "papers" they have are tourist or similar visas, and some don't even have that

  3. The only job they could have procured is an illegal job. Had they procured a legal job, they would have applied for a work visa and hence would not be staying illegally.

Just to clarify, these are not people who are overstaying their tourist visas because they want a chance to see the Grand Canyon. These are illegal immigrants, just like border crossers, who plan to stay permanently and simply used a different means of entering the country.

Anyhow, as I said, the point is not that the groups are absolutely identical, but rather, as I said, the OP is greatly overstating the difference between them.

These are illegal immigrants, just like border crossers

The whole point is that, while they are both illegal immigrants, visa overstayers are not just like border crossers.

One group arrives on airplanes with passports and legal entry visas. The other undertakes a dangerous journey on foot or smuggled in a truck. It doesn't take a brain the size of a galaxy to recognize that there are going to be enormous socioeconomic differences between these two groups. OP didn't "overstate" anything, you're just splitting hairs to try to dismiss a fact that is inconvenient for your worldview (i.e. a deep blue sanctuary state like New York freaking out over the grim reality of what it means for thousands of the second type of illegal immigrant to arrive on one's doorstep).

No one is "splitting hairs." I simply pointed out an inaccuracy in OP's statement, who claimed that the overstayers have jobs. They don't. If anyone who is dismissing facts because they are inconsistent with their worldview it is you, because you keep claiming that places like NY are "freaking out" because illegal immigrants are arriving despite the obvious fact that NYC is full of illegal immigrants from Latin America and elsewhere, who are working as food delivery riders (on bikes, nor cars), dishwashers, etc.

And that is what I said: that the two groups are in the same place vis-a-vis the labor market. And if you did a little more reading,you would know that plenty of people in far-off lands borrow huge (to them) sums of money to fly here with the intent to illegally immigrate. So, although there are certainly some socioeconomic difference between the overstay rates, you are seem to be overstating them.

And here is the most important thing: Your comment is the very first time anyone mentioned socioeconomic status. OP only mentioned current job status. Yet you claim I ignored something that hasn't even been discussed.

Nor, by the way, do you say what relevance the difference in socioeconomic status has to the specific issue we are discussing, which is the NYC response to the bussing of the migrants in question.

who claimed that the overstayers have jobs. They don't.

Then, back to my original question: how do you imagine they survive if they don't have jobs? Do you imagine they are all wealthy retirees, that they are economic parasites on the welfare state, or does the legal category not reflect the underlying reality?

More comments

Can you help me understand how you arrived at the conclusion that visa overstays are the largest group of illegal immigrants in the US? I looked at the overstay reports and I see a somewhat consistent estimate of about 700k per year. 25% of 2M is 500k, but it only represents actual encounters, so I'd expect this number to be the sum of the encounters released and the non-encounters. If even 10% more illegal immigrants are crossing without an encounter, it seems to me that the rate of growth of non-visa overstay illegal immigrants is larger, especially as of the last few years. Is the argument that the total visa overstay population is still larger than the total illegal southern border crossing population? I didn't see estimates for either of those numbers in the overstay reports.

I did not mean to imply that the link was the source of that statement, and because I was agreeing with the post's statement in that regard, I did not look for a citation. But see here

It helps. But dishwasher, cook, etc you don’t need English. I’ve eaten in restaurants in America where the waitress could only speak Spanish. I point at menu, she brings foods, I pay bill.

Even less of an issue at a McDonald’s self check out. They only need to learn how to say order numbers in English.

I'm starting to wonder if this wasn't the reason fast food places didn't shift to meals/combos.

But most restaurant workers are not waiters.

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