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.
It is fascinating to watch politicians come up with 'solutions' to problems that are a direct result of their previous solutions. In many cases, the most efficient thing to do would be to repeal their previous solution and stop being so gung-ho for creating new solutions in the future. But, politically, that is the last thing they will do.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Politicians often create problems with their solutions, yet they prefer to keep adding new solutions instead of repealing the original ones.
This quote by Thomas Sowell critiques the cycle of political decision-making, where solutions proposed by politicians frequently lead to new issues that need further solutions. Instead of reevaluating and potentially rescinding ineffective measures, politicians tend to plow ahead with new initiatives, revealing a reluctance to admit mistakes and a tendency to complicate situations rather than simplify them.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
During a political debate, one could use this quote to highlight how politicians fail to learn from their past mistakes.
More from Thomas Sowell
All quotes →Blacks 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
The United States is squandering international prestige and goodwill and intensifying global anti-American terrorism by unofficially condoning or abetting the Israeli confiscation and colonization of Palestinian territories.
It is our job above all in politics to tackle the big issues and to explain them, and have the honesty to say to people, 'There are no easy solutions here.'
This government has been informed that a Jewish state has been proclaimed in Palestine, and recognition has been requested by the provisional government thereof. The United States recognizes the provisional government as the de facto authority of the new State of Israel.
When they call the roll in the Senate, the Senators do not know whether to answer 'Present' or 'Not guilty.'
If you ever injected truth into politics you have no politics.
Whensoever the General Government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force.