Studying the impact of U.S. immigration barriers on global knowledge production
I have been having similar discussions with my friends. My key takeaway is that if you are in the top 5 or 10%, US is a great place for you. Every place is open and your hard work (and a bit of luck) will take you a long way up. However, if you are average, US sucks for you. There is just so much burden to just keep working, even more so, if you have family. Between lack of public transport, healthcare, exploitative workplace and strong victim blaming attitude, you carry on just hoping that your kids will become one of the top 10%. For every example of successful immigrant, I think about the thousands of farm workers and hard laborers who make a trip here, and struggle to make a good life. And yes, they make more money that they make in their homeland.. but that does not make their current situation better.