Labor Supply Quotes

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.

To assert, as some have, that illegal immigrants do not depress wages because they do the jobs Americans refuse is the kind of nonsense economists speak when they strain to be counterintuitive. It is similar to saying that cheap imports do not hold down prices.

People are willing to work free, and they are willing to work for a reasonable wage; but offer them just a small payment and they will walk away.

If workmen become scarce, the manufacturer gives higher wages, but at first requires an encrease of labour; and this is willingly submitted to by the artisan, who can now eat and drink better, to compensate his additional toil and fatigue.

Making labor less expensive helps firms hire people.

Everything in the world is purchased by labor.

Unemployment is 'involuntary' when the price is above its market clearing level. Workers are unemployed because jobs are not available at the prevailing wages, period. The only recourse is to either expand the number of jobs or somehow lower the wage.

As far as wages are concerned, the only difference between immigration and birth is that birth takes longer.

As the economy turns, one of the most significant impediments to economic growth is going to be labor availability.

In the 1950s and 1960s, an explosion of great corporate jobs, together with a restricted supply of labor, produced healthy wage growth.

The scientific study of labor economics provided the opportunity for me to unite theory with evidence my lifetime intellectual passion.

… immigration reduces the wages of domestic workers who compete with immigrants. That’s just supply and demand: we’re talking about large increases in the number of low-skill workers relative to other inputs into production, so it’s inevitable that this means a fall in wages.

A minimum wage leads to higher levels of unemployment.

We have to have workers that will produce more and will stop work when it is not needed.

Plenty of people must also cause cheapness in wages, which cause cheapness in manufacture.

I find it remarkable that virtually all of the large difference in labor supply between France and the United States is due to differences in tax systems. I expected institutional constraints on the operation of labor markets and the nature of the unemployment benefit system to be more important. I was surprised that the welfare gain from reducing the intratemporal tax wedge is so large.

Immigration is not just compatible with but is a necessary component of economic growth.

With every increase in the power of production, consumption grew, and the labourer received larger returns for his labour, producing a tendency to immigration.

There is this real divisive theory that if we allow more immigrants to come into this country, that they're going to take our jobs. It is simply not true. Every person I know who wants to work in a hotel and change sheets can do it.

Tax rates aren't everything with regard to incentives to work. I would probably work at a 100% tax rate next to a nude modeling studio. I'm joking, but you know what I'm saying. There's a lot more to it than just tax rates. It's economics that I do; I don't do nude modeling studio economics. People do respond to taxes.

You cannot create employees without first creating employers.

We have opened our doors to unrestricted immigration, partly because capitalists want plenty of cheap labor, which is not a good reason; and partly because the immigrants want to come, which is not a sufficient reason.

Our slaves are still drawn oft by higher prices to the West. There is still foreign pauper labor ready to supply their place.

During the thousands of years of monetary system, most workers have been paid just enough to make it necessary that they return to work, even when higher wages have been possible. How else can the wage-payer keep the workers coming back?

So long as there is one [person] who seeks employment and cannot find it, the hours of work are too long.