Comment by barry-cotter | Hacker News Reader

Comment by barry-cotter | Hacker News Reader

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It has at most a small and transitory negative effect on a very small portion of the writing class. The average worker benefits. If we want to help the lowest paid we can reduce they’re taxes or subsidise their wages.

https://fullfact.org/immigration/immigration-and-jobs-labour...

> UK research suggests that immigration has a small impact on average wages of existing workers but more significant effects for certain groups: low-wage workers lose while medium and high-paid workers gain.

The wage effects of immigration are likely to be greatest for resident workers who are immigrants themselves.

Research does not find a significant impact of overall immigration on unemployment in the UK, but the evidence suggests that immigration from outside the EU could have a negative impact on the employment of UK-born workers, especially during an economic downturn.

The impacts of immigration on the labour market depend on the skills of migrants, the skills of existing workers, and the characteristics of the host economy. This means that research evidence on the labour market effects of immigration is always specific to time and place.

For both wages and employment, short run effects of immigration differ from long run effects: any declines in the wages and employment of UK-born workers in the short run can be offset by rising wages and employment in the long run.

The lowest paid already pay effectively no taxes and your suggestion is to have them pay less?

Do you understand the incentives you're creating when you have only a small minority of productive people subsidize everyone else?

That's a bad way to see it. First of all, proportionally they pay quite a lot of taxes because all their money goes into consumption. Depending on where you live, VAT can be up to 25% for example. Also, they are subjected to payroll taxes and other things, so it's wrong to focus solely on income tax here.

But more importantly, it absolutely makes sense to have the poorest be subsidized by the richest. That's what Europe does, and they are doing great. I would much rather be taxed highly in Europe and know that the money is making sure everyone around me has healthcare and a roof above their head than thinking that my productivity is some God-given ability that supersedes a compassionate and rational way to structure society.

> The lowest paid already pay effectively no taxes and your suggestion is to have them pay less?

Yes. I believe that being poor is miserable and that we should make the lives of our fellow citizens less miserable. I don’t see any need not to attach strings to it either. There’s nothing morally wrong with saying you have to be a net tax payer to vote, for example.

> Do you understand the incentives you're creating when you have only a small minority of productive people subsidize everyone else?

It’s not a small minority though. A small minority of people make the most money but something near a majority of people who work for money are net tax payers over their life. The magnitude of their contribution varies enormously but I’d be shocked if most people who work 30 years or more aren’t net tax payers.

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