President trump says that the acceleration of economic growth the United States is one of the main goals of his administration. On Wednesday, he accepted the legislative changes to the immigration system, which, if implemented, will make this goal unattainable.
Trump approved the bill two conservative Republican senators — Tom cotton of Arkansas and David Perdue in Georgia. The bill for ten years would reduce legal immigration by about half, and, according to economists, this change will harm the economic viability of the country. It will reduce the number of immigrants who received “green cards” for permanent residence to approximately 540 thousand annually, with the current level of about 1 million.
Legally this can be achieved mainly through the elimination of “green cards” granted to the brothers and sisters, and adult children of the current immigrants and holders of “green cards” — the so-called chain migration, while simultaneously keeping the number of “green cards” based on job skills. Such immigrants are selected according to the points system, which will give preference to people who speak English, with higher levels of education and high-paying job offers. Apparently, this is the end for the tired, the poor, the downtrodden masses for which the Statue of Liberty served as a lighthouse.
The reduction in the number of legal immigrants by half would deprive a number of enterprises of oxygen in labour. But for the growth in the economy requires a completely opposite strategy. At this point in the country is the stagnation of productivity and a very low unemployment rate. Dramatically reducing the number of legal immigrants program trump will also strengthen the demand for illegal immigrants, which will not keep any one wall.
From the point of view of economy, this law makes no sense. This explains why the senior White house adviser on policy Steven Miller repeatedly defended him, declaring that ordinary Americans support it in poll. (Miller also mentioned that the poem, urging the tired, confused masses in America, not part of the original Statue of Liberty; it was added later. Great argument!).
Miller is right that as a percentage of the population, citizens born abroad, are at the highest level in almost a century. This serious fact is the main reason for the negative reaction of the chauvinist, anti-migrant policies that helped to nominate trump, and which supports the core of his political base even after a disastrous first six months of tenure.
However, when the birth rate in the U.S. is at a historic low, and baby boomers begin to retire, the simple truth is that the United States will need immigrant labour to sustain economic growth, not to mention its extension. To ban entry to migrants with such a low birth rate means to repeat the path of Japan, whose own fading economic prospects were a direct result of such policies, and politics.
The authors of the bill are ignoring Japan, citing Canada and Australia as a model system of immigration based on merit under the law. In fact, in terms of per capita United States every year and without that admit less than half of the number of immigrants who come to Canada and Australia. Although, as stated by trump, newly arrived immigrants reduce wages for certain low-skilled types of work and workers of minorities, they act as “rocket fuel” for the economy as a whole. Reducing their number, trump will undermine the prospects of the country.
