In Open Borders: The Science and Ethics of Immigration, libertarian economist Bryan Caplan and illustrator Zach Weinersmith make the economic case for unlimited immigration.
The graphic non-fiction book argues it’s affordable and even increases global wealth, expressed in terms of gross world product.
Photo: 123rf.com
As lockdown measures are introduced in Italy to contain the spread of Covid-19 and other countries implementing restrictions, Caplan says the actual use of immigration restrictions look nothing like this.
Restricting mobility is a very harsh measure that you should deploy very cautiously, he says.
“When countries are doing it inside, to their own citizens, I am a lot less skeptical of that, it looks like they really are doing something where there is a clear and present danger to human life.
“I’m just saying that under normal circumstances, it is a very bad idea to try to keep people out from the country…”
Caplan says researchers have found it is likely immigration restrictions cause more damage to the world economy in human welfare than any other regulations on Earth.
“The reason being that you are keeping a very large number of people who want to move, from moving, and if they did move they would not only improve their own lives but contribute a lot more to mankind.”
Workers move to a different country and they produce more, he says.
“You may say isn’t there a fixed number of jobs, there totally is not. When women enter the workforce, business just comes up with more jobs, there’s always something useful that you can do with an able-bodied motivated person.”
It’s about producing more and allowing business to keep up, he says.
“It’s mostly the fact that some countries really are not good places to produce, and if you can just move the talent to places that are good for production, you enrich not only the immigrant but the world,” he says.
“Immigrants don’t just compete with you for jobs, they also offer you goods and services.”
When people complain about cultural harm, Caplan says he wonders whether the person has much interaction with what they say is harmful culture.
“When people act that way, my view is that their complaints are mostly just hot air and they don’t actually care very much.”
People are basing their opinions on ideology and on what they see on TV when they don’t have first hand experience, Caplan says.
In the US, it’s clear immigrants have a lower crime rate than those born in the country, he says.
What is the overall fiscal impact immigrants have?
“At least for the US, the immigrants that we have right now it pretty much looks like a net benefit to US tax payers…when the government spends money on redistribution, it’s normally for the elderly, not the poor…and immigrants tend to be young so that means they are a good deal when you let them in and they pay taxes for many decades before they can collect old-age benefits.”
For things like national defence and national debt service, government costs that don’t go up based on population, immigrants actually help to shoulder an existing cost, he says.
Bryan Caplan is a professor of economics at George Mason University and a regular blogger at EconLog. He's also the author of three previous books: 'The Case Against Education', 'Selfish Reasons to Have More Kids', and 'The Myth of the Rational Voter'.
