The great immigration debate has to become the great rethinking and restructuring debate. Charlie Brown is right when he says: “No problem is too big and complicated that it can’t be run away from.”
In both the US and EU, the focus is increasingly on the problem of immigration. President Donald Trump talks of them being criminals, drug traffickers and scroungers. He wants to build a very expensive wall on the border, separating countries that for a long time have not countenanced a war or terror against each other (there is a funny Mexican joke: “Yes, it’s a good idea to build the wall; it will keep Trump out”).
There are good reasons to allow low-skilled immigrants in (I use the word “immigrants” to include refugees). Shikha Dalmia, senior analyst at the Reason Foundation, gives several good reasons. Firstly, Americans are the customers of low-skilled immigrants, buying services from them, everything from hospital cleaning and childcare to house repairs.
Secondly, these immigrants are mobile since they rent rather than own, so they can move to where the work is. Right now, they are being encouraged to move to Detroit, where much of the population has fled the city’s decay and the mayor is trying to revitalize it.
Thirdly, they are good for American and European women. Often nannies, they enable many women to work. Many of them are highly skilled, and thus contribute a good deal to society.
Fourthly, immigrants cost the state less than ordinary workers. They often do not qualify for benefits. They cost the state when it comes to schooling or medical care, but then they pay taxes (unless they are illegals).
Fifthly, they create jobs. They reduce costs of production, and make American or European goods more competitive with Latin American, Chinese, Indian and African exports. Some economists argue that immigrants pull the wages of the host community down, but Dalmia says they have got it wrong. She says it is a win-win situation, since immigration works to maximize the potential of the economy across the board. This lifts all boats.
Sixthly, as long ago as the 1960s, research work done in London made the point — supported by academic work today — that immigrants, apart from refugees, only journey to a country if they hear on the grapevine that lots of jobs are available. If not, they do not come.
A 2005 World Bank report found that if wealthier countries allowed a 3 percent rise each year in the size of their labor forces through easier immigration, the gains to developing world countries over time would be about $300 billion.
Jonathan Power
Seventh, a 2005 World Bank report found that if wealthier countries allowed a 3 percent rise each year in the size of their labor forces through easier immigration, the gains to developing countries over time would be about $300 billion. Fully open borders would double the world’s national income in a few decades, virtually eliminating global poverty.
John Stuart Mill, the great 19th century economist, wrote that migration was “one of the primary sources of progress.” Renowned economist Adam Smith also opposed restrictions on immigration.
Ironically, it was Karl Marx who seemed to be against immigration. He wrote that England’s decision to absorb the “surplus” Irishmen driven out by the famine was a ploy by the English bourgeoisie to “force down wages and lower the material and moral position of the English working class.”
But there are arguments for limiting the flow in the future. In my book “Conundrums of Humanity: The Big Foreign Policy Issues of Our Day,” I argue that there are enough immigrants already (apart from refugees, who should not be refused).
Those who readily argue for more are the middle and upper-middle classes, who not only benefit from their jobs, but enjoy the food and music that immigrants bring with them. It is the lower-middle and working classes who often live cheek by jowl with immigrants. It is they who see their schools and health facilities becoming overcrowded.
Moreover, immigrations put on hold older problems society should have been forced to confront earlier. It has put off the day when menial jobs should have been altered, improved and paid better to attract unemployed natives.
Why should older workers be thrown on the scrapheap when they are 65? There is plenty of work to be done for those with experience. If they are not put to good use, as the population ages millions of immigrants will be needed in Europe and the US. Can one expect societies to adjust uncomplainingly when they feel the country is slipping away from the natives?
• Jonathan Power is a British journalist, filmmaker and writer. He has been a foreign affairs columnist for the International Herald Tribune for 17 years.
SOURCE: http://www.arabnews.com/node/1061286
Categories: Arab World, Economics, Economy, Europe, Europe and Australia, European Union, Muslim World, Socioeconomics, The Muslim Times, United States, World
Just get your facts straight before you start ranting about how the country is filled with ‘immigrants’. Why doesn’t anyone complain about the millions of Brits moving abroad every year eh? what would Britain do without all this work force? coz it looks like Brits are too good to do a lot of the jobs and prefer getting their lives paid for by the government? everyone on this planet has the right to live a comfortable live WHEREVER they want. you can’t blame people for being hungry and craving for the life they deserve just because some rich guys placing borders wherever they like? If you sent all the immigrants back this country would grind to a halt because they do all the horrible jobs that our unemployed wont do. They don’t realise the reason there are so many migrant workers is the locals don’t want to get their hands dirty by doing menial hard work, whereas the East Europeans are happy to do it. 5 million Brits live permanently abroad as foreigners, and many also as migrant workers. British women have a low fertility rate of about 1.89 per woman, which means naturally born Brits are not having enough children to replace the generations. Don’t see why people have such a problem with mass immigration? It enriches our culture and boosts the economy! Britain is a modern, dynamic, fascinating and multicultural country, if you are a selfish intolerant bigot then feel free to go somewhere else and leave the rest of us in peace.
Here’s a new idea – get the f**k out of every Muslim country, stop killing Muslims with your bombs, soldiers, funding and discriminatory policy and let the Muslims sort out their own affairs without Western interference. Then the flow of refugees will stop… Terrorism and fight for freedom has always been there too. Unfair to single out Muslims. Germany, we Muslims will not forgive you for selling nuclear weapon submarines to Israel and giving that racist country a second nuclear strike capability. If you like Jews so much, give a piece of your own country to them as a homeland. The more Muslim countries are attacked, the more you can expect more asylum seekers to come to white countries. You only have yourself to blame. The crusades, colonisation of every brown and black people, slavery, the holocaust, making indigenous populations disappear ( USA CANADA AUSTRALIA NEW ZEALAND), the small box genocide on native Indian in north America. Tasmania is Australia has no native population because they were wiped out 200 years ago. 1 million people died in Iraq since 1990(yeah you liberated us from saddam) 500 thousand in Afghanistan dead since 2001 stealing resource from colonies( east India company any one and many more). I gosh I could remember the whole list. Such nice white Christian people eh. West must learn to respect and tolerate those who are different. The problem of extremism we are experiencing is not “mass immigration”, immigration has been happening since the dawn of mankind.
68% of all immigrants in the United Kingdom are employed, a rate well above of the average immigrant employment rate in the EU (62%). According to a new OECD/EU report the good labour market outcomes are partly explained by the high educational levels of the immigrants to the United Kingdom. While in the EU on average, one in four immigrants holds a university degree, it is almost one in two in the United Kingdom.
Don’t these hypocrites idiots know what their ancestors did to Native American Indians they slaughtered 150 millions of Native American Indians! and also do they know that Great Britain invaded 80% countries around the world? They should call them terrorist first and as well call their ancestors terrorist! British did the same to Native American Indians and sadly they still treat Native American Indians badly! So Americans Indians know how you Muslims feel! They stolen Indian land and killed 150 millions of Indians the British did! They were forced to go to the white man’s school and learn the language, culture and faith of the white man. Inspite of that, they are still the under dogs of the American society.
There will never be an end to immigration, because of aging population and low birth rate. Without migration, European society and economy would bleed to death. There is no end to migration in the near future. The overall problem when dealing with immigration, is the need to first ascertain where these people have come from:- If they are from Commonwealth Countries (most likely not Australia, Canada, or New Zealand – there the immigration goes the other way), this can be seen as 200 years of imperialism coming back to bite us. If they are from Eastern Europe, this can be seen as 20 years of moronic EU policy coming back to bite us. If they come from the Middle East, this can be seen as 100 years of never ending scheming and meddling in that particular region coming back to bite us.
The people who make me the most ill are the people who decry immigration, then employ immigrant cleaners on crap wages. Yes, it’s much like the Republicans in the US, who stoke hostility against Latino migrants, while all the time depending on them as nannies, cleaners and gardeners. Well of course, they will support any policy that will strengthen their own position whilst damaging the rights of indigenous people and any politician wanting to retain British Values and Liberal values will fall by the wayside. So, the banker from Germany the cleaner from Colombia who cleans his/her office will all vote to strengthen their ‘own’ position, because of course their interests precisely coincide. Its almost as if you think they are all the same. And what on earth are ‘British values”? If you are talking about the kind of crap spouted by UKIP and the Tories.
The debate in Britain is becoming more and more polarised on the issue of immigration. Conservatives, Labour and Liberal Democrats are all vying with one another to appear more and more anti-immigrant. Yet it is clear that immigrants are vital to the life of this country, and have been instrumental in creating much of what we now value most. Much of what the big parties are doing is to distract from the real threat to people’s standard of life and to our culture – the capture of our state by the interests of the wealthy and big corporations.
Your car is German. Your vodka is Russian. Your pizza is Italian. Your kebab is Turkish. Your democracy is Greek. Your coffee is Brazilian. Your movies are American. Your tea is Tamil. Your shirt is Indian. Your oil is Saudi Arabian. Your electronics are Chinese. Your numbers are Arabic, your letters Latin. And you complain that your neighbour is an immigrant? Pull yourself together!
Most of Brits do not want immigration on this scale. That is shown by every poll. But at the same time they want someone to serve them in a bar and clean their hospitals and make cheap clothes. They want someone to drive them across town. Birth rate is declining and old population is on the rise. Migration is on the rise. Mass immigration has caused problems, but it is the fault of the politicians. In education, migrant communities should have their own state funded schools with their own teachers so that native teachers could concentrate on their own children. It is never too late to set up schools for different communities. Muslim community suffer more than others in the field of education.
IA
http://www.londonschoolofislamics.org.uk