SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Fred Reed's mathematical analysis of Trump's Wall proves that Trump is insincere, proves that Trump is mathematically incompetent, and earns Fred Reed an honorary nerd card:
https://fredoneverything.org/the-wall-the-sound-and-the-fury-and-not-much-else/
More math!
~childo
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
Trump's Wall Is Mathematically Unlikely
|
Log In/Create an Account
| Top
| 91 comments
| Search Discussion
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Dealing with failure is easy:
Work hard to improve.
Success is also easy to handle:
You've solved the wrong problem.
Work hard to improve.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @07:14AM (58 children)
This guy's math essentially says we can't build a highway across the USA.
Hmmm. Let's check. Do we have highways? Oh, we do. Maybe an advanced space alien civilization put them there?
Ahem. We can do this. It's like a cheap highway with 4 lanes (2 each side) or a nice highway with 2 lanes (1 each side).
It pays for itself pretty quickly too. Half the illegal aliens crossed there, and illegal aliens cost us more than a wall costs us... EVERY SINGLE YEAR. We could build a fresh new wall every few months and still break even.
Considering the federal budget, the cost of a wall isn't even a rounding error. It's nothing.
(Score: 4, Informative) by maxwell demon on Sunday January 07 2018, @07:32AM (32 children)
Really? What exactly is the cost of illegal immigrants? And did you factor in the economic benefit from the work they do?
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by fishybell on Sunday January 07 2018, @07:37AM (15 children)
Illegal immigrants do cost money, but they're not all created equal. Those with a higher education earn more and pay more taxes than they get out of it (social security, medicare, sales taxes, property taxes, etc.). Those with a lower education earn less and cost more taxes (mostly in public education).
Overall though, they end up costing less than people who have the same education and earnings over their lifetime because of the massive cost of social security and medicare that they don't receive.
They may not be free, but they're a good bargain.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @07:45AM (9 children)
I've seen lots of studies that shows they are a net benefit, lacking fully legal status they actually are less able to get any social benefits.
(Score: 0, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @07:49AM
Man says "Ughy..." after he finishes raping toddler. Most ethical rapist?
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Sunday January 07 2018, @08:08AM (7 children)
Oh, there are lots of studies, on both sides. Left wingers dismiss costs like uninsured aliens making use of emergency rooms and other medical services. Right wingers count all of that kind of stuff - welfare benefits, identity theft, crime, and more. You can cherry pick ten, a hundred, a thousand illegal aliens, and demonstrate that they are a net gain to society. Your cherry picked crowd of illegals will only include those who have never committed a crime, never committed tax fraud, never been to court even for non-criminal offenses. Hell, you can cherry pick from any demographic, to demonstrate that that particular demographic is composed of people who are just FAHbulous!
The fact is, California is awash in illegals who cost the state money - mostly in medical expenses. The taxes paid by the illegals aren't nearly enough to pay for the medical expenses.
Study all you like - but if you're going to be serious, you need to account for all costs.
Now, once the studies are all done, we come around full circle. Illegals are illegal because they have nothing but contempt for the law. They violated immigration laws, they violate labor laws, they violate tax laws routinely, all across the demographic. SOME OF THEM violate much more serious laws. In fact, enough of them violate serious laws that - "In California and other border states, specialists warn that the number of illegal immigrants in jail could jeopardize the local prison system." http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-13201212 [bbc.com]
Go ahead, cite some studies. But, don't cite left wing studies that focus only on those model citizens whose only crimes have been crossing the border illegally. Use nation wide figures, or use a border state, and give us all of the information. No, don't go to someplace like Montana that is basically unaffected by immigration. National or border state figures, please. Or, at the least, use those states that have borders with the border states - Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Colorado, Utah, and Nevada.
Fact is, illegals live in a shadow world, that few legal citizens know about. And, crime loves the shadows. Hey, the victims are often detrimental as well. How many crimes go unreported, just because the victim is an illegal? That includes extortion, kidnap, rape, murder, blackmail, child trafficking, sex slavery - the entire gamut of crime. It's all in the shadows, because NO ONE wants to report the crime.
Studies. Want serious studies? Get out there, into the illegal alien communities, and live with them. You'll meet some admirable people - and you'll meet the scum of the earth. And both kinds of people help to perpetuate the shadow culture.
Studies. Go do a real study. Ultimately, the shadow culture is detrimental to a civilized society. It is probably as damaging to society as the military industrial complex is. If not, it runs a pretty close second.
Hail to the Nibbler in Chief.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @07:26PM (1 child)
If we're going to do a tally, can we also tally up all the American's who are drains on the system or are criminals?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Sunday January 07 2018, @09:14PM
Tally away, I don't care. But there is a huge difference between illegal aliens, and citizens. That is, we owe nothing to the illegals, and we can boot them anytime we decide we have the balls to do it. Citizens, on the other hand, are our responsibility, for good or bad. We cannot deport a citizen. And, if we were to do so, where in hell would we send them? To Antarctica? Mars? Alpha Centauri? See, Mexico is responsible for their citizens, and we are responsible for our own.
I suspect that if we DID deport our worst citizens to Mexico, those citizens would soon be assuming room temperature. It would all be extrajudicial, of course. Mexico doesn't have a death penalty, so officially, the government could wash their hands of the entire affair. But, those citizens would be dead, dead, dead.
Hail to the Nibbler in Chief.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by dry on Monday January 08 2018, @02:29AM (1 child)
What about all the people who facilitate these illegals? My understanding is that Americans encourage them by giving them jobs and that is why they cross the border illegally. Is it legal to hire illegals down there? Perhaps if there were no jobs for them, they wouldn't be crossing the borders in such numbers?
For a country that happily locks up millions of citizens, it shouldn't be a problem to lock up anyone who hires an illegal. Could probably just hang out somewhere like Home Hardware with some fake illegals and start busting these people with no respect for the law and no respect for your country. Seems a worse offence to encourage people to sneak into your country compared to being hungry and responding to job offers.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 08 2018, @04:25AM
Your understanding is correct. There is an unfortunate coincidence here, however. Those people who have jobs to offer, also have money. Money talks, and bullshit walks. A little bribe money here - errr, whooops, I meant "campaign contribution" and another "contribution" there, and the SOB's are all but untouchable.
Hail to the Nibbler in Chief.
(Score: 1) by rylyeh on Monday January 08 2018, @05:29AM (2 children)
Um, If there were no employers - would the 'illegals' be here? Has it not been the practice of U.S. businesses to seasonally employ these people? Because California? Texas? Washington state?
"a vast crenulate shell wherein rode the grey and awful form of primal Nodens, Lord of the Great Abyss."
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 08 2018, @08:09AM (1 child)
Please see my reply to Dry, just above. People who are bribing officials to look the other way get away with it. I'm all for burning the employers. If I put bait out to attract any creature, I can't complain that the creatures are in my yard. Offer enough bait, and I could be persuaded to move into a city. Those illegals are just the same. So, yes, the employers should be going to prison, and the illegals should be headed back to Mexico. Actually, the illegals get the better end of that scheme. I don't want to imprison them - they'll be free men and women, as soon as they step across the border.
Hail to the Nibbler in Chief.
(Score: 1) by rylyeh on Tuesday January 09 2018, @05:12AM
I agree completely. 📣
"a vast crenulate shell wherein rode the grey and awful form of primal Nodens, Lord of the Great Abyss."
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @08:03AM (4 children)
We're looking at a net cost (gain minus loss) of about $10,000 per illegal alien per year.
The fact that there might be a few financially beneficial people among these lawbreakers does nothing to change the fact that the average illegal alien is a loss for our country.
They get quite a bit of welfare. Part of this comes via identity theft, which is the norm for illegal aliens. (maybe YOUR identity) Part of it comes via state agencies that don't ask about citizenship or don't require any proof. Part of it comes via children; have a baby and then your whole family gets benefits.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @07:28PM (3 children)
Care to cite some sources?
Again, would love to see your sources
Oh, never mind, I don't need to see your sources anymore, you clearly don't know anything about this subject. Have a nice day!
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday January 07 2018, @09:28PM (2 children)
You're not very bright, are you? The identity theft you scoff at is very real. I see it. I hear it. I was pretty much unaware of what was going on, until one of our guys took two week's vacation, went home to Mexico, and came back with a different name, a different social security number, and demanded that everyone address him by his new name. His new Anglo name. After this one individual made me aware of the process, I've watched several others do the same. One woman, who I was near certain was legal, took her vacation, went home to show off her new baby girl to her relatives, and SHE came back with a new name, new SSN - the works. These are people I work with, people I talk to every day, some of whom I actually LIKE! But, they are identity thieves.
Oh - one of those identity thieves was awfully amusing. His weekly take home pay was normally something over $500. After he came back from vacation, everything was cool, for about five weeks. Then, he got a pay check for about $75. The SSN he was using, belonged to some deadbeat dad in Alabama. Somehow, Alabama found that the SSN was showing an income, so they asked Arkansas to garnish the wages for child support. Of course, the company complied with the request or order. Our Mexican took a week off, and came back with yet another SSN.
Don't even try to play that game. Identity theft is a real thing, and it is pretty much routine for the illegal community. It takes a week or so to get it done, but if you've got the money, you can get it done.
Hail to the Nibbler in Chief.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by dry on Monday January 08 2018, @02:36AM
This is happening at your work? And the owners of the business haven't been thrown in jail for knowingly employing people who change their identity regularly? I think your country has bigger problems then illegals.
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Monday January 08 2018, @03:21AM
Document everything (on the downlow of course) and call 1-866-DHS-2ICE from a burner. Report back with whether Trump's ICE is really enforcing the law. Do it for America!
(Score: 5, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @07:49AM (13 children)
From https://amac.us/illegal-immigration-cost-1/ [amac.us] we have this:
"In 2010, the average unlawful immigrant household received around $24,721 in government benefits and services while paying some $10,334 in taxes."
From https://fairus.org/issue/publications-resources/fiscal-burden-illegal-immigration-united-states-taxpayers [fairus.org] we have this:
Cost is $135 billion, taxes paid are $19 billion, net loss is $116 billion.
To me that looks like roughly $1000 per legit household. Imagine knocking $1000 off your taxes.
Let's consider something else though, which a liberal ought to care about: the effect on poor Americans. Wouldn't you like a living wage? Illegal aliens drive wages down, putting many Americans out of work. Wages rise when immigration laws get enforced. The effect is particularly strong for black people ("people of color" today?) because they are often the first to be laid off and the last to be hired. Illegal aliens hurt black people.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @08:24AM (6 children)
So, uh... punish employers who hire illegal immigrants. That solves pretty much all of the problems, and has no unethical downsides.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @10:05AM (5 children)
Yeah but they are too-big-to-fail. You know, it's always the little guys fault.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by maxwell demon on Sunday January 07 2018, @10:47AM (4 children)
The goal of the punishment should not be to make them fail. The goal should be to make illegal employment more expensive than legal employment.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @05:37PM
It's a fundamental part of running a business to weigh RISK and COSTs over a planned period of time. Breaking the law for MANY corporations is NO different for them to consider than the 1000s of other decisions that must be made. It's so easy to treat legality like any other business factor; same with morality... That is how corporations and how we structure them promotes people who might not be evil individually to do far more immoral and/or illegal things by proxy.
Corporate punishments NEED TO BE FAR MORE SEVERE than individual punishments. A corporation not wishing to collapse will evaluate a severe COST and it's risk accordingly. If they know they won't have a high COST, they'll not even care about the RISK - it can be treated like a TAX... except it's a tax you ONLY pay on the rare occasion you get "assessed" (caught) and you can often negotiate it down lower, unlike a tax.
We NEVER have a shortage of people for management; they are supposed to be paid more for having more responsibility--- but they do not have actual responsibility; culturally, there was a weak implied social contract. We MUST stop viewing them as high priests who magically produce jobs and at least treat them on par with lawyers... if not lower. If they go to jail, that responsibility would justify their salary. The implied social contract that they protect our jobs, our company, our economy-- no longer exists and it wasn't great to begin with. They lack of ANY constraints is why it progressed downhill and continues to do so... especially as they find it easier to remove themselves from the culture in which they are symbiotic parasites. (they are... think about it... they are in it for greed and we want to benefit from that... but the symbiotic relationship is getting way too imbalanced. welcome to the 2nd gilded age.)
(Score: 3, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Sunday January 07 2018, @06:11PM (2 children)
When you make illegal employment more expensive than legal employment (to the employers) then you hurt business - drive up the cost of goods, diminish our competitiveness in world markets, slow the flow of export (and domestic) dollars into the hands of the big business owners - and then they can't trickle it down...
If they really wanted to stop illegal employment, they'd start by putting real enforcement and penalties on businesses that do it - but that's not the kind of thing that real politicians do.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/06/24/7408365/
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @11:40PM (1 child)
Sure. And when you use fines to to make illegal driving more expensive then legal driving then you hurt motorists, and when you use some FDA regulation to make illegal pesticides more expensive then legal pesticides then you hurt farmers, and when you require that surgeons go through some pesky training before operating on someone then you hurt those poor doctors.
But not as much as you hurt the public in general if you don't have or enforce those rules. Why should it be any different for employment?
(Score: 4, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Monday January 08 2018, @12:34AM
Didn't you get the memo? Government has been bought and paid for by business; it now exists to protect business interests first and foremost - all other benefits to the electorate trickle down from a thriving, maximally profitable business sector.
Illegal driving kills people, and frightens many more - dead and frightened consumers are bad for business.
Illegal pesticides kill people too, same principle: dead consumers spend no more.
"Training" doctors is a whole other kettle of fish - now we're talking about throttling supply so that demand spikes to maximize payouts. Medical is a unique field in that people will pay virtually anything to avoid dying, so you want to make sure that doctors are just expensive enough to bankrupt the median family assets when someone dies so as to maximize that flow of capital out of the hands of the families and into the active economy via the luxury cars, real estate, travel and other things that the physicians and hospital investors will purchase with dying people's money.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/06/24/7408365/
(Score: 5, Informative) by tonyPick on Sunday January 07 2018, @10:39AM (3 children)
Except that there are many problems with the way FAIR constructs it's estimates amongst other things:
and
and
and
But to return to your point....
You think spending tens of billions of dollars on something which will mainly increase the purchase of 31 foot sections of Rope in Mexico will somehow help poor Americans?
(Score: 4, Informative) by tonyPick on Sunday January 07 2018, @10:46AM (2 children)
Bah :missing link for source reporting in the above [politifact.com]
(Score: 2, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @10:56AM (1 child)
Politifact is about as biased as can be. It's one of those dishonest "fact checker" sites that the democrats cooked up as a tactic for spreading disinformation.
The moment you take politifact seriously, you are discredited.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @01:59PM
Translation: "Everything politifact says is true, it just contradicts my worldview and all the cult propaganda I have been fed. It hurts my feelings!"
(Score: 5, Informative) by bzipitidoo on Sunday January 07 2018, @11:23AM
Hate the numbers? No. Accurate and honest numbers are to be respected no matter what good or bad news they bring. That's a stance the Right has entirely too much trouble understanding and accepting.
Clearly AMAC is highly partisan. They are anti-abortion (spinning that position as "pro-life" of course) but pro-gun and against Obamacare. A typical contradiction. I wouldn't trust their numbers. A common trick I've seen conservatives pull is to claim the poor don't pay much in taxes, using only the _income_ tax and not counting all the sales taxes and other taxes everyone pays. In recent decades, the political Right has demonstrated over and over that they are insincere, lying, cheating idiots who really seem to think facts do not matter. They have no credibility.
I couldn't tell with a quick look whether FAIR is another propaganda organ.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday January 07 2018, @05:48PM
No, your numbers above indicate cost is around $45 billion ($24k cost per). The $116 billion would need to including the similar level of benefits, which are going to be more than just taxes paid.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Sunday January 07 2018, @01:48PM
Political accounting will back up whatever the speaker wants to say...
Truth is, nobody knows the net economic impact of illegal immigrants - not really. They can tally up the cost of police actions against them, but what amount of that was a sunk cost that would have been spent anyway with, or without illegals? Is Trump really trying to put all those law enforcement officers out of work? When they are out of work, will they themselves turn to petty crimes to feed their family? Or, maybe they can retrain to work in road and wall maintenance? Somehow, I doubt they would have gone into law enforcement in the first place if they would rather have been working construction.
It's like building a road? Yes, yes indeed, the cost is similar, but inevitably higher - there will have to be some sort of road built just to get the construction crews and materials to and from the site, and the road will have to be maintained so crews can maintain and patrol the wall. The difference about this road is that it serves no other purpose, so its construction and maintenance is a 100% sunk cost with no ROI other than more effective blockade of border crossings on that frontier. Clue: if people and goods can't cross there, they will cross elsewhere, so any arguments about interdiction cannot use the entire number of crossings along the wall frontier, because a significant portion of those crossings will happen elsewhere after the wall is built.
Maybe that border road can be built up to highway standards and used like other highways to move goods - increasing commerce, building up the economies of the border towns? Oh, wait - what will the net impact of more and bigger border towns be on immigration control?
I think of it like GWII, WMDs be damned, winning, losing, who cares... do we want to be the assholes invading another country bringing mayhem, chaos and death, or not? Similarly with "the wall" - are we that afraid of Mexico that we need to build the next Great Wall of China to repel the invading hordes? It's not an image of strength in my mind.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/06/24/7408365/
(Score: 2, Interesting) by realDonaldTrump on Sunday January 07 2018, @06:06PM
They cost Kate Steinle her life! Disgraceful verdict in that case. They're bringing drugs, they're bringing crime, they're rapists. Believe me, they treat women like shit. No wonder the people of our Country are so angry with Illegal Immigration.
(Score: 5, Informative) by tonyPick on Sunday January 07 2018, @08:42AM (8 children)
4 lane highway from ARBTA [medium.com]: Construct a new 4-lane highway — $4 million to $6 million per mile in rural and suburban areas, $8 million to $10 million per mile in urban areas.
Wall cost is about $21.6 billion (low end estimate, but the best we have): https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-immigration-wall-exclusive-idUSKBN15O2ZN [reuters.com]
That's about 3600 miles of road. The US is about 3000 miles across. So it's a new 4 lane highway road coast to coast. For now that passes the smell test.
However you don't get any choice in where the wall goes - so the legal costs will be significantly higher. And it doesn't generate revenue. And it now has to be transparent, resist up to "at least an hour" of handheld construction tool working, and be "made of concrete". And "go six feet underground".
From the Congressional Budget Office: https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/110th-congress-2007-2008/reports/12-6-immigration.pdf [cbo.gov]
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @09:24AM (6 children)
The first thing I spotted was the wrong assumption that TANF benefits are not received. (because illegal aliens are not eligible) Well they do in fact get TANF. Part of this is simple fraud, and part of it is inherent in the "F" which stands for "Family".
Perhaps a more serious error is conflating "immigrants" with "illegal aliens". This particularly affects the section on crime. Illegal aliens are known to commit crime at rates which are higher than normal, not lower than normal. Border jumpers are being mixed up with H1B nerds, probably on purpose.
Health care costs have changed for the worse since that report was written over a decade ago. This increases the cost of illegal aliens.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @10:02AM (3 children)
Do you have any actual data, or are you operating on the same assumption as Trump & co, that feels = facts? Of course, assuming we're not including the crimes of illegal immigration and working undocumented, which would give us a ~100% crime rate.
Here's an NYT article [nytimes.com] from the top of the search results about immigrant crime rate. Quoting the last paragraph:
If you're one of those people who wouldn't trust NYT if they said the sky was blue, there are links to research papers and stuff that you can check yourself.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @10:50AM (2 children)
Since NYT is fake news, let's go with something trustworthy:
http://www.breitbart.com/big-journalism/2015/08/08/illegal-alien-crime-accounts-for-over-30-of-murders-in-some-states/ [breitbart.com]
If you are one of those people who wouldn't trust Brietbart if they said blood is red, there are pointers to government data sources and stuff that you can check yourself.
More:
http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2015/07/illegal_aliens_murder_at_a_much_higher_rate_than_us_citizens_do.html [americanthinker.com]
https://www.constitutionparty.com/illegal-alien-crime-and-violence-by-the-numbers-were-all-victims/ [constitutionparty.com]
Hint: search on an unbiased search engine like duckduckgo, and include the term "illegal alien" (as used in our laws) in your search terms
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @01:11PM
If I want right-wing propaganda and anti-any-immigration rhetoric, or want to feed my conspiracy theories, those are certainly sites I would trust to just that ... and only that.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @05:51PM
Funny you should say that, that's almost exactly what I did [duckduckgo.com] when I found that NYT link. Pretty much all of the top results are talking about "hyperbole" and "mythical connection" and "Trump is a lying asshole" (paraphrased).
(Score: 2) by tonyPick on Sunday January 07 2018, @10:44AM (1 child)
Well, it's clear about the sources of data being built on extrapolations between legal and illegal immigrants behaviours, data sets which combine the two populations and indirect surveys, which means any oputputs will be estimates based on the combined behaviour of the two populations. It's more specific where it can be.
And to take your example, on crime, the FAIR statistic downthread: [politifact.com]
Which somehow is suddenly not a problem for anyone quoting those numbers?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 08 2018, @06:22AM
Politifact provides PR service for democrats.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday January 07 2018, @01:51PM
That's actually a very key economic point about illegal immigrants, being illegal they are eligible for a reduced set of social services, and even tend to avail themselves less of the ones they are eligible for (though, in many cases we would be net-economically better off if they would take advantage of some services...)
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/06/24/7408365/
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Sunday January 07 2018, @09:37AM (14 children)
Reads like a comedian script, actually.
So, he's probably never built a dog house, but he wants us to take his word that his math is applicable.
Why assume six inches? Why not assume two feet thick? Or three feet? Or, even ten feet? Why six inches? The images supplied at the top of his humor page are all far more substantial than a mere six inches. Obviously, he isn't interested in facts, but merely wants to poke fun at a concept that he is incapable of understanding.
Why make such an assumption? In the construction industry, there are these magical portable concrete mixers. No, I don't mean concrete trucks, I mean portable mixers, that take a few hours to set up, or to break down. They can be moved ten miles, a hundred miles, or however far they are needed. http://www.cemcoinc.com/ [cemcoinc.com] Prefab would be stupid, considering that prefab sections are typically welded together, inviting rust and corrosion at crucial assembly points.
All a total waste, as I've already demonstrated that the concrete can be mixed on site, or very close to on site, then trucked a mile, five miles, or ten miles to the active pour site. Actually, the concrete plant would probably be moved about 40 miles at a time. Set it up twenty miles ahead of the active pour site, and mix concrete until the pour site is twenty miles ahead. Where there are good roads, it only takes 20 minutes for a concrete truck to arrive at the pour, another ten minutes to empty, and twenty minutes back to the plant. In rougher terrain - it could be a two hour round trip.
And, the author hopes that we believe that he is intimate with shovels? Why, exactly? He cites no work experience in which he may have been intimate with hand tools of any kind.
Cost per mile is nearly meaningless - some miles are going to be hell, and other miles will just flow. Cost per section is even more meaningless, as his sections are meaningless.
See what I mean about comedy?
Duhhh - ideally, the foundation and wall are a monolithic pour. Probably not, but that would be ideal. Most likely, the ditch is dug, an elevation shot, that elevation marked with nails or pins driven into the sides of the ditch, rebar put into place, foundation poured, then the form for the wall is set on top of the foundation, with rebar inside of it. Pretty common practice, really. And, the concrete in the wall is poured within a day or two after the foundation being poured, to get some bonding between the concrete in the two pours. In addition, the industry commonly uses keyways and/or a bonding agent poured onto the foundation, to get a better bond.
Here, he either does his best comedy, or he exposes himself for a halfwit. California can contract from one to ten or even fifty independent companies to do sections of the wall within it's own borders, and Arizona can do the same, New Mexico likewise, and Texas again. We might have ten, or a hundred "primary" contractors, responsible for some number of miles of wall. Even IF each company were only capable of erecting a mile of wall per month, we've certainly eliminated that 2000 months bullshit. Want the wall finished in a year? Throw the resources at it, and it will happen.
What a naif. Or, an ultimate comedian. Trump is not a politician. He is many things, including a con artist, an opportunist, a real estate magnate, a bullshitter, and much much more. But, he's not a politician. Every time he opens his mouth, or twits a tweet, he proves that he's an idiot as a politician. The dumb bastard stirs the pot, whereas politicians like to keep a low profile, and avoid controversy.
That's about his last attempt at funny.
His last funny. What does his vision have to do with blathering on about subjects of which he knows nothing? Basically, he admits that he is no mathematician, and blames it on his bad eyes? Yeah, I guess that's funny too.
Hail to the Nibbler in Chief.
(Score: 5, Funny) by maxwell demon on Sunday January 07 2018, @10:54AM
Probably the main work of building the wall will be done by illegal immigrants, just because they are cheaper. ;-)
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @01:28PM (9 children)
Wow. I'd have to write a short thesis to point out all of your inanity.
Go read the specs for the wall. And go look at the terrain for the entire length of the border - especially the large swaths without roads (not even dirt roads) or even level ground. Oh, and don't forget that pesky river.
A 30 foot high wall isn't going to be received with open arms by all of the land owners so be sure to bring your legal team. These folks are not going to roll over just to please you or the government (Texans are like that). SCOUTS isn't going to expedite your eminent domain demands so you better be prepared to slog through the federal court system.
If you honestly think "pour in place" is feasible in that environment then you are as delusional as you assert Reed is. In fact, many of these obstacles are going to prevent "the wall" no matter how they intended to build it.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday January 07 2018, @01:52PM (7 children)
Uhhhh, how many years do you have in construction? And, maybe you have a few years of logging behind you. And, bridge building? Yes, pour in place in feasible, almost everywhere along that 2000 miles. Those places where it is infeasible, few if any illegal aliens are crossing the border.
BTW - if it's not possible to pour in place, then how in hell are those prefab pieces going to get there? Are we back to helicopters? If the terrain is THAT damned rough, then you can be very sure that very, very, VERY few illegal aliens are crossing in that spot.
Inane, you say? WTF does the river have to do with anything? Did you think that we were going to just damn the river with the wall? Heh - farmers and ranchers in the Salton sea wouldn't be very happy about that. I don't remember offhand how high the river would have to be dammed, but it isn't much. There goes millions of acres of fertile farmland, because we added a few cubic miles of water to the dry sea.
Hail to the Nibbler in Chief.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @02:09PM (6 children)
Actually, I've been doing work for construction related companies for decades.
Pour in place is feasible in many environments, but not along that 2,000 mile border.
You'll have to build roads robust enough to handle all of the heavy truck traffic and decades of ongoing maintenance. That is going to add time and cost.
That is the exact argument being made by many government officials - Republicans among them - in the border states who think this wall is a fool's errand, and just another monument Trump wants to put his name on.
They have to build the wall along the river, not damn the river. That will remove direct access to the US side of the Rio Grande. And that is going to be a problem.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Sunday January 07 2018, @03:06PM (4 children)
Oh, THAT river. The wall doesn't have to be right there, at the river. A common practice in farm country, is to set your fence back a couple of feet. We can do the same with the wall - a setback of half a mile, or even two miles. No big deal. It still stops free access of pedestrians, and channels everyone to a border patrol checkpoint.
Hail to the Nibbler in Chief.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 08 2018, @03:27PM (3 children)
Why are you defending this wall idea??
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 08 2018, @04:47PM (2 children)
Because scofflaws are routinely breaking the law, and I'd like to see the law enforced. The wall won't stop ALL of the scofflaws, but it will cut the flood to a trickle. That, and it's an engineering feat that I'd like to see. Build the wall. America needs the jobs. Everybody wins. We create more jobs, at the same time cutting down on the illegal competition for those jobs. And then, we enforce everify for ALL employers. An employer caught using illegal aliens is put out of business, his earnings confiscated, and sent to prison for a good long while. When he leaves prison, he is barred for life from running a business. Everybody wins - except the lawbreakers.
Hail to the Nibbler in Chief.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @01:17AM (1 child)
If your best argument is that building a wall will create jobs, why not employ people to make something useful. Channel the money in to improving roads, or the railways, or some other form of infrastructure that is actually useful for the economy.
And enforcing laws, are there not other laws that it would be more beneficial to improve enforcement of? If you think illegals are a serious problem that needs to be dealt with better, then more punishment for employing them and more enforcement of such laws against employing them will surely be much more cost effective than building a wall, and those actions don't require a wall to be in place.
Economically, is the wall really worth building?
If building it isn't economically worth while, then does it provide significant extra security to the USA?
I think the answer to both those questions is "no". So what are the benefits of building this wall?
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday January 09 2018, @02:56AM
The wall is useful. The wall is economically useful, because it will help to stabilize our economy. It does increase security. The fact that you think the answers to your questions is "no" doesn't make it so. Bring on the punishment for employers, that's great. I love the idea. Meanwhile, build the wall.
Again, the Chinese accomplished a comparable feat, thousands of years ago, using only grunt labor and millenia old technology. Are we such wimps, that a wall challenges us? Just build the wall. The wall will mess with the flow of drugs, probably to a greater extent than all of the DEA's other misguided efforts. That alone justifies the wall.
National pride has something to do with all of this. If you have none, then you see no point in the wall. I have such pride. This country belongs to us, and we don't owe it, or any part of it, to outsiders. Those Mexicans, and everyone else, can just stay out, unless they ASK politely to come in, and we eventually grant permission.
Do you leave your doors at home hanging open, and allow anyone and everyone to come in, as they wish? I didn't think so. Why are our doors hanging open at the border? Close the doors. Control immigration, and stop allowing immigration to control us.
Hail to the Nibbler in Chief.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday January 09 2018, @03:20AM
I had to come back to this one. You say that it's feasible to build roads to remote locations, so that you can truck in those sections - and at the same time deny that it is feasible to mix and pour concrete on site. How, exactly, do you justify that claim? The very same roads that you are willing to build for sectional building will serve to set up the mixing equipment, and allow the cement trucks access to the same areas that your sections need to go. And, of the 2000 miles of border, MOST of it is accessible without building any kind of roads at all. Farmers and ranchers drive along those borders on a daily basis, in their 4x4 pickups. In fact, more than half of the border is accessible to vehicles without four wheel drive. Any pickup can drive along it, or cars, or motorcycles, or even tractors. Once away from the mountains in California, you can walk the border, if you like, without any special gear or equipment.
I insist, unless you are resorting to helicopters to place your sections, then anywhere that you can erect prefab sections, I can pour on site. Note that I haven't claimed that it will be "easy" to do. I am saying that it can be done. Some places, roads will have to be built, but you've already noted that you'll have to build roads to get your sections in.
I leave it up to you to demonstrate how and why it would be possible to erect prefab sections, where it is impossible to our on site. Helicopters are out, as you have already stated that you're going to build roads.
Hail to the Nibbler in Chief.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @06:11PM
No, most Texans be like: "You wanna build a wall to stop them illegals? Darn tootin'!"
Tip: Most Texans don't live in Austin.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @04:14PM (1 child)
Blah, blah, blah. DO YOU HAVE DIFFERENT MATHS TO PRESENT OR WHAT?
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday January 10 2018, @11:19PM
Different maths, as opposed to what maths? Author provided no math in the article. He provided humor instead.
Hail to the Nibbler in Chief.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday January 10 2018, @07:11PM
But, didn't you hear? The great Orange is going to MAKE Mexico build this wall for us... so, one construction crew working for 200 years sounds about right.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/06/24/7408365/
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 08 2018, @03:26AM
The high way system was built for the military to move vehicles around the country, so it would have to have been completely impossible not to have been done. The upgrades done in the '60s were largely about doing it faster and more conveniently.
In short, if it had been impossible at the time, somebody would have invented a way of making it happen as it was that important.
The wall though, isn't anywhere near as important. There's nothing about the wall that couldn't be done in other ways for less wasted money.