Fed Foolishness [Southern Sympathizer] - 01/20/05

Fed Governor Ben Shalom Bernanke emitted some pro-immigration warbling at a recent Council of Foreign Relations press conference (where else?)

"I think a very important part of the productivity gains in the past decade were associated with our open immigration policy…If we don't allow, if we don't make provision for bright people, whether they be graduate students or professional people to come...that's a loss to our society and a loss to our potential productivity."

Of course, this makes no sense. The current policy of flooding the country with illiterate, low-quality labor cannot help productivity, which is a mathematical ratio of per capita output  

And why did not this highly sophisticated observer of labor markets arrive earlier at Ed Rubenstein’s view that current immigration distorts the employment numbers and hurts native born-workers—now validated by Bear Stearns (scroll down – 4^th item)?

Alas, it appears that Bernanke is just another of those romantics who idolize immigration. At a Chicago Federal Reserve Conference last year, seemingly devoted to helping illegal immigrant escape U.S. regulations, he said: 

“all four of my grandparents [emphasis added] were foreign-born, coming from Europe to the United States either just before or directly after the First World War last year a period, incidentally, that represented a high-water mark of immigration to the United States.”

Bernanke knows a great deal about Central Banks. But why should anyone expect him to know anything about America?

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