What about when they’re temporary, and go back home with their money?

That’s not an “immigrant”, that’s a seasonal migrant worker. Typically not legally capable of competing with legal citizens. They’re picking fruit, not edging you out of a Target cashier job, much less anything else. If they’re actual immigrants, and not seasonal workers, this is home.

What about when they come from a country so desperate and poor that they’re terrified of being forced to go back, and so they’ll do anything for work, even work half of minimum wage? You don’t think that might drive down wages?

If they live here, they live here. If they’re legally able to apply to jobs that pay above minimum wage, why would they be forced to go back? Are there any employment-dependent visas for minimum wage work? I’m certainly not aware of any.

What if they’re so terrified that they won’t form a union? Shouldn’t the IWW care about that?

What?

What if this is all a trick by the capitalists themselves?

Immigration? I mean yeah, they’re the driving force behind seasonal migrant workers. But actual immigrants?

But then you’re being reductive

Yes, I explicitly said so. Almost as reductive as “basic supply and demand” arguments. Almost.

Because as you say, it’s not just as simple as that. The person above you has a point.

On the contrary, that only proves my overarching point that actual economics is more complicated than “basic supply and demand”.

What you’re describing is relatively common among seasonal workers, but that’s an entirely different can of worms than normal migrants. Seasonal migrant workers are not competing against locals for jobs, because locals aren’t applying for those jobs, which is why there’s a market for seasonal migrant workers in the first place.

If they’re taking their money back home with them, they aren’t really the immigrants we’re talking about. Immigrants are people who have made this their new home.

And again, those people are doing jobs locals don’t want. They aren’t seeking citizenship and applying for normal jobs, they’re moving here for a season to pick fruit under the table. Locals are not competing for those jobs.

But again, it’s a complicated system. “Basic supply and demand” is basically irrelevant outside the classroom. Sure it’s one of many factors, but it’s not the ultimate truth in a rational understanding of actual economics. It’s a spherical cow.

How is that a deflection? It’s a direct refutation of your central point.

When a person moves in and takes a job at a grocery store, they aren’t just a customer for the grocery store. They are a customer for clothing stores, movie theaters, appliance stores, barbers, restaurants, mechanics, etc.

To simplify things to “basic supply and demand” levels: if you have 20 businesses in town which each staff at a 1:20 ratio, 20 migrants moving into town and shopping at those businesses, increases supply exactly in proportion to the increase in demand.

It’s reductive, but then “basic supply and demand” is itself extremely reductive. It’s a drastic simplification to illustrate basic concepts, like frictionless surfaces and spherical cows in Physics 101. “Basic supply and demand” is not how economies actually work, it’s a simplified model for Econ 101.

And? I’m talking broadly about the economy, not one particular business.

More people isn’t just more supply, it’s also more demand. More people means more customers.

It’s strange to see sentiment on malls shift from “soulless shrines to decadent consumerism” to “the last real third space”