How Socialism Eliminates The Immigration Question

Recently, I posted an image on my Facebook page from IWW which included the following text:

"You can't be pro-worker and anti-immigration. Immigrants ARE workers. Don't be fooled by dog-whistle racism. Immigrants aren't driving down wages, bosses are."

I thought it might be pertinent here to illustrate some different perspectives on this as in my original post, I only focused on the socialist perspective within a capitalist system. So first up, here is (near enough) what I originally posted.

The Socialist Perspective (Of A Capitalist System)

Employers drive down wages and here's a simple explanation of why using the basic economic concepts of supply and demand.

In an employment situation, the labour-force is the supply and the capitalist/employer is the demand.

When supply outstrips demand, the capitalist/employer uses "market saturation" or "cost-cutting" as a pretext for their behaviour which is usually to slash wages, other work benefits, or make redundancies. Of course, the capitalist/employer still needs a source of labour so they turn to a cheaper source, which in this case is the migrant worker.

The only person who has the power here is the capitalist/employer and there are two solutions to the problem: Blame the powerless or blame the power.

The answer is obvious and if right-wingers are genuinely concerned about job losses, they would unionise with the powerless and become a power bigger and more forceful than the capitalist/employer.

The Conservative's Perspective

Immigration drives down wages and here's a simple explanation of why using the basic economic concepts of supply and demand.

In an employment situation, the labour-force is the supply and the capitalist/employer is the demand.

When supply outstrips demand, the workforce, both natives and immigrants, compete with each other in the labour market for jobs. Immigrants are simply willing to work for less so they end up pushing out hard-working native workers. They should go back to their own country and find a job there!

The people to blame here are the immigrants. If they weren't here, native workers would have jobs.

The answer is obvious and if left-wingers are genuinely concerned about the job losses of native workers, they would join with us and push for an end to immigration.

Two Solutions To One Problem

I thought I might have caricatured the conservative perspective but upon reading an article in The S*n, I don't think I actually have...

Yikes. Anyway... 

Labour markets and businesses don't work in isolation of course, and there is much more that can be said, such as how the presence of migrants creates new demands on businesses which leads to them needing more employees so supply can meet the new demand and create an overall economic expansion. For now, though, I just want to address the dichotomy that capitalism presents for employment.

The problem we see here is that both of the above perspectives are equally valid, even if we might disagree with them, and both have workable if disagreeable solutions, depending on your perspective. Both perspectives, however, are an expanded analysis of what are essentially market imperatives. The problem, in fact, is the commodification of labour and the labour market itself.

Interestingly though, both perspectives express support for the workers; conservatives divide the workers into "in" and "out" groups whilst socialists make a class analysis and examine the power dynamics.

So what then do we make of this dichotomy? How should we address this problem in a way that can compel us towards a solution?

The Socialist Answer

The embryo of an answer might be found in the fact that both prior solutions make a tacit assumption; they are premised upon capitalism as being the only viable means of economy and hence, they fail to foresee an answer past its boundaries and outside of the relations it creates. 

What we need is a post-capitalist solution, a socialist one, and when I invoke socialism, I mean something somewhat different from the socialist states of old. Although Marx remains relevant, we are living in a post-Marxist era, so it has to be something new that is undogmatic and works to transform our current material conditions. I'm near enough parroting Yanis Varoufakis' ideas here with a basic threefold solution:

1. We first need abolition of the traditional employer-employee relationship. This, in many respects, is something that has already been accomplished by the co-operative sector.  
   
   
2. We need a scheme of universal basic income in some form, a dividend that could be derived from the profits of large companies which are sourced through publicly subsidised innovations. 
   
   
3. The abolition of labour and financial markets.

The third point here is the most pertinent and central to how employment would work in a socialist society.

Without labour markets, how do you guarantee anyone a job? Imagine that, when you come of age, you are issued with a card, which is your right to work. This card guarantees you one share and one vote in whichever company you choose to work for.

There is no quibbling needed over whether a company can afford you or not since you already receive a universal basic dividend payment which can also act as capital to get you started in your new place of work. All you require otherwise is the appropriate education.

When you leave a company, the capital you have created in that company moves with you and it does so because it is you who has created it.

Financial markets no longer have a need to exist because now everyone is a shareholder - capital, along with democracy, has become both a personal and universal thing.

Final Thoughts

With these three changes, we have eliminated the two-perspective problem of capitalist employment. If every country adopted these changes in an international revolution or consensus, the maxims above would prevent brain-drain and capital flight from countries with otherwise high levels of emigration under capitalism. These things happen for many reasons, of course, such as lack of work, poor living conditions, Western imperialism and so on. By making these changes internationally, we also eliminate the immigration question  

In a previous article, I mentioned that co-operatives, municipalism and people's assemblies are paradigms of socialism that exist within capitalism. Here, all these paradigms are still present but they exist in a transformed, socialised state and this is why it is imperative that we start building them today. Of course, the question of private property still needs to be addressed but I will leave that for another time.

In this new world, there is no longer any need to unionise against bosses and there is no longer any need to demand restrictions on or place blame on immigration because there is no reason for people to leave their own country for economic reasons.

In fact, this might eventually even beg the question of the necessity of borders between nations.

It is possible for us all to become equitable, democratic partners in our post-capitalist society.

Now let's win this world!