Who Makes Policy Campaign 2016 Edition

What does Trump’s stance on deportation mean for the U.S economy?

A major theme in Donald J. trump’s immigration reform policy is his proposal to remove 11.3 million undocumented immigrants living in the U.S.

A report by Moody’s Analytics predicts that “the economy will suffer as Mr. Trump’s deportation policy acts like a negative supply shock, requiring millions of undocumented immigrants to leave the country and resulting in a reduction in the size of the labor force.

The deportation of 11.3 million undocumented immigrants will also have significant negative demand side impact on the economy as the purchasing power of these immigrants also 
leaves the country.

As undocumented immigrants leave the country; the labor market will tighten with the contracting labor force. Labor costs will skyrocket as employers struggle to fill the open job positions.

Recent research has shown that native U.S. workers are imperfect substitutes for immigrants due to different occupation choices and skills. For example, where undocumented immigrants work as manual laborers in agriculture, it is unlikely that many natives are interested in performing these labor-intensive jobs even at modestly higher wages. It is even the case that farms that struggle due to labor shortages may prompt native job losses in upstream and downstream industries.

Mr. Trump’s immigration policies will thus result in fewer jobs, potentially severe labor shortages, and higher labor costs. This will also ultimately cause businesses to more aggressively raise prices for their products.”

 

Joe Biden’s Big Announcement on Gitmo.

As discussed in this article from the UK Daily Mail, Vice President Joe Biden announced in a press conference in Sweden that he expects the infamous military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba to be closed down by the end of Obama’s Presidency in January.

This announcement comes just after Obama ordered the release of 15 prisoners from the facility earlier this month, with plans to send them to the United Arab Emirates.  This group includes 12 Yemeni Nationals and 3 Afghans, and this constitutes the single largest release of detainees from the facility during Obama’s tenure.

Predictably, Republicans have railed against Obama’s decision.  New Hampshire Senator Kelly Ayotte called the decision “reckless”, criticizing the administration for releasing “terrorists” in the name of “fulfill[ing] a misguided campaign promise to empty and close Guantanamo.”  Representative Ed Royce of California, the Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, joined in on the criticism, saying that those being released are “hardened terrorist”.

And then, of course, there’s the Republican Presidential nominee, Donald Trump, who certainly wouldn’t miss an opportunity to make his opinions known.  In a fundraising email sent out Thursday, he made clear that “[a]s president, Trump REFUSES to shut down Gitmo and REFUSES to have foreign radical Islamic terrorists tried in our regular court systems here in America.”  He continued, saying that “Americans oppose shutting down Gitmo and releasing terrorists to our shores…his has to end. And it has to end NOW.”

Keeping in mind that Obama has tried during his Administration to shut down Gitmo, and has been vehemently stymied by Congress throughout, Vice President Biden’s announcement is welcome but, at the end of the day, is simply just nice words.  Republicans will shout and holler, loud opposition will be drummed up, and a bold (certainly in this political environment) proposal will likely go nowhere.

One shouldn’t hold their breath on whether Guantanamo will truly be closed by January 20th, 2017.

 

Elderly, homelessness, mental health, and Social Security

This one hits a bit close to home for me. My mom is just over 70-years old and I have helped her navigate Social Security (and failed a few times). Due to a number of past events she also has little savings (and no retirement aside from Social Security) so she also works, for the most part, full-time.

The idea of Social Security was to ensure that the elderly would not be homeless or in poverty when they retired (or someone could not work anymore). Also, social security was designed when the average lifespan was all but 65 or so years old.

There are issues with the system for sure. My mom gets about a grand a month from her Social Security which is not enough to even pay the rent on her apartment. Becuase she works she has to pay taxes on her Social Security income (which I think is ridiculous).

Anyway, that is why this piece from the Washington Post hits close to home. This 70-year old woman was homeless because the Social Security Administration messed up (and trust me they mess up a lot). Add to that she was homeless for 16-years while fighting for what was owned her (up to now over $100,000.00). If you want to fight for what is owed you, it is advisable to get an attorney. But when you make so little, and the attorney takes either percentage of what is recovered or several thousand dollars that many elderly can ill afford, many people choose not to fight (my mom is one).

As the article points out there are more claims now than ever due to the Boomers retiring. Add to that budget cuts and staff reductions at the Social Security Administration and we have a recipe for disaster: long waits for appointments, backlogs of claims processing. Is this what we want for our parents (I don’t even say us because Social Security likely will not be there when we retire)? If we don’t want this for our parents what can we do to fix it? That is a big question, one that I don’t have time for in this post, but I think is starts with the following issue that we have to figure out: do we want a social safety net (welfare, and social programs) to be a part of our society? If we do, then we must fund them, which means we must pay for them. If we do not, then we have to figure out a way to transition the soon to retire so we don’t have a generation of the elderly on the streets.

A first look at Russia… and Clinton.

I did a Twitter search for Putin and have a few things to share.

First, there is the new Clinton “scandal” revolving around a nuclear deal between Russia and Canada. Twitter was aflutter with tweets like this:

If you did into this story, however, it becomes obvious that this is likely much ado about nothing (as much of the Clinton attacks seem to flush out to be). To get a better idea of the facts look to PolitiFact, the Times, and the Washington Post.

I really have to ask myself, and all of us I think should be asking the same, why are the Clinton’s always mired in scandal. Personally, I think Clinton was stupid for having the personal server. She knows she is under a microscope. So is this Clinton making silly choices that are not a big deal, are some of them big deals, or is it really the Right trying to bring her down at all cost, or a little of all of it? How will this affect her ability to be a productive President?

About that Wall

Is Trump ‘pivoting’ on immigration, softening his position on forced deportations? TBD. But his recent near-suggestion that he might graciously allow some long-time undocumented stay on as non-citizens already has Ann Coulter, ultra right-wing commentator and author of In Trump We Trust:E Pluribus Awesome! scrambling to interpret his scramble.

In the book, launched just yesterday, Coulter declared:

“There’s nothing Trump can do that won’t be forgiven. Except change his immigration policies.”

A few hours later she tweeted:

“I think he panicked and he had to say [it] … I don’t think he is softening. I mean the big thing is the wall.”

So is he panicking, softening, pivoting or just blowing more smoke? Take a look at this timeline on Trump’s ‘evolving’ immigration position posted by The Hill and let us know what you think is happening.

A new way to look at the binary political spectrum.

I think many think of politics as binary. Left and right. Libertarian and liberal. Fascist and Communist. Moreover, I think many think that these are substitutions for each other. I want to give everyone this site, Political Compas (link here).

What these researchers are asking is simple (and complex in a way) are these multiple dimensions actually distinct? Can we understand political beliefs better by mapping these as distinct interrelated constructs? So for some food for thought I will leave this here for comment:

So, do people think that Hillary and Donald, as proxies for the zeitgeist of their party, are, in fact, more to the right politically but more separate on the authoritarian-libertarian dimension? (Please note: this survey instrument was designed to look at left-right and authoritarian-libertarian on an international basis and is not Ameri-centric.)

Comments on New Yorker Article: “Politics and Personality: Most of What You Read is Malarkey”

I came across this article “Politics and Personality: Most of What You Read is Malarkey” in the New Yorker.

Overall, I think this is an interesting piece. It summarizes the source document quite well. Given that there are a lot of problems with the reproducibility of some social science experimentation (especially in the field of social psychology, see the reproducibility project, this summary from science, and this Atlantic piece about Brian Nosek’s version of the project).

As Ms. Konnikova notes about the bulk these types of studies they use correlation, and as we all should know “correlation does not equal causation.” However, and this is where I push back on the ultimate thesis of this piece, these types of analyses in psychological science are somewhat outmoded. To hold modern psychological science to the methods of the past in light of OLS regression, multiple regression, structural equation modeling, and other methods which can establish both correlation and causation better than those used when Zimbardo did the “Stamford Prison Experiment” is somewhat disingenuous.