Does cutting immigration hurt the economy?
Reprising a long-running and itinerant argument about the relative economic costs and benefits of immigration, Professor Austan Goolsbee, a professor of economics at the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business, argues in the NY Times:
The Trump administration may find the falling immigration numbers a cause for celebration. But, more than any drop in the stock market or fall in manufacturing sentiment or consumer confidence, they present the scariest economic news we have seen in some time. The impact of low immigration on the American economy will be profoundly negative, both now and in the future.
The argument shows how recent debates over economic aspects of immigration — the incentives for employers, the rights of workers — keep relevant data sources such as the 509-report a few years ago from the National Academy of Sciences, “The Economic and Fiscal Consequences of Immigration,” which critics and advocates both endorsed for their views.
MHC