A Quote by Alan Greenspan
Most high-income people in our country do not realize that their incomes are being subsidized by their protection from competition from highly skilled people who are prevented from immigrating to the United States. But we need such skills in order to staff our productive economy, so that the standard of living for Americans as a whole can grow.
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Skilled shortages in America exist because we are shielding our skilled labor force from world competition. [Visa quotas] have been substituted for the wage pricing mechanism. In the process we have created [a] privileged elite whose incomes are being supported at non-competitively high levels by immigration quotas on skilled professionals. Eliminating such restrictions would reduce at least some of the income inequality.
The burning issue of our time is the growing inequality in income and wealth in our country, and it's got to be addressed. We've got to stop it. It's eroding our politics. It's separating our society into the haves and the have-nots. It's condemning a whole younger set of our population to not be able to enter the middle class. And, it hits hardest in the prairie areas of the United States, our small towns and communities, where the jobs just aren't available and the incomes are low.
What is worrisome about that is the U.S. standard of living. I think it is very difficult to envision our standard of living being preserved if we are in an economy where all people do is flip hamburgers, wait on people in stores, and sue each other. It’s not much of a basis for an economy.
Preventing people from illegally immigrating to the United States should be the primary purpose of Customs and Border Protection.
The United States has more people living in poverty than at almost any time in the modern history of our country. I believe that in a democratic, civilized society none of our people should be hungry or living in desperation. We need to expand Social Security, not cut it. We need to increase funding for nutrition programs, not cut them.
The Hudson River Tunnel is a chokepoint for the financial center - and most productive region - of the United States. It is the most heavily trafficked piece of rail in the entire country and even a partial closure will suffocate our nation's economy.
It's all very well for us to sit here in the West with our high incomes and cushy lives, and say it's immoral to violate the sovereignty of another state. But if the effect of that is to bring people in that country economic and political freedom, to raise their standard of living, to increase their life expectancy, then don't rule it out.
There is a section of our population in South Africa that you can't expect to get integrated in the economy of its own. These are people without skills and that will include young people who might very well have matric certificates, but don't have the skills to be absorbed in the economy. So we need to target people like those in a special way, in a focused way so that they have the skills and the capacity to participate in the economy. That requires special programmes.
Our government is committed to helping our young people develop the skills and training they need to succeed. Through our Summer Company program, students can launch a business, become employers, and gain an advantage in the highly competitive global economy - all while still in school.
We ought to be opening up our borders to skilled labour from all parts of the world because [the state of the world is as follows: ] if we were to do that we would increase the supply of skilled workers that our schools have been unable to create and as a consequence of that we would lower the average wage of skills and reduce the degree of income inequality in this country.
In our high-tech, high-skilled economy where low-skilled work is being scaled back, phased out, exported, or severely under-compensated, all the right behavior in the world won't create better jobs with more pay.
The reality is there's a limit to how many people any country can bring in. And we as a country have a right to say we want to bring people based on their ability to contribute to our economy, to be safe, productive citizens, and to uplift the nation as a whole.
The United States is the most indebted country in the world. It has almost 17 billion dollars of debt with the rest of the world while living off the world's savings. They are living off the savings of the people of Greece, the savings of the people of Spain, France etc. All of those countries that save their reserves in the banks in dollars are simply financing the American economy, and that is why the average American citizen consumes two and a half times more than their income.
We have a high standard of living. ... In Norway, we've tripled our income since 1970. In the rest of western Europe, income has merely doubled.
To be productive and focused, the rugged individuals in our economy need health security so that our country can remain competitive and agile in the changing economy.
I'm reaching out to all Americans - Democrats, Republicans, and independents - because we need everybody to help make our country what it should be, to grow the economy, to make it fairer, to make it work for everyone. We need your talents, your skills, your commitments, your energy, your ambition.
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