The Economics of Immigration

When a company goes out of business, it is a good thing.

Do I have your attention?

See, with few exceptions, when a business goes under, it is because it is not the best use of money as compared to other things it (the money) can be used for. And most of the exceptions can be classified as government overregulation.* So going out of business, no matter how painful to some, is the way that the world lets you know that you need to do better.




In the debate over immigration, people talk about both immigrants "taking American jobs" and about immigrants "doing jobs Americans won't do". Both statements are missing the point.

Americans don't deserve jobs because they are Americans. No one 'deserves' a job...that isn't how economics works. So once we put those fallacies aside, we are left with supply and demand.

The more people available to be hired, the better chance we have of finding the best possible person at the most appropriate salary. This applies to both those at both ends of the salrary spectrum: as much to Mexican tomato pickers as it does to Indian engineers.



This post is not as clear as I would have liked. Maybe I'll try again later.




*No, I did not make a mistake by not including Enron in the exceptions. Enron is not an exception, it holds to what I said before: stealing money is not the best economic use of said money.