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Comment by voakbasda | Hacker News Reader

A belief held by the majority does not make it better simply for that fact. Not that long ago, the majority view was that slavery was a great thing, so I think you should see that argument falls fairly flat.

Offering birthright citizenship makes the US better than 95% of the other countries. Not worse.

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> Offering birthright citizenship makes the US better than 95% of the other countries. Not worse.

No arguments why its better, just stating it as if its fact.

Most countries do not have it because it creates many preverse incentives (such as anchor babies). This especially in countries which are targets of immigration (such as the US).

> Not that long ago, the majority view was that slavery was a great thing

A bit of a tangent, but is that actually the case? The highest estimate I have seen puts slave ownership at 5% of the population while the lowest puts it at 1%.

Obviously just because somebody doesn't own slaves doesn't mean they didn't support the system. There could be economic or legal reasons they couldn't own a slave.

I am just not sure that it was actually a majority view at any point in time in the US.

People are pretty expensive (they're literally worth a lifetime of free labor). 1 slave would've been like 3 complete years income for an average free white southerner to purchase, plus ongoing expenses obviously. So they basically end up in the hands of upper class people who have a steady need for lots of manual labor. Doesn't mean that everyone else around was not benefiting from the economic surplus, or was not supportive of the institution.

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