Points & Desis | Sepia Mutiny

As Abhi points out, one of the key elements of the proposed immigration bill was a Canadian-/Aussie-style points system to allocate immigration spots. The overall bill failed.

The proposed point system, however, was pretty interesting. The general goal was to provide a more systemic, color-blind way of sorting the through the massive pool of applicants. Factors like English proficiency, degrees, and occupations would be allocated values and the sum determined where in the stack you ranked….

Of course, the world being the non-uniform soup it is, the second you start calling some traits more ‘desirable’ than others, you’re going to run into, uh, disparaties in how frequently those traits are found across ethnic groups. Towards this end, the NYT published this very interesting chart which showed how, based on the past 15 yrs of immigration data, a few select groups would have been allocated points. By my eye, Desi’s would have scored rather conspicuously well….

I’ll take a break from my usual proclivity to rabble-rouse and leave it to y’all to interpret the results and their desirability. 😉

59 thoughts on “Points & Desis”

Thanks Newt! Look forward to your lecture series on corporate welfare, off-shore tax havens, property taxes & school funding, legacy admissions, the evils of the estate tax, and non-taxable “income” in private equity, etc.

Let me know if you wish to discuss these topics and I will gladly oblige.

As for this, multigenerational government dependency spare me the syllables and just call them leaches.

I use the term that I feel is most apt. The use of your term, however, is solely yours. BTW, no comment on the responsibility side for those receiving the entitlements? No comments on the displacement of citizens from the semi-skilled and unskilled marketplace? No comments regarding the failure of existing programs to correct the problems for which they were created?

blockquote>Morality is a subjective construct and thusly the contention of the application of some uniform standard of morality is dubious/blockquote>

What part of the universal Golden Rule of morality: do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you, do you find “dubious” and “subjective”?

“charity” is mandated by the government under the color of actual or implied force, it no longer becomes charity.

You must have a problem with taxes then. And with the safety net, universal education etc they pay for. You must really love how India works then: abandoning multitudes of its children to hunger, illiteracy, slave labor, beggary…

being a libertarian, I see such responsibility lying first with the individual and then secondly (a distant second) with their government.

So you think a child is a “responsible individual” who should be held accountable for the “decisions” it makes regarding its life?

Morality is a subjective construct and thusly the contention of the application of some uniform standard of morality is dubious

What part of the universal Golden Rule of morality: do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you, do you find “dubious” and “subjective”?

“charity” is mandated by the government under the color of actual or implied force, it no longer becomes charity.

being a libertarian, I see such responsibility lying first with the individual and then secondly (a distant second) with their government.

So you think a child is a “responsible individual” who should be held accountable for the “decisions” it makes regarding its life?

I was just waiting for the cavalry! 🙂

What part of the universal Golden Rule of morality: do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you, do you find “dubious” and “subjective”?

The “Golden Rule” is no more of an objective basis for morality (particularly in the context of ubiquity)than would be some random (well, not that random) section of Hammurabi’s Code (you know which one to which I am making reference). Morality varies not only across cultural boundaries but also across temporal boundaries within the same culture.

You must have a problem with taxes then. And with the safety net, universal education etc they pay for. You must really love how India works then: abandoning multitudes of its children to hunger, illiteracy, slave labor, beggary…

Yes and no. Depends on the rationale for the tax, depends on how much the tax is and depends on how the tax money is spent. The current entitlement system is vastly different than the safety net concept under the guise of which many of the programs were put into place. As far as universal education goes, it depends on the funding mechanism. A sales tax as a funding mechanism is one that I am fine with but a property tax based mechanism is not one that I am fine with. When it comes to the issue of India, and more specifically Indians in India and their children, the onus of responsibility lies with the people that are making the children that they can ill-afford to support.

So you think a child is a “responsible individual” who should be held accountable for the “decisions” it makes regarding its life?

It is the people that volitionally engaged in the activities of making the child upon whom the responsibility falls upon. I don’t take a particularly positive view of the r-selected breeding strategies of those that can ill-afford to feed themselves much less their dependents.

An article in Slate on how much an immigrant is worth.

Who are these Indians (and Mexicans) that speak ‘English only’ (like this only?)?

Indian citizens who are growing up in the US?

In other words people with parents that never tought them their mother tongue. That’s dumb. =)

Why is it that educated people end up doing professions that arent theirs when they come to Canada? In several cases this is seen. Why is it so?

Who are these Indians (and Mexicans) that speak ‘English only’ (like this only?)? Indian citizens who are growing up in the US?

In other words people with parents that never tought them their mother tongue. That’s dumb. =)

Not necessarily dumb.What if both parents speak different “mother tongues” and so the only common link language is English ?

What about those Anglo Indians whose mother tongue is English ? “Indian” doesn’t just mean “brown person with funny accent and English as second language” any more than “American ” means “white person with an American accent”

DSummoner on June 12, 2007 at 5:01 am said:

Thanks Newt! Look forward to your lecture series on corporate welfare, off-shore tax havens, property taxes & school funding, legacy admissions, the evils of the estate tax, and non-taxable “income” in private equity, etc.

Let me know if you wish to discuss these topics and I will gladly oblige.

As for this, multigenerational government dependency spare me the syllables and just call them leaches.

I use the term that I feel is most apt. The use of your term, however, is solely yours. BTW, no comment on the responsibility side for those receiving the entitlements? No comments on the displacement of citizens from the semi-skilled and unskilled marketplace? No comments regarding the failure of existing programs to correct the problems for which they were created?
Prema on June 12, 2007 at 5:59 am said:

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blockquote>Morality is a subjective construct and thusly the contention of the application of some uniform standard of morality is dubious/blockquote>

What part of the universal Golden Rule of morality: do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you, do you find “dubious” and “subjective”?

“charity” is mandated by the government under the color of actual or implied force, it no longer becomes charity.

You must have a problem with taxes then. And with the safety net, universal education etc they pay for. You must really love how India works then: abandoning multitudes of its children to hunger, illiteracy, slave labor, beggary…

being a libertarian, I see such responsibility lying first with the individual and then secondly (a distant second) with their government.

So you think a child is a “responsible individual” who should be held accountable for the “decisions” it makes regarding its life?
Prema on June 12, 2007 at 6:04 am said:

Morality is a subjective construct and thusly the contention of the application of some uniform standard of morality is dubious

What part of the universal Golden Rule of morality: do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you, do you find “dubious” and “subjective”?

“charity” is mandated by the government under the color of actual or implied force, it no longer becomes charity.

You must have a problem with taxes then. And with the safety net, universal education etc they pay for. You must really love how India works then: abandoning multitudes of its children to hunger, illiteracy, slave labor, beggary…

being a libertarian, I see such responsibility lying first with the individual and then secondly (a distant second) with their government.

So you think a child is a “responsible individual” who should be held accountable for the “decisions” it makes regarding its life?
Rahul on June 12, 2007 at 6:06 am said:

I was just waiting for the cavalry! 🙂
DSummoner on June 12, 2007 at 10:46 am said:

What part of the universal Golden Rule of morality: do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you, do you find “dubious” and “subjective”?

The “Golden Rule” is no more of an objective basis for morality (particularly in the context of ubiquity)than would be some random (well, not that random) section of Hammurabi’s Code (you know which one to which I am making reference). Morality varies not only across cultural boundaries but also across temporal boundaries within the same culture.

You must have a problem with taxes then. And with the safety net, universal education etc they pay for. You must really love how India works then: abandoning multitudes of its children to hunger, illiteracy, slave labor, beggary…

Yes and no. Depends on the rationale for the tax, depends on how much the tax is and depends on how the tax money is spent. The current entitlement system is vastly different than the safety net concept under the guise of which many of the programs were put into place. As far as universal education goes, it depends on the funding mechanism. A sales tax as a funding mechanism is one that I am fine with but a property tax based mechanism is not one that I am fine with. When it comes to the issue of India, and more specifically Indians in India and their children, the onus of responsibility lies with the people that are making the children that they can ill-afford to support.

So you think a child is a “responsible individual” who should be held accountable for the “decisions” it makes regarding its life?

It is the people that volitionally engaged in the activities of making the child upon whom the responsibility falls upon. I don’t take a particularly positive view of the r-selected breeding strategies of those that can ill-afford to feed themselves much less their dependents.
Rahul on June 13, 2007 at 2:27 am said:

An article in Slate on how much an immigrant is worth.
mlechh on June 14, 2007 at 10:10 am said:

Who are these Indians (and Mexicans) that speak ‘English only’ (like this only?)?

Indian citizens who are growing up in the US?
mizzbrownie on August 17, 2007 at 7:18 pm said:

In other words people with parents that never tought them their mother tongue. That’s dumb. =)

Why is it that educated people end up doing professions that arent theirs when they come to Canada? In several cases this is seen. Why is it so?
Runa on August 17, 2007 at 7:25 pm said:

Who are these Indians (and Mexicans) that speak ‘English only’ (like this only?)? Indian citizens who are growing up in the US?

In other words people with parents that never tought them their mother tongue. That’s dumb. =)

Not necessarily dumb.What if both parents speak different “mother tongues” and so the only common link language is English ?

What about those Anglo Indians whose mother tongue is English ? “Indian” doesn’t just mean “brown person with funny accent and English as second language” any more than “American ” means “white person with an American accent”