Stopping illegal immigration would mean that wages would have to rise to a level where Americans would want the jobs currently taken by illegal aliens.
All too often when liberals cite statistics, they forget the statisticians' warning that correlation is not causation.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote emphasizes that just because two events are correlated, it doesn't mean one causes the other.
In this quote, Thomas Sowell highlights a common mistake made by individuals, particularly liberals in this context, when interpreting statistics. He warns that correlation alone should not be mistaken for causation, thereby reminding us to critically assess the relationships between events or data points before concluding that one directly influences the other. This serves as a caution against oversimplification in the analysis of complex social issues.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
In a debate about economic policy, one might use this quote to emphasize the need for careful analysis of data.
More from Thomas Sowell
All quotes βBlacks were not enslaved because they were black but because they were available. Slavery has existed in the world for thousands of years. Whites enslaved other whites in Europe for centuries before the first black was brought to the Western hemisphere. Asians enslaved Europeans. Asians enslaved other Asians. Africans enslaved other Africans, and indeed even today in North Africa, blacks continue to enslave blacks.
One of the reasons for conspiracy theories is an assumption that people in high places always know what they are doing. When they do something that makes no sense, devious reasons are imagined by conspiracy theorists, when in fact it may be due to plain old ignorance and incompetence.
You will never understand bureaucracies until you understand that for bureaucrats procedure is everything and outcomes are nothing.
The real problem, both in discussions of mass shootings and in discussions of gun control, is that too many people are too committed to a vision to allow mere facts to interfere with their beliefs, and the sense of superiority that those beliefs give them.
Why is history important? Without history, many people have no idea how many of today's half-baked ideas have been tried, again and again - and have repeatedly led to disaster. Most of these ideas are not new. They are just being recycled with re-treaded rhetoric.
Similar quotes
Cities give us collision. 'Tis said, London and New York take the nonsense out of a man.
Decisive moment: the one when you will be really alone. And it is perhaps this that makes her hesitate: not the void, but the vastness of the solitude. It's as well if you are frightened of solitude. It's a sign that you have come to the moment of your birth.
Don't pointless things have a place, too, in this far-from-perfect world? Remove everything pointless from an imperfect life, and it'd lose even its imperfection.
Nowhere nor in anything, except in the assertion of the Church, can we find that God or Christ founded anything like what churchmen understand by the Church.
Patience is a mind that is able to accept fully and happily, whatever occurs. It is much more than just gritting our teeth and putting up with things. Being patient means to welcome wholeheartedly whatever arises, having given up the idea that things should be other than what they are.
Say not, 'I have found the truth,' but rather, 'I have found a truth.'