Om Pandya, Staff Writer
Ideology: Libertarian | Writing from: New York, NY
Immigration is a partisan issue, just like any other. While the right-wing of this country typically holds a stance against illegal immigration, the left is far more “accommodating” of illegals – petitioning for their rights to “handouts.” I would say it is impossible to have free market capitalism without a border that allows workers to come and go as prices rise and fall. In any Economics 101 class, you are taught to treat labor just as any other good, which increases national welfare if allowed to cross borders. The pro-business segment of the Republicans would benefit from an influx of cheap labor, which would lower prices for all, but we increasingly see as an argument against immigration that it is a burden on taxpayers.
The topics of racism, capitalism, and the welfare state, which I touched on in my last article, all converge on the topic of immigration. Emily Seig, in her article about the plight of immigrants in Europe, spoke about the racism that immigrants are facing in the EU. However, it is no coincidence that the main nations she focused on were France and Germany, both of which give out welfare generously (see McCaffrey: Chasing the Wrong Carrot). Emily sympathized with the plight of the Turk minority in Germany, but ignored the fact that while the average native German pays more in taxes than he receives in benefits between the ages of 20 and 65 while the average Turk in Germany only pays more taxes than gets benefits between the ages of 28 and 57. In France, much of the Muslim population is on welfare, and the attraction of a society with a safety net attracts more immigrants every year.
Although the high rates of immigration should be good for the work force in the EU, the numbers tell otherwise. In Germany the numbers of foreigners increased from 3 million to 7.5 million between 1971 and 2000, but the number of foreigners working stayed at 2 million. The low birth rates in Europe leave a vacuum for hard-working immigrants to fill, but increasingly the families of the workers come also to enjoy the fruits of other taxpayers labor. Another example is Denmark, where the Danish national bank calculated that it must raise taxes by 1.6 billion to offset the cost of third-world immigrants living in Denmark, who can find jobs but nevertheless must be supported.
No one likes to see his or her hard-earned money go to someone else, but this is even more so when the person in question is not a native of your country and espouses different beliefs that you. Such is the case in France where two-thirds of the imams are supported by welfare. Imagine the anger and increased racist tendencies of a white female Christian when she learns that her taxes go to fund a mosque that possibly preaches the subjugation of women or that Christians will go to hell. Even someone who is completely and totally not racist would feel some sort of exasperation at the increase in immigrants no matter what their ethnicity, since each additional person is a burden on the state and therefore on each taxpayer.
The racism immigrants are facing in the EU is not a reflection on the people. The people of Western Europe abolished the slave trade a full 400 years before the United States did. The people of Europe overwhelmingly supported Obama in the United States election even though he was black. However the presence of extreme nationalist right-wing parties, such as the National Front in France, that are a far greater force than similar parties in the U.S. signal that there is increasing racism in Europe. This racism is a backlash of high immigration, which is caused and supported by the welfare state.
As I pointed out in my last article, a free-market system is the ideal economy for resisting racism while a socialist welfare state gives rise to a dangerous trend of racist thought. Of course it is absurd to say that socialism and capitalism are inherently racist, just as it is absurd to say that hurricanes or swimming pools are racist. However, the effect that socialism has on immigration and the individual taxpayer causes racism. We already see the result of this in Europe, and could see even more of the same effect in the United States if we start providing taxpayer-funded handouts to immigrants.