Trump's wall is about ego and having a politically efficacious talking point, not border security

But it is unevenly distributed.

As with most other things that benefit the "economy" these days, it benefits the upper 20% or so at some cost to everybody else.
Example: Trump's golf courses. He pays 10 - 12 bucks an hour for illegals to run bulldozers, and they take even that back home with them - the 25 - 50 an hour he would have had to pay American citizens would have stayed in the the US. The "economy" profits (the golf course is an economic asset, Trump makes money, etc), but the guys who didn't get hired to bulldoze do not - and neither does their neighborhood, town, etc.

 

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The government doesn't have income, or profit, it has taxes. I meant immigration is a net economic gain.

 

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why does the government pay private business a profit to operate government facilities ?

 

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It doesn't pay them a profit. It pays them for the work. The company decides what their profit will be. Cheaper than trying to use government workers.

 

It isn't always - or even typically - cheaper. Especially if paying for the same work, rather than lesser work, it is often more expensive.
And the government does, often, pay them a profit - a guaranteed margin above their costs, a guaranteed percentage they can add to their "costs", etc - especially in military contracts.

 

Does his "stream of unconsciousness" rambing remind you of anything? It reminds me of my age-addled grandparents, and more recently parents approach to musing about days and events long gone. My grandparents did that when my siblings and I visited. Momma does it at family gatherings, Dad did too, but he's passed on. They do/did that because it's what happens when one's brain is in its dotage.

It's rather charming when one's elderly relatives do it. Who doesn't enjoy old folks regaling them with stories from "way back when I was your age?" But Trump is the POTUS, not our grandfather. He can ramble incoherently like that with his grandkids, and it'd be just fine that he does.

Speaking of rambling incoherently...Lord only knows what sort of classified stuff he tells his kids and grandkids. The way he likes to brag, there's likely no limit to what he will or won't tell them.

 

just skim read this
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-47702152
US-Mexico border wall: Pentagon authorises $1bn transfer

 

The residents of Tijuana have been stealing construction material from the short sections of fencing built under Trump's administration. https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-brie...terials-installed-under-trump-stolen-and-used

They apparently use the stuff - concertina wire, steel and foundation materials, etc - for walls around their own houses, something the violence of the US drug wars, deportations, and trade treaties, has made a significant concern.

Much as I like the idea of Trump paying for Mexican citizen's walls, there is obviously an inventory control problem involved - nobody expected Trump's walls to involve high levels of honest contracting and sound public works management, but if this is any indication of the situation we're looking at boondoggle level "shrinkage" in the less visible corners.

 

why doesn't he just dig a massive canal
...preferably with carbon neutral equipment

 

He can fill it with the water sitting in Nebraska.

Meanwhile, there's a petition going around to invite Trump to visit Nebraska, round up the flood refugees for a week in a sports stadium with no sewer service, and throw paper towels at them from the box seats. The full Republican FEMA service, in one stop.

 

like a neighborhood version of Puerto Rico ?

like throwing out the football or the baseball, but in this case preferably womens sanitary products to teenage girls who have no health insurance or reproductive health care.

i thought he would be all over nebraska like nappy rash because it is a bit of a semi wild state which probably has a lot of independant voters in it.
maybe they dont pay republican party membership fees so he has been banned from going there by the republican party red pants wearing committee of man babies.