By
Peter Brimelow
Contra Costa Times
Published
Saturday, December 4, 1999
“IN AMERICA, WE have a
two-party system," a Republican
congressional staffer is supposed to have told a
visiting group of Russian legislators some years
ago.
"There is the stupid party. And
there is the evil party. I am proud to be a member of
the stupid party."
He added: "Periodically, the two
parties get together and do something that is
both stupid and evil. This is
called—bipartisanship."
Our current mass immigration policy
is a classic example of this fatal Washington
bipartisanship. It is a stupid policy because there is
absolutely no reason for it—in particular, Americans as
a whole are no better off economically because of mass
immigration.
It is an evil policy because it
second-guesses the American people, who have shown
through smaller families that they want to stabilize
population size.
Unfortunately, our current
immigration policy is consuming the environment with
urban sprawl, hurting the poor and minorities with
intensified wage competition, and ultimately threatening
the American nation itself—what Abraham Lincoln called
"the last, best hope of earth"—with cultural and
linguistic fragmentation.
And, of course, the current mass
immigration policy is bipartisan. Both major party
leaderships have tacitly agreed to keep the subject out
of politics. No single figure is more
responsible for this than
Sen. Spencer Abraham, R-Mich., chairman of the
Senate's Immigration Subcommittee.
Abraham was a key figure in
sabotaging the most recent chance of reform, the
Smith-Simpson immigration bill, in 1996.
Ironically, this was a truly
bipartisan measure, proposed by Republicans but
based on the work of the
Jordan Commission, headed by the former black
liberal
Democratic Congresswoman Barbara Jordan. She
recommended almost halving immigration, in part because
of its impact on the poor.
The economic stupidity of current
mass immigration policy is illustrated by a brilliant
new book,
"Heaven's Door: Immigration Policy and the American
Economy" (Princeton University Press).
The author,
Professor George Borjas of Harvard University's John
F. Kennedy School of Government, is widely regarded as
the leading American immigration economist. And he is an
immigrant, arriving here penniless from Castro's Cuba in
1962, when he was 12 years old.
Borjas has every reason to favor
immigration. He writes movingly about his own early
experiences, and compassionately about the immigrant
waves that have followed him.
But, as a scholar, he recognizes
what he calls "accumulating evidence" that immigration
has costs as well as benefits. "My thinking on this
issue has changed substantially over the years," he
admits.
Professor Borjas' devastating
findings:
The current wave of mass
immigration is not benefiting Americans overall. "All
of the available estimates suggest the annual net gain
is astoundingly small," writes Professor Borjas,
"... less than 0.1 percent of the Gross Domestic
Product." Roughly: less than $10 billion in a $7
trillion economy.
Note carefully what Professor
Borjas is saying here. Sure, those immigrants who work
do raise overall GDP. But the bulk of that increase goes
to the immigrants themselves, in the form of wages. The
benefit to native-born Americans, after everything is
taken into account, is infinitesimally small.
Current mass immigration is not
benefiting Americans overall—but it is transforming
their country. For nothing.
Least-skilled Americans are being
hurt. Borjas estimates that almost half of the increased
wage gap between high school dropouts and high school
graduates can be attributed to immigration.
Again, note carefully what
Professor Borjas is saying. Mass immigration is not
making Americans richer overall. But it is, in effect,
redistributing income between Americans. Specifically,
because immigrants tend to be unskilled, they compete
with American unskilled workers and have forced their
wages down.
Of course, profits for employers of
unskilled workers have correspondingly gone up. But the
employers' gain, according to Professor Borjas'
calculations, does not cancel out the workers' loss.
And it's not just unskilled
American workers. Any group of workers could be
displaced. It's already happened in the computer
software industry. Employers prefer to import cheap
young immigrant programmers rather than retrain and pay
older American programmers.
Current mass immigration is hurting
key states badly. Because immigrants tend to be
unskilled, and because we now have a costly social
safety net, immigrants cost taxpayers money in the
half-dozen states where they concentrate.
A lot of money. For example,
immigration has raised the taxes of native households in
California by a stunning $1,200 a year. Overall, this
fiscal loss easily cancels out any small benefit
immigration brings to native-born Americans.
Not only are Americans seeing their
country transformed, they are actually paying for the
privilege.
Oh, in case you're wondering: The
amazing fact is that
Borjas' views are the consensus in his
profession—see the National Research Council's 1997
report
"The New Americans."
Evil? Or stupid? Either way,
immigration policy is broke. And it needs fixing. Now.
