[nsagent]

Having lived in bumblefuck Alaska for a year, I can honestly say that they do in fact pay more, but it's also super expensive to live in rural Alaska.

Likely a bigger issue is that very few people want to live in a town of 3000 people or less that isn't connected to the interstate road system. Money can only do so much to fix that.

[throwaway85825]

Some people live in a pressurized bubble for a month for saturation diving. If the price is right you can get someone to do almost anything.

[fc417fc802]

That is true but I think the salient observation here is that it's only realistic to pay so much for education. So either you can't have children in such a town, or you're forced to homeschool, or (I guess what's being suggested is) you import someone willing to work an undesirable job if it gets them into the country.

I think there's an important difference between importing labor to undercut qualified americans in a populated area versus importing labor to do a job that the vast majority of qualified americans will have no interest in at any reasonable pay rate.

[spwa4]

Do we even realize this is the very beginning of the worldwide demographic transition? American and Worldwide cities aren't replacing themselves, and they're not having children ... as a way to save. And this is getting worse. Meanwhile the whole world is going through a demographic transition.

Which, allow me to translate, means in less than 25 years there will not be any society worldwide that has the people to allow Emigration. As stupid as it sounds now, Iran, China, the Taliban (just an example) are 15 years away from outlawing emigration, and Germany less than that. China is mostly there, btw, but apparently able to keep that little extra authoritarian detail out of the news.

You're a farmer in China? There's NO way out. You can't go to the city, you can't leave the country. No way out whatsoever, except perhaps death. And the question "how is that different from slavery?" will be fought, not answered, by Chinese authorities. As I said, pay attention, because the 2 presidents down the US president, whoever it is by then, will make the same arguments (Yes, I get that there were worse slavery systems, like the African slave trade, than that. But it's still slavery)

That means in less than a generation any American town WILL be forced to dedicate their own population to everything they need done.

[mothballed]

Watch some documentaries about Chinese borders (easy to find ones of peasants illegally entering Kashmir for instance) or even look at a map. There is absolutely no way to keep even broke peasants from leaving. China doesn't even know where many of their borders are, that's why a lot of them show up as dotted lines. China has about the most porous border for leaving as any place on earth but Russia or Brazil (entering illegally is a different issue -- if you want to go anywhere urban desirable you will be found out -- that they have good controls for). This compounded by the fact that many of China's neighboring countries have robust populations of undocumented / nationless people into which they can be absorbed rather than sticking out as a sore thumb wherever they end up.

Iran and Afghanistan are almost as laughable. When I was in Syria I met an Iranian guy with one eye that travelled through the Kurdish mountains into Iraq and then Syria. Iran doesn't even control the mountain passes out of the country, they're literally controlled by Kurdish rebels who have very little concept of immigration controls other than pay me a dollar.

[machomaster]

> the vast majority of qualified americans will have no interest in at any reasonable pay rate.

Herein lies the whole problem. It is the potential employees who determine what a reasonable pay rate is, not the employer - the cat decides what kind of milk it likes.

[8note]

you could also export the children, or the whole family, to a place that can support teachers

[hdgvhicv]

Depopulating rural Alaska, or America in general, is certainly a campaign strategy.

[murderfs]

I mean, so's "Bumfuck, Alaska needs a handful of teachers, therefore we're going to import infinite Indians"

[fc417fc802]

Who said anything about infinite? I don't see anything wrong with importing labor if it's of net benefit to our society. If there was genuinely no citizen that wanted the job for any reasonable price then what's the harm in bringing in an educated outsider who contributes positively? It improves several metrics simultaneously without harming anyone.

[ahoka]

Do you really suggest to copy Ceaușescu and start evacuating villages in rural Alaska?

[throwaway85825]

After the subsidies stopped everyone moved out of Siberia.

[fc417fc802]

I wonder if he realizes that we historically went to great lengths to get people to move there.

[allarm]

It doesn't matter how much money you have if you can't spend it.

[throwaway85825]

That applies to a ton of people in the military. People are capable of delayed gratification.

[janalsncm]

Well, maybe that’s the solution to the problem. Deploy troops to the classrooms.

[thisisit]

What is the federal budget for military vs education? Which one increases and which one decreases most of the time?

[redserk]

Repeating trite platitudes only makes your argument sound weak and tired.

[RobotToaster]

Does Amazon not deliver to Alaska?

[watwut]

I would be fully willing to live in a pressurized bubble for a month for saturation diving. Sounds cool and doable. Living for years in rural Alaska and being a teacher? Absolutely not.

That being said, there are not that many saturation divers, because being a month in a bubble is kind of least problem with it. The lifelong health impact is.

[maratc]

The biggest issue with saturation diving is not the pressure or the health impact, it's the fact that you share a tiny space with 3-6 other people for a month.

This might be the opposite of living in Alaska where you share a really huge amount of space with not a lot of other people.