Immigration as One of the Most Controversial Topics in the American Political Discourse Today - Coursework Example

Immigration is surely one of the most controversial topics in the American political discourse today, with opinions and positions running the gamut from those favoring completely open borders and those favoring completed closed borders. Both sides seem to present convincing arguments for their respective cases; however, some of these arguments are meaningless beneath their face appeal to the self-interests of native citizens who come to see immigrants as threats to the perceived scarcity of resources. This Malthusian notion of scarcity is based around the perception of scarcity in one’s own life, and does not necessarily reflect correct economic principles of wealth-creation. In reality, an increase in immigration to a different country moves production capital into the host country, increases real wages, and provides a positive indicator for economic growth within the country. Within the past century, the colonial notion of America as “a city upon a hill” and therefore conservatively opposed to the notion of open borders, has replaced the liberal philosophy of an open frontier in which resources are not scarce: producing government policies aimed at limiting the number of individuals seeking to benefit from the United States’ welfare. Economically, immigration surplus is valuable to the welfare of a country when factors of production shift from that country to another; environmentally, immigration poses no great additional threat beyond the hazards of previously existing infrastructures. In the religious language of Puritan John Winthrop and the political discourse of the conservative President Ronald Reagan, America is “a city upon a hill” (Chace). This characterization of American exceptionalism paints the nation with the brush of exclusivity: a community chosen and ordained by God to be an example for the rest of the world. This conservative ideal of an American held off from the rest of the world is the bastion of a social traditionalism that has descended from Colonial times to the present day, when the same ideas are being discussed, only in different contexts and in relation to different issues. This notion of a city upon a hill faded through the establishment of the new American nation, and through the opening of the frontier, in which individuals were allowed from every corner of the world to come (Shipton 510). This liberal conception of immigration opened the door for concepts like the American Dream to take root in the American consciousness. However, with the closing of the frontier, and the realization of a scarcity of land in the new United States, the last 100 years of American ideological history have witnessed the return of the colonial-conservative concept of immigration—a threat and a menace to the stability of the country—return to prominence. In the economic theory of Thomas Malthus, the competition for scarce resources leads inevitably to a Malthusian catastrophe, the point at which population growth has outpaced agricultural production. As individuals, human beings are always faced with economic decisions relating to the existence of scarce resources. And, as individuals tend to do, these problems are projected onto society as a whole, leading them to question the public resources at the disposal of the community to which they belong. This produces the conception of immigration as an undue addition of consumers in a world in which there is a static, unchanging level of producers. On this view, there will forever remain a social carrying capacity (that is, the population size of the species that the environment can sustain indefinitely), and immigration puts the society above its carrying capacity in terms of land, jobs, food, and other scarce valuable resources (Spengler). Opponents of immigration in the contemporary debate frequently point to a number of problems, including the decline in skills of immigrants, the likelihood of immigrant participation in welfare, and the size of immigrant flow. The existing literature that reviews studies and research related to the issue of immigration addresses all of these concerns quite unambiguously; however, it fails to ask whether native populations derive economic benefits from the influx of immigrants, and whether these benefits outweigh the disadvantages brought along with migrants. In terms of a purely economic analysis, immigration surplus is actually advantageous for efficiency and welfare when factors of production move from one country to another (Borjas 5). The nonsensical fear of immigration based on economics is largely based around the question of jobs and whether American citizens will lose their work to immigrants. But this is based on the fallacy that “there is only a finite amount of work to be done” (Binswanger). If the supply of money in an economy is constant, nominal wage rates fall; however, real wage rates increase insofar as total output of the economy has increased due to the movement of production capital into that economy. Real wages must, by economic principle, continue to increase so long as immigrants can support themselves and produce more than they consume (Binswanger). Even though the United States seems to take pride in being a “nation of immigrants”, there is still public hostility to the idea of individuals “illegally” crossing borders to find new opportunities in the American economy. Despite this, the number of illegal immigrants doing this is a reliable economic and social indicator for progress within the United States. After all, the rate of immigration into the United States is far higher than the rate of immigration into Mexico. This is because the United States continues to outpace growth in all aspects of the economy compared to Mexico. Given that immigration is an indicator of the desirability of living in the United States, it seems childish to think that an increased rate of immigration into the United States is a somehow “bad” thing. With that said, the “economic contributions of immigrants are enormous” (Orrenius). More specifically, the pace of economic growth within this country is tightly correlated to the pace of immigration. In terms of the environment, immigrants “are frequently said to cause a natural resource squeeze for natives” (Simon 371). However, this Malthusian notion of the scare resource-carrying capacity of human society is categorically false. Not only have water and food ingestion increased in quantity and purity in the past decades, but the air in the United States is also considerably less polluted. Natural resources, from all reliable measures, are becoming less scarce, not scarcer, as gauged by the fundamental economic measure of cost. That is, additional people do not necessarily lead to increased resource demand and prices in the short-term. Rather, in the long-term, when the system adapts to new sources and substitutes, the result is that resources are very often more available (and therefore less expensive) than if short-run shortages had never occurred (Simon). More concretely, the population density of the United States is far less than that of, for instance, France (roughly one-third, in fact) (Binswanger). A more interesting question this raises about the environment is whether France’s population density adversely affects the environment and whether an equivalent figure in the United States would do the same. Within the past 100 years, a conservative concept of American exceptionalism has reemerged to replace the once dominant liberalism which favored the open movement of individuals across borders and settling in the open frontiers. But from a purely economic standpoint, movement of people is valuable to welfare when factors of production shift from one country to another. From a purely environmental perspective, immigration creates no significant problem beyond those already posed by previously existing practices. The notion of social scarcity and social carrying capacity is based on a perception of personal scarcity. In reality, an increase in immigration to a different country moves production capital into the host country, increases real wages, and provides a positive indicator for economic growth within the country. Given this information, one cannot help but wonder why there is so much opposition to immigration, especially in a country made by immigrants. If this kind of xenophobia continues, government policies will inevitably become more necessary to combat the results of a positive economic indicator. Works Cited Binswanger, Harry. Open Immigration. Houston: Houston Objectivism Society, 2006. Borjas, George J. "The Economic Benefits from Immigration." The Journal of Economic Perspectives 9(2) (1995): 3-22. Chace, James. "The Dilemmas of the City upon a Hill." World Policy Journal 14(1) (1997): 105-107. Orrenius, Pia M. U.S. Immigration and Economic Growth: Putting Policy on Hold. Issue 6. Dallas: Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, 2003. Shipton, Clifford K. "Review: Policing the City: Boston, 1822-1885. By Roger Lane." The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 91(4) (1967): 509-510. Simon, Julian Lincoln. The Economic Consequences of Immigration. 2nd. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1999. Spengler, Joseph J. "Issues and Interests in American Immigration Policy." Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 316 (1958): 43-51. Read More