Tag Archives: Michael Clemens

The Simpsons’ Springfield just had a massive infrastructure upgrade

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Research shows that the combination of urban sprawl and a lack of adequate public transportation is disastrous for low-income urbanites. Aware of this fact, the political leadership of Springfield resolved that they would do everything in their power to avoid becoming the next Atlanta. But to do so they have had to overcome challenges such poor demand (on account of a tiny car-loving population of just over 30,000), endemic corruption, and the lack of political will (The last time the town tried to build a subway system the contractor did a rather shoddy job, forcing the town to abandon the project altogether).

According to Architizer.com:

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The old “ring” subway system

This is not the first transportation overhaul that the STA (Springfield Transit Authority) has implemented, although the last drastic change was way back in a 1993 episode with the introduction of a failed monorail system. Since then, it’s been pretty much all cars and skateboards on the city’s streets, and viewers learned that the single sad loop of a subway system in the city was actually abandoned. Poor transportation construction seems to be endemic to Springfield, as the tunnels, although functional, were apparently ruining the underground foundations of buildings.

ImageThe system appears much more lively, covering spunky new districts like Jerk Circle, Boulevard of Broken Dreams, and Little Pwagmattasquarmsettport (last stop on the indigo line).

…….Bart probably won’t be putting his skateboard away any time soon, but it will be interesting to see how these fictional sites of comedy and intrigue return in the series. Will Springfield face a familiar future of urban disputes—perhaps sparked by the aesthetic retaliation from the residents of the Ugli district, or maybe the gentrification of Ethnictown?

However, there are still lingering questions about future commercial viability of the new expensive subway system, especially if the town fails to attract new residents. It doesn’t help that the town has a history of being hostile to immigrants. But given their apparent appreciation for evidence-based rigorous academic research in the process of public policy development, perhaps they could benefit from some of the fantastic work on immigration and migration coming out of the CGD.

In addition, it is unclear how the town financed the new subway system. As the Economist reports, banks have lately been wary of financing infrastructure investments. And with Yellen and co. scheduled to hit the brakes soon and a sooner-than-expected rates hike, Springfield’s public debt could become unsustainable. 

More on this here.

Michael Clemens and Justin Sandefur review Paul Collier’s new book

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Sometimes even the output of independent intellectuals cannot escape the spirit of the times. It appears that Paul Collier’s new book embodies this challenge by reflecting Europe’s current struggles with immigration. I haven’t read the book, and still might read it, but the review by Clemens and Sandefur (both of CGD) in Foreign Affairs does not paint the picture of an objective academic argument on the merits/demerits of immigration. Here’s an excerpt: 

Paul Collier, has just published an extended apologia for the tight strictures on immigration [that led to this raid], arguing for a global system of coercive quotas on people moving from poorer countries to richer ones. Such quotas, he writes in Exodus, would serve the “enlightened self-interest” of immigrants’ host countries and constitute an act of “compassion” for immigrants and their countries of origin. Collier argues that at a certain point, immigration begins to harm both host and origin countries, that many countries are near or past that point, and that even in countries that have so far remained unharmed, “preventative policies are greatly superior to reactive ones.”

It is refreshing to see the grand case against immigration served up by someone of Collier’s intelligence and credentials. But although Collier styles his book as a balanced review of the research literature, it is in fact a one-sided polemic that stands mostly outside academic research — by Collier or anyone else. Far from advancing a convincing case for a moderate middle path, the book offers an egregious collection of empirical and logical errors about the sociological and economic consequences of immigration. And they lead Collier to propose policies that would greatly harm, not help, the millions of people seeking to escape their homelands in search of a better life.

…… Collier has written a text mortally wounded by incoherence, error, and overconfident leaps to baseless conclusions.

The whole review is definitely worth reading. It provides great analysis, albeit in abbreviated form, of some of the benefits of immigration, both for immigrants and natives (or earlier immigrants as might sometimes be the case).