Jeopardy: "They can stay here to keep wages down... but they'll never get the vote!"

[cthulu2016]

What is, "The Republican immigration reform plan," Alex.

__________________________

Immigration has long been a Republican oddity. The Republican position on anything can usually be deduced simply by its effect on American wages. But with immigration you have business' desire for a larger population of workers versus the RW base's racism, nativism and the Republican Party's institutional concern with electoral demographics.

But the, "Stay, but no path to citizenship," is just enough to tip the scales, satisfying both the institutional Republican Party and business. Labor that cannot vote! More new workers but no more new Democrats.

(It is not racist or nativist to say that a large labor pool can reduce wages. It often does. It also increases GDP, but not necessarily GDP per capita. The economic effects of immigration are complex, and dependent on many variables. Immigration can be an economic boon or a labor nightmare. Neither ending all imigration or simply opening the border are optimal solutions for labor. Complex equation.

And, I suggest, the Republicans favor setting variables in that complex equation that suck for everyone except the people at the top. Handled differently, it would not suck. But in a democracy, a big pool of non-voting labor is always going to suck, relatively, because that means a chunk of labor with no voice, which increases the relative voice of capital.)

[Faryn Balyncd]

1. If they can't have slavery, then the RW will settle for a disenfanchised workforce.

[DirkGently]

2. American conservatives: Always looking for an underclass to abuse.

Women, minorities, the poor. Children. Immigrants.

Someone has to be a "non-person" for their worldview to work. Someone needs to be afraid, and desperate, and without recourse or rights or status of any kind.