Nation on decline : Does a nation enroute to decline attract more immigrant or opposite.
Markets Solve The Immigration 'Problem'
John Tamny, 01.26.09, 12:00 AM EST
A decline in foreign migrants is a bad sign for any economy.
During the darkest days of the war in Iraq, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair was asked whether the United States' best days were behind it. Instead of piling on with the popular suggestion that the U.S. was a nation in decline, Blair calmly replied that failing countries usually repel rather than attract immigrants.
Far from indicating a country on the ropes, the foreigners seeking both legal and illegal entry into the U.S. in the last decade are a market signal pointing to a nation doing far better than elite thinking around the world has suggested. Simply put, countries that attract the washed and unwashed the world over are pictures of success; the countries that lose their limited human capital are failures. Cuba, North Korea and Zimbabwe do not have immigration "problems."
Blair's past thinking takes on new meaning when we consider a recent front page story from USA Today titled, "Fewer immigrants caught sneaking into U.S." Thanks to a weakened economic outlook stateside, the number of people "caught trying to sneak into the USA from Mexico is at its lowest level since the mid-1970s."
No doubt tougher border enforcement explains some of the above, but the bigger story here reveals the market forces that factor into all human activity. With jobs in the U.S. presently harder to come by, the number of migrants here has declined. As University of Texas, El Paso professor Josiah Heyman described it to USA Today, when economic opportunities in the U.S. become less plentiful, "Word gets back to Mexico really fast."
All of this speaks to a broader truth about immigration itself. High immigration doesn't indicate a nation besieged, but rather the fact that jobs exist. When jobs do not exist, basic market forces cause migrants to seek economic opportunity elsewhere.
The U.S. does not have an "immigration problem." It would be more realistic to say that for much of the last 25 years the U.S. has been blessed with a booming economy; one made more vibrant thanks to the influx of workers seeking better opportunity in an economy that needed more workers than our existing population provided. In The Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith used a pin factory to show the wonders of the division of labor, and in our case, new human capital from across the border has freed us up to do even higher value work during a period mostly marked by labor shortages, as opposed to labor gluts.
So if it's established that the somewhat natural ups and downs of our economy serve as a natural, market-driven regulator of worker inflows into the states, this reality should cause us to rethink policies meant to keep immigrants from reaching the U.S. altogether. As the aforementioned downturn has revealed, worker demand, or lack thereof, does a good job in that regard.
Markets Solve The Immigration 'Problem'
John Tamny, 01.26.09, 12:00 AM EST
A decline in foreign migrants is a bad sign for any economy.
During the darkest days of the war in Iraq, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair was asked whether the United States' best days were behind it. Instead of piling on with the popular suggestion that the U.S. was a nation in decline, Blair calmly replied that failing countries usually repel rather than attract immigrants.
Far from indicating a country on the ropes, the foreigners seeking both legal and illegal entry into the U.S. in the last decade are a market signal pointing to a nation doing far better than elite thinking around the world has suggested. Simply put, countries that attract the washed and unwashed the world over are pictures of success; the countries that lose their limited human capital are failures. Cuba, North Korea and Zimbabwe do not have immigration "problems."
Blair's past thinking takes on new meaning when we consider a recent front page story from USA Today titled, "Fewer immigrants caught sneaking into U.S." Thanks to a weakened economic outlook stateside, the number of people "caught trying to sneak into the USA from Mexico is at its lowest level since the mid-1970s."
No doubt tougher border enforcement explains some of the above, but the bigger story here reveals the market forces that factor into all human activity. With jobs in the U.S. presently harder to come by, the number of migrants here has declined. As University of Texas, El Paso professor Josiah Heyman described it to USA Today, when economic opportunities in the U.S. become less plentiful, "Word gets back to Mexico really fast."
All of this speaks to a broader truth about immigration itself. High immigration doesn't indicate a nation besieged, but rather the fact that jobs exist. When jobs do not exist, basic market forces cause migrants to seek economic opportunity elsewhere.
The U.S. does not have an "immigration problem." It would be more realistic to say that for much of the last 25 years the U.S. has been blessed with a booming economy; one made more vibrant thanks to the influx of workers seeking better opportunity in an economy that needed more workers than our existing population provided. In The Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith used a pin factory to show the wonders of the division of labor, and in our case, new human capital from across the border has freed us up to do even higher value work during a period mostly marked by labor shortages, as opposed to labor gluts.
So if it's established that the somewhat natural ups and downs of our economy serve as a natural, market-driven regulator of worker inflows into the states, this reality should cause us to rethink policies meant to keep immigrants from reaching the U.S. altogether. As the aforementioned downturn has revealed, worker demand, or lack thereof, does a good job in that regard.
