Paul Krugman is not the only one who recognizes how important immigrants are for the American economy. Fareed Zakaria also knows that as he explained in his 2023 CNN special report.

Zakaria pointed out how Under Trump legal immigration plummeted by 2/3rds. And Trump tried to build a wall to keep out those seeking sanctuary. Trump was no John Kennedy.  As Zakaria said, “those new policies led to a new immigration crisis.” And no one talked about it.

This crisis was brought on by a sharp demand for immigrant workers for jobs Americans no longer wanted. There were 2 job openings in the US for every job seeker. As Fareed Zakaria said, “Populist politicians are right. America is facing an immigration crisis.  It was just not the crisis they thought it was.

Donald Trump said he would send a message to all the immigration and asylum seekers that “our country is full.” As Zakaria said, “The real crisis is not that too many immigrants have made it to the US, it’s that we aren’t letting in nearly enough.’

Part of the reason for this is that American women decided not to have babies. Zakaria said, “America is in the middle of a baby bust.” The American birth-rate had fallen below the replacement level. The Americans being born were less than those dying. That is not good for an economy. Starting during the Trump regime, because the numbers of immigrants dropped so sharply, the country was “cut off from the workers we so desperately need” said Zakaria.

This then fanned the flames of inflation. There were too few workers pursuing too many jobs. And this started during the Trump administration partly as a result of declining numbers of immigrants. America, not Mexico was paying a big bill for the wall Trump was building.

The author Robert Guest, another person who recognized the importance of immigrants,  said America had 3 options: “you can either have more babies, or you can welcome more immigrants, or you can dwindle and fade into stagnation and irrelevance.” The first option according to experts just won’t happen. The last alternative is not very attractive to Americans who insist on being #1 in everything except justice. That leaves more immigration not less. Otherwise, the labour shortage will continue and social security will become unsustainable. As Fareed Zakaria said, “instead we have chosen the third—stagnation. Refusing to let in more foreign workers according to one estimate could cost the US economy 9 trillion dollars by 2030.

That would make the loss of immigration more expensive than their vaunted military!

For years it has been my belief—an unpopular belief—that the justification for countries to impose barriers to immigration are dubious. After all, what gives us the right here in North America the right to keep others out? Everyone wants to control immigration, but few can give rational justifications for it, other than personal preference. We want the right so we must have the right. But is it really that simple?

Once again Americans, particulars those who follow demagogues, have chosen to vote against their own self-interest, when they voted for Trump.  As Robert Guest said, “If everyone in the world who wanted to move could move, by one estimate the total income of humanity would double!” This would happen as people from less affluent economies moved to more prosperous economies.

The world needs more immigration!