Sure. Things like off-shoring, automation, etc. drive down the cost of labor in a number of ways, but primarily by increasing the share of the workforce with little to no legal protections (sweat shops, robots) and decreasing the share of the workforce that expects a living wage (Americans). This process, which has been going on for decades, has left our lower and middle classes in a precarious situation--they have much lower employment security than their parents did, worse benefits across the board, and the prospects for their children look even more grim than their own. The
research on American wage stagnation is uncontested on these points.
Thank you for the link, however, so many of us are familiar (and have discussed) many of those factors that have effectively stagnated wage growth while seeing their costs soar and debt accumulate. Many more factors for this occurred to me before automation. Certainly the result of decreased purchasing power impacts service businesses in a consumer society.
An American working class that is poorer, sicker and less secure is one is that less able to spend on the goods and services that have driven our economic growth since the Industrial Revolution. So these companies are prioritizing short-term goals/ quarterly growth targets at the expense of long-term viability. But that's just the modus operandi of liberalism (the political philosophy, not Democrats specifically).
I would think that our economic growth was first driven by expanding westward with the demands for companies that could supply materials, by immigration and by innovation while the workforces adapted to industrial changes. Agree on the failure of liberalism.
I'm not optimistic. Texas is one of the few states with good medium-term growth prospects, due in part to Hispanic immigration but also to domestic migration of citizens and businesses from other states. From a national perspective, a lot of that growth is illusory, since Texas is growing at the expense of other states. And if you look at the children of typical 2nd and 3rd generation Hispanic immigrants, their fertility looks nearly identical to the national average. Any family we welcome will become fully American within a generation or two, so we can't rely on immigrants to fix what ails us.
As far as in-migration v immigration, Texas' economic growth across multiple industries and with multi-national companies investing there drives their population growth and attracts a workforce with the necessary tools. First generation Americans may be in the service industries but succeeding generations may drive those industries with higher education. West Virginia with a reliance on a couple of stagnant industries may continue to see its residents leave. From a dynamic perspective, the job creation related to the Internet, for example, should sustain states like Texas from highly-skilled jobs to lower-skill jobs servicing them. I just think Texas for those reasons and those factors that affect job creation are worth studying, especially their replacement level fertility.
I'd phrase it this way - assuming increasing economic success and freedom especially in their high-growth industries in their metropolitan areas, will a probably younger and more educated population in a state with a high rate people practicing their religions, lower abortion rates and immigrants with higher birth rates see an increase in fertility rates?
Employment by industry, 1910 and 2015 (U.S. Bureau of Statistics)
