Bryan Caplan's Blog, page 103
March 15, 2016
How Open Borders Will Win, If It Wins, by Bryan Caplan
Harvard's spring break was last week, so its students celebrated Open Borders Day one week early. Here are the slides for the talk I presented there. Full video coming soon.
P.S. In honor of regularly-scheduled Open Borders Day, I'm debating the Center for Immigration Studies' Mark Krikorian tomorrow in DC. RSVP here.
(7 COMMENTS)
P.S. In honor of regularly-scheduled Open Borders Day, I'm debating the Center for Immigration Studies' Mark Krikorian tomorrow in DC. RSVP here.
(7 COMMENTS)
March 13, 2016
The Microaggressions of Immigration, by Bryan Caplan
I have zero sympathy for the fashionable crusade against "microaggressions." When backed by government funding and lawsuits, the concept is a thinly-veiled attack on freedom of speech. But even without government backing, "microaggression" is an attack on common decency. Taking offense when a speaker intends no offense is simply rude. If someone happens to step on our emotional toes, civility impels us to suppress the urge to take it personally. Say "Don't mention it" - or better yet, don't mention it.
The microaggression label is narrowly tied to leftist identity politics. Support for the concept, however, is far broader. With the possible exception of Mormons, what group doesn't leap at the chance to decry the slightest of slights? On-campus, of course, we usually hear about straight cisgendered white males committing racist, sexist, homophobic, and transphobic microaggressions. Off-campus, however, I see a totally different pattern: Natives lamenting the microaggressions immigrants commit against our national identity.
The most obvious case: Americans routinely grouse when immigrants publicly speak languages other than English. They get even more annoyed when they have to "press 1 for English" on an ATM machine or customer service menu. Offending Americans is the furthest thing from the immigrants' minds; they're just going about their business. But natives take offense anyway: "In America, we speak English!"
The same goes when Americans voice antipathy for immigrants' distinctive appearance: The clothes they wear, the cars they drive, the sports teams they cheer. Immigrants intend no offense, but Americans take offense nonetheless.
I also often hear Americans fret that immigrants - especially Muslims - are too intolerant to keep around. Why? Not because their crime rates are objectively high, but because they come from sexist, homophobic, anti-Semitic cultures - and thereby make women, gays, and Jews feel uncomfortable. The upshot: even the most tolerant Muslim in the world commits microaggressions by walking around, making Americans wonder if he's intolerant in his heart.
When leftist college students fume over microaggressions, the non-academic world properly scoffs. Government shouldn't lift a finger, and students should grow a thicker skin. Logically, the same goes for immigrants' alleged microaggressions. Government should do nothing, and nativists should grow some tolerance. Immigration inspires some serious concerns, but natives' hypersensitivity isn't one them.
What about Americans' right to "preserve their culture"? I'm tempted to call it the nativist version of a "safe space," but cultural preservation is far more totalitarian. A "safe space" is but an enclave - a small corner of the world where politically-correct norms prevail. To "preserve a culture," in contrast, requires a whole country to impose traditional norms on everyone. And this is crazy: You don't even have the right to force your culture on your adult children, much less millions of strangers.
(3 COMMENTS)
The microaggression label is narrowly tied to leftist identity politics. Support for the concept, however, is far broader. With the possible exception of Mormons, what group doesn't leap at the chance to decry the slightest of slights? On-campus, of course, we usually hear about straight cisgendered white males committing racist, sexist, homophobic, and transphobic microaggressions. Off-campus, however, I see a totally different pattern: Natives lamenting the microaggressions immigrants commit against our national identity.
The most obvious case: Americans routinely grouse when immigrants publicly speak languages other than English. They get even more annoyed when they have to "press 1 for English" on an ATM machine or customer service menu. Offending Americans is the furthest thing from the immigrants' minds; they're just going about their business. But natives take offense anyway: "In America, we speak English!"
The same goes when Americans voice antipathy for immigrants' distinctive appearance: The clothes they wear, the cars they drive, the sports teams they cheer. Immigrants intend no offense, but Americans take offense nonetheless.
I also often hear Americans fret that immigrants - especially Muslims - are too intolerant to keep around. Why? Not because their crime rates are objectively high, but because they come from sexist, homophobic, anti-Semitic cultures - and thereby make women, gays, and Jews feel uncomfortable. The upshot: even the most tolerant Muslim in the world commits microaggressions by walking around, making Americans wonder if he's intolerant in his heart.
When leftist college students fume over microaggressions, the non-academic world properly scoffs. Government shouldn't lift a finger, and students should grow a thicker skin. Logically, the same goes for immigrants' alleged microaggressions. Government should do nothing, and nativists should grow some tolerance. Immigration inspires some serious concerns, but natives' hypersensitivity isn't one them.
What about Americans' right to "preserve their culture"? I'm tempted to call it the nativist version of a "safe space," but cultural preservation is far more totalitarian. A "safe space" is but an enclave - a small corner of the world where politically-correct norms prevail. To "preserve a culture," in contrast, requires a whole country to impose traditional norms on everyone. And this is crazy: You don't even have the right to force your culture on your adult children, much less millions of strangers.
(3 COMMENTS)
March 6, 2016
Libertarianism Against the Welfare State: A Refresher, by Bryan Caplan
I'm a hard-core libertarian who defines libertarianism broadly. If you think voluntarism is seriously underrated and government is seriously overrated, you're a libertarian in my book. I also strive to treat others with common decency regardless of their political views. That includes libertarian apostates. People sometimes cease to be libertarians even on my broad definition - and when that happens, the proper reaction is not anger and ostracism, but friendliness and curiosity.
In recent years, I've heard many libertarians expressing new-found appreciation for the welfare state. This is most pronounced at the Niskanen Center, but that's only part of a broader trend. If the revisionist position were a clear-cut, "Sure, most of the welfare state is terrible, but the rest of okay. We should cut social spending by 80%, not 100%," their libertarian credentials would not be at issue.
When libertarians start describing Danish "flexicurity" with deep admiration, however, I don't just doubt their libertarian commitment. More importantly, I wonder why they changed their minds. And to be honest, the more I listen to them, the more I wonder. The most enlightening path, I think, is to restate what I see as the standard libertarian case against the welfare state, and find out exactly where they demur. Here goes.
Soft-Core Case
1. Universal social programs that "help everyone" are folly. Regardless of your political philosophy, taxing everyone to help everyone makes no sense.
2. In the U.S. (along with virtually every other country), most government social spending is devoted to these indefensible universal programs - Social Security, Medicare, and K-12 public education for starters.
3. Social programs - universal or means-tested - give people perverse incentives, discouraging work, planning, and self-insurance. The programs give recipients very bad incentives; the taxes required to fund the programs give everyone moderately bad incentives. The more "generous" the programs, the worse the collateral damage. As a result, even programs carefully targeted to help the truly poor often fail a cost-benefit test. And while libertarians need not favor every government act that passes the cost-benefit test, they should at least oppose every government act that fails it.
4. "Helping people" sounds good; complaining about "perverse incentives" sounds bad. Since humans focus on how policies sound, rather than what they actually achieve, governments have a built-in tendency to adopt and preserve social programs that fail a cost-benefit test. Upshot: We should view even seemingly promising social programs with a skeptical eye.
Medium-Core Case
5. There is a plausible moral case for social programs that help people who are absolutely poor through no fault of their own. Otherwise, the case falters.
6. "Absolutely poor." When Jean Valjean steals a loaf of bread to save his sister's son, he
has a credible excuse. By extension, so does a government
program to tax strangers to feed Valjean's nephew. If Valjean steals a
smartphone to amuse his sister's son, though, his excuse falls flat - and
so does a government program designed to do the same.
7. "No fault of their own." Why you're poor matters. Starving because you're born blind is morally problematic. Starving because you drink yourself into a stupor every day is far less so. Indeed, you might call it just desserts.
8. Existing means-tested programs generally run afoul of one or both conditions. Even if the welfare state did not exist, few people in First World countries would be absolutely poor. And most poor people engage in a lot of irresponsible behavior. Check out any ethnography of poverty.
9. First World welfare states provide a popular rationale for restricting immigration from countries where absolute poverty is rampant: "There just coming to sponge off of us." Given the rarity of absolute poverty in the First World and the massive labor market benefits of migration from the Third World to the First, it is therefore likely that existing welfare states make global absolute poverty worse.
Hard-Core Case
10. Ambiguity about what constitutes "absolute poverty" and "irresponsible behavior" should be resolved in favor of taxpayers, not recipients. Coercion is not acceptable when justification is debatable.
11. If private charity can provide for people in absolute poverty through no fault of their own, there is no good reason for government to use tax dollars to do so. The best way to measure the adequacy of private charity is to put it to the test by abolishing existing social programs.
12. Consider the best-case scenario for force charity. Someone is absolutely poor through no fault of his own, and there are no disincentive effects of transfers or taxes. Even here, the moral case for forced charity is much less plausible than it looks. Think of the Good Samaritan. Did he do a noble deed - or merely fulfill his minimal obligation? Patriotic brainwashing notwithstanding, our "fellow citizens" are strangers - and the moral intuition that helping strangers is supererogatory is hard to escape. And even if you think the opposite, can you honestly deny that it's debatable? If so, how can you in good conscience coerce dissenters?
Personally, I embrace all twelve theses. But even the Soft-Core Case implies radical opposition to the welfare state as it currently exists. My questions for lapsed critics of the welfare state: Precisely which theses do you reject - and what's the largest welfare state consistent with the theses you accept?
(1 COMMENTS)
In recent years, I've heard many libertarians expressing new-found appreciation for the welfare state. This is most pronounced at the Niskanen Center, but that's only part of a broader trend. If the revisionist position were a clear-cut, "Sure, most of the welfare state is terrible, but the rest of okay. We should cut social spending by 80%, not 100%," their libertarian credentials would not be at issue.
When libertarians start describing Danish "flexicurity" with deep admiration, however, I don't just doubt their libertarian commitment. More importantly, I wonder why they changed their minds. And to be honest, the more I listen to them, the more I wonder. The most enlightening path, I think, is to restate what I see as the standard libertarian case against the welfare state, and find out exactly where they demur. Here goes.
Soft-Core Case
1. Universal social programs that "help everyone" are folly. Regardless of your political philosophy, taxing everyone to help everyone makes no sense.
2. In the U.S. (along with virtually every other country), most government social spending is devoted to these indefensible universal programs - Social Security, Medicare, and K-12 public education for starters.
3. Social programs - universal or means-tested - give people perverse incentives, discouraging work, planning, and self-insurance. The programs give recipients very bad incentives; the taxes required to fund the programs give everyone moderately bad incentives. The more "generous" the programs, the worse the collateral damage. As a result, even programs carefully targeted to help the truly poor often fail a cost-benefit test. And while libertarians need not favor every government act that passes the cost-benefit test, they should at least oppose every government act that fails it.
4. "Helping people" sounds good; complaining about "perverse incentives" sounds bad. Since humans focus on how policies sound, rather than what they actually achieve, governments have a built-in tendency to adopt and preserve social programs that fail a cost-benefit test. Upshot: We should view even seemingly promising social programs with a skeptical eye.
Medium-Core Case
5. There is a plausible moral case for social programs that help people who are absolutely poor through no fault of their own. Otherwise, the case falters.
6. "Absolutely poor." When Jean Valjean steals a loaf of bread to save his sister's son, he
has a credible excuse. By extension, so does a government
program to tax strangers to feed Valjean's nephew. If Valjean steals a
smartphone to amuse his sister's son, though, his excuse falls flat - and
so does a government program designed to do the same.
7. "No fault of their own." Why you're poor matters. Starving because you're born blind is morally problematic. Starving because you drink yourself into a stupor every day is far less so. Indeed, you might call it just desserts.
8. Existing means-tested programs generally run afoul of one or both conditions. Even if the welfare state did not exist, few people in First World countries would be absolutely poor. And most poor people engage in a lot of irresponsible behavior. Check out any ethnography of poverty.
9. First World welfare states provide a popular rationale for restricting immigration from countries where absolute poverty is rampant: "There just coming to sponge off of us." Given the rarity of absolute poverty in the First World and the massive labor market benefits of migration from the Third World to the First, it is therefore likely that existing welfare states make global absolute poverty worse.
Hard-Core Case
10. Ambiguity about what constitutes "absolute poverty" and "irresponsible behavior" should be resolved in favor of taxpayers, not recipients. Coercion is not acceptable when justification is debatable.
11. If private charity can provide for people in absolute poverty through no fault of their own, there is no good reason for government to use tax dollars to do so. The best way to measure the adequacy of private charity is to put it to the test by abolishing existing social programs.
12. Consider the best-case scenario for force charity. Someone is absolutely poor through no fault of his own, and there are no disincentive effects of transfers or taxes. Even here, the moral case for forced charity is much less plausible than it looks. Think of the Good Samaritan. Did he do a noble deed - or merely fulfill his minimal obligation? Patriotic brainwashing notwithstanding, our "fellow citizens" are strangers - and the moral intuition that helping strangers is supererogatory is hard to escape. And even if you think the opposite, can you honestly deny that it's debatable? If so, how can you in good conscience coerce dissenters?
Personally, I embrace all twelve theses. But even the Soft-Core Case implies radical opposition to the welfare state as it currently exists. My questions for lapsed critics of the welfare state: Precisely which theses do you reject - and what's the largest welfare state consistent with the theses you accept?
(1 COMMENTS)
March 1, 2016
Myth of the Rational Voter 2016, by Bryan Caplan
In 2007, I published The Myth of the Rational Voter: Why Democracies Choose Bad Policies. Every presidential election year, people ask for an update, and I normally say, "Nothing's changed." But 2016 really does look like an outlier. My thoughts:
1. While the public perennially exhibits what I call anti-market and anti-foreign biases, 2016 is egregious. Sanders is anti-market bias personified, Trump is anti-foreign bias personified. Sadly, my claim that the median American is a "moderate national socialist - statist to the core on both economic and social policy" looks truer than ever.
2. While Sanders' odds of winning the nomination are now low, his policy views seem closer to the median Democrat's than Clinton's. The typical Democrat will vote for Clinton's name recognition and general electability, but still pines for Sandersian socialism.
3. Trump's average policy views may be farther from the median Republican's than his rivals'. But he's the only candidate whose anti-foreign bias matches the median Republican's. I've long thought this was important to Republicans, but it now looks like anti-foreign bias matters more to them than all other issues combined. And unlike Sanders, Trump started out with more name recognition than his competitors - an edge that's snowballed over time.
4. After bleakly assessing public opinion, The Myth of the Rational Voter argues that democracies normally deliver substantially better policies than the public wants. The political system tends to quench the public's anti-market and anti-foreign urges while substantially watering down the policy poison. In 2016, one of the main dilution mechanisms has badly failed: Using social pressure to check and exclude hard-line demagogues.
5. Fortunately, most of the other dilution mechanisms remain intact. Most notably: (a) While the public often likes crazy policies, they resent the disastrous consequences of those crazy policies. This gives politicians a strong incentive for felicitous hypocrisy once they gain power - especially when contemplating policy change. (b) The median voter has a short attention span, so relatively sane elites have more influence in the long-run than the short-run. (c) Old-fashioned checks and balances: Congress, the Supreme Court, and state governments make it hard for Sanders or Trump to fulfill their promises even if they want to.
6. As a puritan, Sanders revolts me and Trump horrifies me. Even impotent populism makes my flesh crawl. The spectacle of populism-with-a-prayer-of-a-chance has already lost me hours of sleep. Trump in particular keeps intruding on my Bubble.
7. Flesh crawling aside, the actual consequences of a Trump or Sanders presidency remain shrouded. I'd bet that deportations (de jure plus de facto) rise under Trump, and give a 25% chance that the 1965 immigration act is amended in an anti-immigration direction. But I can also easily imagine four years of gridlock.
8. Main 2016 worry: My base rate for war between the United States and another major power is about 2% per presidential term. For Trump, I'd up the odds to 5% per term. Yes, I know by some measures he's less hawkish than his Republican rivals and Hillary. But his macho persona and casual remarks seem more predictive than his public statements.
9. Neither Sanders nor Trump "prove me right." My case rests on stable features of democratic politics, not the latest salacious stories.
10. Still, if voters were rational, Sanders and Trump wouldn't stand a chance. None of the candidates would survive serious scrutiny, but Sanders and Trump would be thrown out as soon as they delivered one short speech.
11. Suppose an Hispanic version of Donald Trump were thrilling Hispanic voters. Call him Donaldo Trumpo. Opponents of immigration would plausibly fear that El Donaldo is a classic strongman plotting to turn the U.S. into a banana republic. And they would hasten to the inference that Hispanics are fundamentally authoritarian and unfit for democracy. If 2016 doesn't convince you that political externalities are a two-way street, nothing will.
(13 COMMENTS)
1. While the public perennially exhibits what I call anti-market and anti-foreign biases, 2016 is egregious. Sanders is anti-market bias personified, Trump is anti-foreign bias personified. Sadly, my claim that the median American is a "moderate national socialist - statist to the core on both economic and social policy" looks truer than ever.
2. While Sanders' odds of winning the nomination are now low, his policy views seem closer to the median Democrat's than Clinton's. The typical Democrat will vote for Clinton's name recognition and general electability, but still pines for Sandersian socialism.
3. Trump's average policy views may be farther from the median Republican's than his rivals'. But he's the only candidate whose anti-foreign bias matches the median Republican's. I've long thought this was important to Republicans, but it now looks like anti-foreign bias matters more to them than all other issues combined. And unlike Sanders, Trump started out with more name recognition than his competitors - an edge that's snowballed over time.
4. After bleakly assessing public opinion, The Myth of the Rational Voter argues that democracies normally deliver substantially better policies than the public wants. The political system tends to quench the public's anti-market and anti-foreign urges while substantially watering down the policy poison. In 2016, one of the main dilution mechanisms has badly failed: Using social pressure to check and exclude hard-line demagogues.
5. Fortunately, most of the other dilution mechanisms remain intact. Most notably: (a) While the public often likes crazy policies, they resent the disastrous consequences of those crazy policies. This gives politicians a strong incentive for felicitous hypocrisy once they gain power - especially when contemplating policy change. (b) The median voter has a short attention span, so relatively sane elites have more influence in the long-run than the short-run. (c) Old-fashioned checks and balances: Congress, the Supreme Court, and state governments make it hard for Sanders or Trump to fulfill their promises even if they want to.
6. As a puritan, Sanders revolts me and Trump horrifies me. Even impotent populism makes my flesh crawl. The spectacle of populism-with-a-prayer-of-a-chance has already lost me hours of sleep. Trump in particular keeps intruding on my Bubble.
7. Flesh crawling aside, the actual consequences of a Trump or Sanders presidency remain shrouded. I'd bet that deportations (de jure plus de facto) rise under Trump, and give a 25% chance that the 1965 immigration act is amended in an anti-immigration direction. But I can also easily imagine four years of gridlock.
8. Main 2016 worry: My base rate for war between the United States and another major power is about 2% per presidential term. For Trump, I'd up the odds to 5% per term. Yes, I know by some measures he's less hawkish than his Republican rivals and Hillary. But his macho persona and casual remarks seem more predictive than his public statements.
9. Neither Sanders nor Trump "prove me right." My case rests on stable features of democratic politics, not the latest salacious stories.
10. Still, if voters were rational, Sanders and Trump wouldn't stand a chance. None of the candidates would survive serious scrutiny, but Sanders and Trump would be thrown out as soon as they delivered one short speech.
11. Suppose an Hispanic version of Donald Trump were thrilling Hispanic voters. Call him Donaldo Trumpo. Opponents of immigration would plausibly fear that El Donaldo is a classic strongman plotting to turn the U.S. into a banana republic. And they would hasten to the inference that Hispanics are fundamentally authoritarian and unfit for democracy. If 2016 doesn't convince you that political externalities are a two-way street, nothing will.
(13 COMMENTS)
February 28, 2016
Means-Testing Social Security: The Cohen-Friedman Debate, II, by Bryan Caplan
As you may recall, Milton Friedman debated former HEW Secretary Wilbur Cohen on means-testing Social Security back in 1972. Now let's check out the Friedman highlights. The Great One begins with his characteristically brilliant contrarianism: Public opinion notwithstanding, Social Security, not welfare, is the policy disaster.
P.S. If you think of Friedman as a strict Chicago-School utilitarian, think again:
Widespread dissatisfaction with the public assistance program-with the so-called welfare mess-has produced numerous proposals for drastic reform, including the President's proposed Family Assistance Plan now before the Congress. On the other hand, general complacency about social security is reflected in pressure to expand it still farther.Friedman's probably wrong about the net redistributive direction of Social Security, but his core point is sound: Taxing everyone to help everyone is madness. More:
My own attitude toward the two programs is almost the reverse. Bad as the welfare mess is, at least public assistance does go mainly to needy persons who are at lower income levels than the persons paying the taxes to finance the payments. The system badly needs reform but, at the moment, it serves an essential social function. It seems impossible to eliminate it promptly, even though its elimination should be our long-term objective. On the other hand, social security combines a highly regressive tax with largely indiscriminate benefits and, in overall effect, probably redistributes income from lower to higher income persons. I believe that it serves no essential social function. Existing commitments make it impossible to eliminate it overnight, but it should be unwound and terminated as soon as possible.
I believe that a program which is going to give income to people, which is going to give funds to people, should have a means test. I believe we have a responsibility to the taxpayer and not only to poor people.Friedman's ultimate response to Cohen's "A program for the poor will most likely be a poor program" argument:
I believe that the person who pays taxes has every right to require that, if he pays the taxes in order to help somebody, there be some evidence that that person needs help.
A program of that kind would be vastly less expensive than the ones we've now got. It would do a better job of helping people. In my view, the task of people like Mr. Cohen and myself is not to speculate about what people will do if they don't have leadership but to try to provide leadership in order to obtain the kind of good program that would achieve our objectives.Overall verdict: While I'm glad Friedman takes my side on means-testing, his arguments are disappointing. He doesn't clearly compare - much less measure - the disincentives of means-testing versus the disincentives of taxes high enough to fund universal programs. He doesn't ponder alternative measures of "means" (income, wealth, expected lifetime income, etc.). He doesn't emphasize the obvious fact that most Americans are perfectly capable of saving for their own retirement. And he doesn't drive home the overlooked fact that retired home owners with zero cash income only look poor. They can and should be expected to support themselves out of their home equity.
P.S. If you think of Friedman as a strict Chicago-School utilitarian, think again:
Mr.(1 COMMENTS)
Cohen's view, one which unfortunately is very widely held today, is
different. It treats the nation not as a collection of individuals and
of the groups which individuals separately value, but as an organic
unit. In his paper, Mr. Cohen says: ttl speak for the view that the
nation should be generous toward the elderly." I would argue that the
nation can't be generous to anyone. Only people can be generous.
Generosity is a human, individual trait, not a collective trait. There
is no generosity involved in my imposing taxes on you to help him. That is not generosity.
February 24, 2016
Upcoming Events, by Bryan Caplan
My next few weeks are packed with speaking engagements - hopefully somewhere near you! The schedule:
1. Students for Liberty, Washington DC. February 27, 9-10 AM. "Immigration Restrictions: A Solution in Search of a Problem."
2. Institute for Humane Studies, Yale University. March 4, 1:30-3 PM. "The Myth of the Rational Voter."
3. Harvard Law School. March 7, Noon-1:30 PM. "Let Anyone Take a Job Anywhere."
4. Open Borders Day @ Harvard University. March 9, 5-7 PM. "How Open Borders Will Happen, If It Happens."
5. America's Future Foundation, Washington, DC. March 16, 6:30-8 PM. "Open Borders Debate." Me versus Mark Krikorian.
Along the way, I'll be spending time in Princeton, New Haven, Boston, and Bethlehem, PA. Email me if you're interested in meeting up.
(0 COMMENTS)
1. Students for Liberty, Washington DC. February 27, 9-10 AM. "Immigration Restrictions: A Solution in Search of a Problem."
2. Institute for Humane Studies, Yale University. March 4, 1:30-3 PM. "The Myth of the Rational Voter."
3. Harvard Law School. March 7, Noon-1:30 PM. "Let Anyone Take a Job Anywhere."
4. Open Borders Day @ Harvard University. March 9, 5-7 PM. "How Open Borders Will Happen, If It Happens."
5. America's Future Foundation, Washington, DC. March 16, 6:30-8 PM. "Open Borders Debate." Me versus Mark Krikorian.
Along the way, I'll be spending time in Princeton, New Haven, Boston, and Bethlehem, PA. Email me if you're interested in meeting up.
(0 COMMENTS)
EconLog Reading Club Round-Up: Ancestry and Long-Run Growth, by Bryan Caplan
In case you missed any segment of the latest Reading Club, here's the full package:
Background
Lead-in
Part #1: Putterman and Weil
Putterman's Commentaries, with My Replies
Part #2: Comin, Easterly, and Gong
Part #3: Spolaore and Wacziarg
Two Fun Facts from Putterman-Weil
Part #4: Chanda, Cook, and Putterman
Chanda Comments
AMA Questions
AMA Answers
Concluding Thoughts
(0 COMMENTS)
Background
Lead-in
Part #1: Putterman and Weil
Putterman's Commentaries, with My Replies
Part #2: Comin, Easterly, and Gong
Part #3: Spolaore and Wacziarg
Two Fun Facts from Putterman-Weil
Part #4: Chanda, Cook, and Putterman
Chanda Comments
AMA Questions
AMA Answers
Concluding Thoughts
(0 COMMENTS)
Ancestry and Long-Run Growth Reading Club: My AMA Answers, by Bryan Caplan
Here are responses to the Reading Club AMA questions, point-by-point:
December:
In general, I am very open to genetic explanations of human behavior; I have a whole book on the topic. But as I explain in that book, virtually all behavioral genetic evidence measures the effect of genes within the First World. The fact that environmental differences within the First World have little long-run effect on human development is a flimsy reason to doubt that growing up in the Third World is tremendously damaging. And as usual with migration, this is not just a humanitarian concern; physical and intellectual stunting also hurts the global poor's potential customers.
Denver:
Joshua Woods:
(4 COMMENTS)
December:
What about the possibility that the distribution of traits may varyThe papers covered in the reading club treat ancestry as fixed, but remain agnostic on the mechanism. It could be genetics; it could just be persistent culture. The mechanism doesn't really affect their results. However, my claim that civilized migration outperforms historic migration by swiftly acculturating newcomers does depend on the mechanism. The greater the role of genes, the less credible my revisionist story becomes.
between populations due to genetic differences between populations? If
it is those traits are driving long-run growth, and those traits cannot
be easily copied due to their partial genetic basis, how does that
affect the analysis you've been making in this series and your views on
open borders?
In general, I am very open to genetic explanations of human behavior; I have a whole book on the topic. But as I explain in that book, virtually all behavioral genetic evidence measures the effect of genes within the First World. The fact that environmental differences within the First World have little long-run effect on human development is a flimsy reason to doubt that growing up in the Third World is tremendously damaging. And as usual with migration, this is not just a humanitarian concern; physical and intellectual stunting also hurts the global poor's potential customers.
Denver:
The papers I discussed present "reduced form results"; they sum all direct and indirect effects of ancestry, institutional impacts included.
While I tend to agree with your assessments, I do have one
reservation. Most of these measures are simply looking at the ancestry
of the populace, and correlating it with current levels of productivity.
But what about institutional impacts? That is, what impact do you think
ancestry plays in forming social norms and government policy? Which could then have these observable impacts in productivity.
For example, if ancestry measures were as predictive as
anti-immigration advocates often imply, then we would expect to see
homogeneous nations (in terms of ancestry), like Europe, outperform
their heterogeneous counterparts: the US. On the whole, I tend to think
the opposite is true: heterogeneity outperforms homogeneity.
Indeed, this is just what Putterman and Weil find.
...So I have one final question: givenI would let them vote. Voting restrictions make sense as long as relatively sensible people care about the well-being of less-sensible people, leading voters to pick policies that are better for everyone. Contrary to popular belief, this is roughly true for U.S. citizens. Unfortunately, unselfish voting stops at the nation's border. A century of U.S. policy shows native-born Americans can't be trusted to treat foreigners with minimal decency, much less take their interests to heart. Giving foreigners the vote helps them collectively defend themselves from natives' callousness. While this raises the risk foreigners will treat natives unjustly, the opposite danger is far more serious.
the two options, open borders or open borders given that immigrants from
backwards countries (measured by "SAT", IQ, or another relevant
measure), and their descendants, are barred from voting, which would you
choose?
Joshua Woods:
1. What seems to you to be the most promising avenue for future research in this area?
Re-doing all the results with population weighting, so we stop treating China, India, and the United States as empirically relevant as Bhutan, Malta, and Belize. Nathaniel Bechhofer is pursuing this route already. You'll know more when I do.
2. The addition of latitude controls drastically affected the
coefficients on the various ancestry variables. Do you think this
powerful effect of latitude holds today at our much higher technology
level?
My best guess is that there's a huge indirect effect. Latitude mattered a lot directly in the past. But no matter why a country is poor today, current poverty holds back prosperity in a hundred different ways.
Has any objective research or even informed speculation been done on why
latitude effects are so strong? Agriculture concerns would have been
important in past centuries, but probably not so much in the past 50
years. Plucky New Englanders might suggest that experiencing the seasons
sets our resolve to be more productive (or something).
Easterly and Levine 2003 try to do this. Their bottom line: "We find evidence that tropics, germs, and crops affect development
through institutions. We find no evidence that tropics, germs, and crops
affect country incomes directly other than through institutions, nor do
we find any effect of policies on development once we control for
institutions." I find their distinction between institutions and policies pretty artificial, but their paper is still the obvious place to start.
(4 COMMENTS)
February 22, 2016
Ancestry and Long-Run Growth Reading Club: Ask Me Anything, by Bryan Caplan
In the comments, Ask Me Anything about ancestry and long-run growth. Tomorrow I'll do my best to answer every question.
P.S. Feel free to repost comments from earlier Reading Club entries.
(1 COMMENTS)
P.S. Feel free to repost comments from earlier Reading Club entries.
(1 COMMENTS)
Teaching to the Test Bleg, by Bryan Caplan
I'm looking for good empirical work measuring the prevalence and effects of "teaching to the test." Nothing good pops up on Google Scholar. Help!
(2 COMMENTS)
(2 COMMENTS)
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