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Comment by notch656c | Hacker News Reader

It's more profitable to our lower classes to keep the Mexicans / Guatemalans / whatever locked up in their own country to suppress their wages and competition and then allow free trade of goods. That gets us lots of cheap shit without having to pay USA wages.

I'm in favor of open borders mostly on humanitarian grounds, and I offer our lower wage laborers as offerings on the pillar of sacrifice for that.

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I don't really understand the argument for open borders as a net humanitarian good. For the individuals who come to the US, sure. But how will these countries in Middle America ever develop while their most ambitious, most hard-working, most risk-taking people are siphoned off to live (relatively) cushy lives in the USA?

Just look at what has happened to Puerto Rico. Everyone who can, leaves. What's left is grim. Easy access to the USA is a great deal for the minority who get out, but for most Puerto Ricans, it's hard to imagine that they're better off as a result.

> I'm in favor of open borders mostly on humanitarian grounds, and I offer our lower wage laborers as offerings on the pillar of sacrifice for that.

Half the country agrees with you, but they'd never admit it.

I hope those countries would adapt by competing and fixing the things that fuck up their business climate. Also worth noting if their labor flees the price of labor in their country would rise and hopefully make things better for the remainder.

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