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We Wanted Workers: Unraveling the Immigration Narrative
We are a nation of immigrants, and we have always been concerned about immigration. As early as 1645, the Massachusetts Bay Colony began to prohibit the entry of “paupers.” Today, however, the notion that immigration is universally beneficial has become pervasive. To many modern economists, immigrants are a trove of much-needed workers who can fill predetermined slots along the proverbial assembly line.
But this view of immigration’s impact is overly simplified, explains George J. Borjas, a Cuban-American, Harvard labor economist. Immigrants are more than just workers—they’re people who have lives outside of the factory gates and who may or may not fit the ideal of the country to which they’ve come to live and work. Like the rest of us, they’re protected by social insurance programs, and the choices they make are affected by their social environments.
In We Wanted Workers, Borjas pulls back the curtain of political bluster to show that, in the grand scheme, immigration has not affected the average American all that much. But it has created winners and losers. The losers tend to be nonmigrant workers who compete for the same jobs as immigrants. And somebody’s lower wage is somebody else’s higher profit, so those who employ immigrants benefit handsomely. In the end, immigration is mainly just another government redistribution program.
“I am an immigrant,” writes Borjas, “and yet I do not buy into the notion that immigration is universally beneficial. . . . But I still feel that it is a good thing to give some of the poor and huddled masses, people who face so many hardships, a chance to experience the incredible opportunities that our exceptional country has to offer.” Whether you’re a Democrat, a Republican, or an Independent, We Wanted Workers is essential reading for anyone interested in the issue of immigration in America today.
But this view of immigration’s impact is overly simplified, explains George J. Borjas, a Cuban-American, Harvard labor economist. Immigrants are more than just workers—they’re people who have lives outside of the factory gates and who may or may not fit the ideal of the country to which they’ve come to live and work. Like the rest of us, they’re protected by social insurance programs, and the choices they make are affected by their social environments.
In We Wanted Workers, Borjas pulls back the curtain of political bluster to show that, in the grand scheme, immigration has not affected the average American all that much. But it has created winners and losers. The losers tend to be nonmigrant workers who compete for the same jobs as immigrants. And somebody’s lower wage is somebody else’s higher profit, so those who employ immigrants benefit handsomely. In the end, immigration is mainly just another government redistribution program.
“I am an immigrant,” writes Borjas, “and yet I do not buy into the notion that immigration is universally beneficial. . . . But I still feel that it is a good thing to give some of the poor and huddled masses, people who face so many hardships, a chance to experience the incredible opportunities that our exceptional country has to offer.” Whether you’re a Democrat, a Republican, or an Independent, We Wanted Workers is essential reading for anyone interested in the issue of immigration in America today.
240 pages, Hardcover
First published October 11, 2016
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July 15, 2022George Borjas writes about the econometric challenges of appropriately measuring the economic benefits and costs of immigration. Of course, every immigrant is not the same. Given this heterogeneity of people, there is not one labor market supply shock, but rather shocks in multiple labor markets depending on the skill-set and other factors of the immigrant.
Ultimately, he argues that immigration benefits the U.S. by $50 billion. However, he argues that this is a very small benefit in an $18 trillion economy and the fiscal costs of welfare programs associated with immigrants, which he considers to be higher than natives, leads to a no significant economic impact. He also argues that a 10% increase in the supply of immigrants can reduce wages by about 3%. Moreover, there are other assimilation and redistribution effect costs that has him conclude that immigration should be restricted, particularly low-skilled immigrants.
My take is that this is an enlightening book with a valuable explanation of the limitations of econometrics and data used. Borjas dives into the immigration issue on multiple fronts and explains varying viewpoints relatively well. It is good that he makes the case that this is not about widgets but about people.
However, his focus is primarily on the costs and benefits to Americans with very little discussion on the benefits to the immigrants. He also overlooks the knowledge problem of the government to run an efficient, effective immigration system.
From other research that I've read, the net employment and economic effect may be small from immigration but the global gains to individuals and markets are quite high. Moreover, the fiscal argument against immigration assumes no changes in the safety net, which is a bad assumption because of the need to change it, but the political courage does seem sparse.
Overall, I think this is a well-written book that I learned much from and recommend that you read if you want to learn more about the costs and benefits of immigration. However, given my other readings on this issue, I think his worldview biases his conclusion toward less immigration and more government control.
A market-based system that would allow prices of visas for different skill sets to efficiently influence firms and immigrants to decide how many immigrants should migrate depending on jobs available would be preferable. This would improve the ability to respect the rule of law, which is essential in a republic, of a border and provide an environment less resistant to immigrants because they will be employed where their services are needed most.
This is not an open borders argument, but rather one that enhances the legal process we have today and provides the means to reduce fiscal costs while providing a market solution for a movement of people issue. The mix of jobs will change for Americans, but the cost of goods and services and innovations that allow for more jobs of varying incomes at home and abroad will be available.
Therefore, immigration is a net positive.
Ultimately, he argues that immigration benefits the U.S. by $50 billion. However, he argues that this is a very small benefit in an $18 trillion economy and the fiscal costs of welfare programs associated with immigrants, which he considers to be higher than natives, leads to a no significant economic impact. He also argues that a 10% increase in the supply of immigrants can reduce wages by about 3%. Moreover, there are other assimilation and redistribution effect costs that has him conclude that immigration should be restricted, particularly low-skilled immigrants.
My take is that this is an enlightening book with a valuable explanation of the limitations of econometrics and data used. Borjas dives into the immigration issue on multiple fronts and explains varying viewpoints relatively well. It is good that he makes the case that this is not about widgets but about people.
However, his focus is primarily on the costs and benefits to Americans with very little discussion on the benefits to the immigrants. He also overlooks the knowledge problem of the government to run an efficient, effective immigration system.
From other research that I've read, the net employment and economic effect may be small from immigration but the global gains to individuals and markets are quite high. Moreover, the fiscal argument against immigration assumes no changes in the safety net, which is a bad assumption because of the need to change it, but the political courage does seem sparse.
Overall, I think this is a well-written book that I learned much from and recommend that you read if you want to learn more about the costs and benefits of immigration. However, given my other readings on this issue, I think his worldview biases his conclusion toward less immigration and more government control.
A market-based system that would allow prices of visas for different skill sets to efficiently influence firms and immigrants to decide how many immigrants should migrate depending on jobs available would be preferable. This would improve the ability to respect the rule of law, which is essential in a republic, of a border and provide an environment less resistant to immigrants because they will be employed where their services are needed most.
This is not an open borders argument, but rather one that enhances the legal process we have today and provides the means to reduce fiscal costs while providing a market solution for a movement of people issue. The mix of jobs will change for Americans, but the cost of goods and services and innovations that allow for more jobs of varying incomes at home and abroad will be available.
Therefore, immigration is a net positive.
February 23, 2017
This is a great economic analysis of immigration. Borjas explains the way many studies have been misinterpreted. He shares his own research, along with the assumptions and limitations (of which there are many). I was unhappy to find out that many of the economic benefits I presumed were either small or negligible. But, it's better to argue a position knowing the facts rather than just hoping for them.
I think the most important point Borjas makes is showing that even when immigration is a net benefit to the overall economy, there are winners and losers. In the end, he proposes a different way of debating the immigration issue. Rather than cherry-picking data to support your position, recognize whose side you are on. Then, evaluate the consequences of that side and try to alleviate the negative outcomes.
For example, I am pro-immigration. Whether or not it benefits the economy, I think it's the right thing to do to allow others to escape poverty or oppression and have a chance at freedom and prosperity. I also think immigrants bring societal benefits beyond economics. But, allowing unskilled workers into our country may drive down wages and take jobs from low-skilled native workers. (They'll bring benefits to other players, but there is a group of people who are injured.) To make it work, we need to find ways to assist the low-skilled natives who are worse off - maybe through job training programs or other kinds of assistance. I think this is a much more intellectually honest way of arguing the position.
This book helped me understand why the Trump immigration platform was compelling to so many people. I still disagree with it, but I feel like I have a better understanding of the other side now.
The one thing Borjas didn't go into that I would like to see more on is how immigrants who start businesses impact the economy. He spends quite a bit of time on high-skilled workers on H1B visas (which seem to be very beneficial to the overall economy), but not on business owners. I'd like to see an analysis of how Google has impacted the economy and what would happen if Google was started in another country instead. And what about the immigrant down the street who opens up a restaurant and employs lots of people. It seems like these kinds of job-creators are hard for anyone to argue against, but I'd love to know if the data backs up that intuition.
I think the most important point Borjas makes is showing that even when immigration is a net benefit to the overall economy, there are winners and losers. In the end, he proposes a different way of debating the immigration issue. Rather than cherry-picking data to support your position, recognize whose side you are on. Then, evaluate the consequences of that side and try to alleviate the negative outcomes.
For example, I am pro-immigration. Whether or not it benefits the economy, I think it's the right thing to do to allow others to escape poverty or oppression and have a chance at freedom and prosperity. I also think immigrants bring societal benefits beyond economics. But, allowing unskilled workers into our country may drive down wages and take jobs from low-skilled native workers. (They'll bring benefits to other players, but there is a group of people who are injured.) To make it work, we need to find ways to assist the low-skilled natives who are worse off - maybe through job training programs or other kinds of assistance. I think this is a much more intellectually honest way of arguing the position.
This book helped me understand why the Trump immigration platform was compelling to so many people. I still disagree with it, but I feel like I have a better understanding of the other side now.
The one thing Borjas didn't go into that I would like to see more on is how immigrants who start businesses impact the economy. He spends quite a bit of time on high-skilled workers on H1B visas (which seem to be very beneficial to the overall economy), but not on business owners. I'd like to see an analysis of how Google has impacted the economy and what would happen if Google was started in another country instead. And what about the immigrant down the street who opens up a restaurant and employs lots of people. It seems like these kinds of job-creators are hard for anyone to argue against, but I'd love to know if the data backs up that intuition.
January 5, 2017
This book provides an interesting analysis of the economic impact of immigration. It counters some of the assertions of open border advocates on the benefits of immigration.
Quoting the author’s conclusion:
“The most credible estimate of the immigration surplus—the increase in native wealth resulting from immigrant participation in the productive life of our country—is about $50 billion annually. As long as we focus on economic effects, the bottom line that really matters will contrast this surplus with the fiscal impact. If immigration is a boon on the fiscal side, with immigrants paying far more in taxes than they take out, the $50 billion gain will increase, and will increase dramatically, if we can place any trust in some of the long-run estimates. However, if immigration is a net loss fiscally, as is certainly the case with the short-run estimates, the immigration surplus will quickly start dwindling, and the net gain could get dangerously close to zero and perhaps become negative.
If we take the most conservative estimate of the short-run fiscal impact seriously, the fiscal burden essentially offsets the $50 billion surplus, so that immigration barely affects the size of the "economic pie" accruing to natives. In the long term, the estimates of the fiscal impact are far too dependent on arbitrary assumptions to make them a reliable basis for any kind of cost-benefit calculation. The most credible evidence, therefore, suggests that it is not far-fetched to conclude that immigration is a net economic wash.
This conclusion contradicts the narrative that immigration is good for everyone. It also contradicts the claim that immigration is harming the average American. Instead, the reality is much more nuanced. Although the mythical average person may be unaffected, immigration creates many winners and losers. This redistribution of wealth— in an economy where the size of the native economic pie remains relatively fixed—is the key insight I have gleaned from decades of research on the economics of immigration. After all is said and done, immigration turns out to be just another government redistribution program. And this lesson sheds a lot of light on which groups are on which side of the immigration wars.”
The source of the $50 billion surplus is an interesting study in winners and losers. The winners are companies which in aggregate gain $566 billion per year while native workers lose $516 billion per year. It was also interesting to note that 47% of immigrant households receive welfare compared to 27% of native households.
Quoting the author’s conclusion:
“The most credible estimate of the immigration surplus—the increase in native wealth resulting from immigrant participation in the productive life of our country—is about $50 billion annually. As long as we focus on economic effects, the bottom line that really matters will contrast this surplus with the fiscal impact. If immigration is a boon on the fiscal side, with immigrants paying far more in taxes than they take out, the $50 billion gain will increase, and will increase dramatically, if we can place any trust in some of the long-run estimates. However, if immigration is a net loss fiscally, as is certainly the case with the short-run estimates, the immigration surplus will quickly start dwindling, and the net gain could get dangerously close to zero and perhaps become negative.
If we take the most conservative estimate of the short-run fiscal impact seriously, the fiscal burden essentially offsets the $50 billion surplus, so that immigration barely affects the size of the "economic pie" accruing to natives. In the long term, the estimates of the fiscal impact are far too dependent on arbitrary assumptions to make them a reliable basis for any kind of cost-benefit calculation. The most credible evidence, therefore, suggests that it is not far-fetched to conclude that immigration is a net economic wash.
This conclusion contradicts the narrative that immigration is good for everyone. It also contradicts the claim that immigration is harming the average American. Instead, the reality is much more nuanced. Although the mythical average person may be unaffected, immigration creates many winners and losers. This redistribution of wealth— in an economy where the size of the native economic pie remains relatively fixed—is the key insight I have gleaned from decades of research on the economics of immigration. After all is said and done, immigration turns out to be just another government redistribution program. And this lesson sheds a lot of light on which groups are on which side of the immigration wars.”
The source of the $50 billion surplus is an interesting study in winners and losers. The winners are companies which in aggregate gain $566 billion per year while native workers lose $516 billion per year. It was also interesting to note that 47% of immigrant households receive welfare compared to 27% of native households.
December 28, 2019
Over the past decade, the debate over immigration policy in the United States has transformed from a series of peripheral interchanges between think tank researchers to the locus of the most intense and heated political confrontations of our time. In the wake of the Trump phenomenon and the resurgence of protectionist or nativist skepticism of the supposed economic and cultural benefits of mass immigration, the rhetorical bombast has become ever more explosive.
The parties have become polarized at the extremes—while scrupulously avoiding reasonable policy proposals. The populist right advocates a complete moratorium on immigration, and reacts rather callously to the plight of Latin American immigrants who were brought into the country illegally as children, or who languish in squalid and overcrowded detention centers. Democratic politicians demand the abolition of ICE, demonize the Border Patrol and other law enforcement agencies as an American Gestapo, and effectively denounce the territorial integrity of the United States by proposing that border officials no longer arrest and detain illegal entrants.
Both sides cling fervently to their positions, however intuitional and ill-informed, because they both sense that something deep and integral to the American identity is at stake. Immigration hawks fret over what they perceive to be an impending ethnic balkanization of the country, and wonder if what they understand to be the traditional, universal cultural norms of the nation will survive as successive waves of immigrants—a sizeable plurality of whom come from Mexico and Central America—form self-contained enclaves and displace native-born workers; while advocates have so thoroughly imbibed the idyllic twentieth-century image of America as a universal melting pot which welcomes and accommodates the “huddled masses yearning to breathe free” from around the globe while retaining a uniquely transethnic—or even trans-territorial—national identity that any suggestion of even enforcing laws against unauthorized entry more strictly—let alone of limiting the number of legal immigrants the country receives each year, which currently sits at around one million—is greeted with alarm and indignation, as if everyone in the world is an American and some have simply not yet been recognized as such.
Unsurprisingly, the historical realities of American immigration policy have been more complicated than many imagine. Though the nation has sported a large contingent of immigrants since the colonial period, and there were few federal restrictions on immigration until the mid-nineteenth century, there have also been periods of exclusion and consolidation. States imposed head taxes on immigrants until a Supreme Court case in 1875 revoked their authority to do so and made immigration policy a purely federal concern. The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 barred the entry of all Chinese laborers until the Act was repealed in 1943. Immigration was often restricted on the basis of national origin, socio-economic class, and disability status, and by 1917 the United States prohibited the entry of convicts, prostitutes, persons likely to become public charges, “idiots”, “lunatics”, tuberculosis patients, polygamists, political radicals, and virtually everyone born on the continent of Asia.
The 1924 Immigration Act was designed to preserve the northern European ethnic predominance of the United States by instituting a quota system based on national origins and tying the distribution of visas proportionally to the ancestral makeup of US citizens. This policy was repealed by the Amendments of 1965, which abolished discrimination based on national origins and instead gave precedence to immigrants with immediate relatives already residing in the United States. To diversify the pool of immigrants, the United States also began distributing 50,000 visas per year through a global lottery system (the US receives about 15 million visa applications per year).
Today, two-thirds of immigrants who come to the United States do so through the family preference policy. Roughly 16 percent of the US population is foreign born: a figure three times higher than it was in 1970, and nearly as high as it was at the peak of the Ellis Island Era in the first decade of the twentieth century. The immigrant cohort is dominated by migrants from Mexico and Central America, whereas the immigrants of the early twentieth century were divided fairly evenly by national origin. The US also has one of the largest populations of illegal immigrants in the world, and Borjas gives ample reason to suspect that the DHS’s reported figure of 11 million is a significant understatement. The figure assumes that only ten percent of illegal immigrants fail to report their country of birth on the US Census out of fear of discovery and deportation, when the actual percentage is likely far higher.
Borjas, himself a childhood immigrant from Cuba, takes a skeptical approach to the purported benefits of the current immigration regime. Because immigrants are human beings, and not simple automatons who fill job vacancies and contribute to the national GDP, their impact on the American economic and cultural climate is multidimensional and not adequately captured by the narrow statistics that often appear in partisan media. Immigration certainly benefits some people tremendously—like low-skilled immigrants who can earn a significantly higher income by doing the same work in the United States that they previously did in their countries of origin, or employers who save money on labor costs when immigrants drive down wages by saturating specific fields—but it also has adverse effects on some elements of the native population: namely working-class tradespeople whose wages have stagnated in the post-NAFTA era.
Immigrants produce a $2.1 trillion increase in GDP annually, but because immigrants are people who have to be paid for their work and supported by public welfare programs when they fall on hard times—as they are significantly more likely to do than the native-born population before they become economically assimilated—they also consume $2.05 trillion in payments and benefits, leaving an annual surplus of $50 billion out of a national GDP of $18 trillion, most of which accrues to native firms rather than native workers.
There is also evidence that the rate of economic assimilation has slowed dramatically over the last few decades. A study using data from 2009 found that while immigrants who arrived in 1955-59 saw a nearly 15 percent improvement in their average wage ten years after their arrival, immigrants who arrived in 1995-99 saw no wage increase at all over ten years. This phenomenon is largely attributable to the emergence of Spanish-language enclaves in the United States that make it less necessary for Spanish-speaking immigrants to learn English (and English fluency over time has indeed decreased dramatically since the 1970s), but also restrict the access of immigrants to the broader American economy and the education and training opportunities that would lead to higher-paying jobs.
There are certainly benefits to be gained from immigration, like having a larger pool of taxpayers to help support an aging native-born population and having more consumers to fuel economic growth, but we also need political reforms based on a reasonable assessment of the economic hardships that mass immigration undoubtedly leaves in its wake. Though difficult to foresee, immigration hawks and doves alike may have to lower the rhetorical temperature and set aside ideological dogmas in order to provide effective immigration reform.
The parties have become polarized at the extremes—while scrupulously avoiding reasonable policy proposals. The populist right advocates a complete moratorium on immigration, and reacts rather callously to the plight of Latin American immigrants who were brought into the country illegally as children, or who languish in squalid and overcrowded detention centers. Democratic politicians demand the abolition of ICE, demonize the Border Patrol and other law enforcement agencies as an American Gestapo, and effectively denounce the territorial integrity of the United States by proposing that border officials no longer arrest and detain illegal entrants.
Both sides cling fervently to their positions, however intuitional and ill-informed, because they both sense that something deep and integral to the American identity is at stake. Immigration hawks fret over what they perceive to be an impending ethnic balkanization of the country, and wonder if what they understand to be the traditional, universal cultural norms of the nation will survive as successive waves of immigrants—a sizeable plurality of whom come from Mexico and Central America—form self-contained enclaves and displace native-born workers; while advocates have so thoroughly imbibed the idyllic twentieth-century image of America as a universal melting pot which welcomes and accommodates the “huddled masses yearning to breathe free” from around the globe while retaining a uniquely transethnic—or even trans-territorial—national identity that any suggestion of even enforcing laws against unauthorized entry more strictly—let alone of limiting the number of legal immigrants the country receives each year, which currently sits at around one million—is greeted with alarm and indignation, as if everyone in the world is an American and some have simply not yet been recognized as such.
Unsurprisingly, the historical realities of American immigration policy have been more complicated than many imagine. Though the nation has sported a large contingent of immigrants since the colonial period, and there were few federal restrictions on immigration until the mid-nineteenth century, there have also been periods of exclusion and consolidation. States imposed head taxes on immigrants until a Supreme Court case in 1875 revoked their authority to do so and made immigration policy a purely federal concern. The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 barred the entry of all Chinese laborers until the Act was repealed in 1943. Immigration was often restricted on the basis of national origin, socio-economic class, and disability status, and by 1917 the United States prohibited the entry of convicts, prostitutes, persons likely to become public charges, “idiots”, “lunatics”, tuberculosis patients, polygamists, political radicals, and virtually everyone born on the continent of Asia.
The 1924 Immigration Act was designed to preserve the northern European ethnic predominance of the United States by instituting a quota system based on national origins and tying the distribution of visas proportionally to the ancestral makeup of US citizens. This policy was repealed by the Amendments of 1965, which abolished discrimination based on national origins and instead gave precedence to immigrants with immediate relatives already residing in the United States. To diversify the pool of immigrants, the United States also began distributing 50,000 visas per year through a global lottery system (the US receives about 15 million visa applications per year).
Today, two-thirds of immigrants who come to the United States do so through the family preference policy. Roughly 16 percent of the US population is foreign born: a figure three times higher than it was in 1970, and nearly as high as it was at the peak of the Ellis Island Era in the first decade of the twentieth century. The immigrant cohort is dominated by migrants from Mexico and Central America, whereas the immigrants of the early twentieth century were divided fairly evenly by national origin. The US also has one of the largest populations of illegal immigrants in the world, and Borjas gives ample reason to suspect that the DHS’s reported figure of 11 million is a significant understatement. The figure assumes that only ten percent of illegal immigrants fail to report their country of birth on the US Census out of fear of discovery and deportation, when the actual percentage is likely far higher.
Borjas, himself a childhood immigrant from Cuba, takes a skeptical approach to the purported benefits of the current immigration regime. Because immigrants are human beings, and not simple automatons who fill job vacancies and contribute to the national GDP, their impact on the American economic and cultural climate is multidimensional and not adequately captured by the narrow statistics that often appear in partisan media. Immigration certainly benefits some people tremendously—like low-skilled immigrants who can earn a significantly higher income by doing the same work in the United States that they previously did in their countries of origin, or employers who save money on labor costs when immigrants drive down wages by saturating specific fields—but it also has adverse effects on some elements of the native population: namely working-class tradespeople whose wages have stagnated in the post-NAFTA era.
Immigrants produce a $2.1 trillion increase in GDP annually, but because immigrants are people who have to be paid for their work and supported by public welfare programs when they fall on hard times—as they are significantly more likely to do than the native-born population before they become economically assimilated—they also consume $2.05 trillion in payments and benefits, leaving an annual surplus of $50 billion out of a national GDP of $18 trillion, most of which accrues to native firms rather than native workers.
There is also evidence that the rate of economic assimilation has slowed dramatically over the last few decades. A study using data from 2009 found that while immigrants who arrived in 1955-59 saw a nearly 15 percent improvement in their average wage ten years after their arrival, immigrants who arrived in 1995-99 saw no wage increase at all over ten years. This phenomenon is largely attributable to the emergence of Spanish-language enclaves in the United States that make it less necessary for Spanish-speaking immigrants to learn English (and English fluency over time has indeed decreased dramatically since the 1970s), but also restrict the access of immigrants to the broader American economy and the education and training opportunities that would lead to higher-paying jobs.
There are certainly benefits to be gained from immigration, like having a larger pool of taxpayers to help support an aging native-born population and having more consumers to fuel economic growth, but we also need political reforms based on a reasonable assessment of the economic hardships that mass immigration undoubtedly leaves in its wake. Though difficult to foresee, immigration hawks and doves alike may have to lower the rhetorical temperature and set aside ideological dogmas in order to provide effective immigration reform.
October 12, 2024
“We wanted workers, but we got people instead.” - Max Frisch
Overview
After Ben Shapiro told a crowd of college students that there is no such thing as white European culture, he went on about how legal immigration is a good thing because it attracts people from around the world who are talented. As long as we have some sort of vetting system to filter out the bad guys, legal immigration is great for the United States for economic reasons (that cultural and demographic replacement stuff doesn’t matter).
In the intro, Borjas explains that the purpose of this book is to demonstrate that it is naive and ignorant to view immigrants simply as labor and not as people. But migrants are people, and not just workers. In other words, after immigrants finish their day at work, they go home in the same neighborhoods as locals, send their kids to the same schools, participate in politics, attend local events, win the lottery, and assimilate in virtually every factor of life. And since they always have an in-group mentality, even if they do not have nefarious intent, they are bound to negatively impact native-born citizens due to the cultural difference. “But what about the economic benefits?” you may ask. This book is the answer to that question.
Data Manipulation
Economists who favor immigration like to pretend the data supports their case, but in fact they are very deceptive and manipulative when it comes to “the facts.” Here just a couple examples out of many that he gives:
Argument: Open borders would allow for equal and evenly distributed wealth throughout the world.
Response: Borjas points out that economists make assumptions about the initial wage gap between developed and developing countries, as well as the change in wages between both of these hypothetical worlds (38). If we use the numbers open-border economists use, it is true that overall world GDP increases, but with certain consequences. One of these absurd consequences is that 95% of the workforce in the developing countries would have to move to the developed ones, and that number does not even include their family members (39). In a world without borders, the entire body of developing countries would become almost completely empty, and where would they go? He rightly points out that these advocates conveniently leave out consequences like this when discussing these policies (40).
Argument: The children of immigrants end up becoming more educated and more skilled than their parents, and end up becoming a net-positive for society. The upward trend is documented by economists.
Response: Statistics are given to demonstrate this, but if you couldn’t already guess, Borjas shows how they are very misleading. “...the family ties between the first and second generations identifiable in a census snapshot are very tenuous. The typical second-generation worker in the 2000 snapshot was forty-two years old. But about 90 percent of the working immigrants enumerated in 2000 had arrived after 1970, making it impossible for them to have US-born children in their thirties or older. In other words, the average immigrant in 2000 cannot possibly be the parent of a working second-generation person enumerated at that same time…” (114-15). Two experiments are cited, one in Sweden and one in the US, that show ethnic conclaves have a huge influence on the economic outcomes of the immigrants. If the conclave is not educated and works low-skilled labor, then the odds of the children in the enclave following suit are very high. The inverse is also true. This means that no matter how much government policy tries to steer these communities, their ethnic loyalty will influence their societal outcome in a far greater way (122-23).
The Beginning of the End
When did this immigration disaster begin? For most of the 19th century, immigration in the United States had little if no restriction at all. A large portion of them were German and Irish. Later on around 1875, more strict measures were starting to be put in place, such as restricting entry for “Chinese laborers and… idiots, lunatics, and persons likely to become public charges to the list for good measures” (52). Prostitutes and convicts were later added to the list. These rules may not seem that strict, but compared to today’s immigration policy where illiterate felons are let in everyday, they are in retrospect. These initial waves of immigrants participated in a lot of low-skilled labor, such as factory and automotive work.
Congress eventually passed the “national origins quota system” in the early 1920s. This basically meant that the ratio of ethnic citizens must be in proportion to the same amount of ethnic immigrants. “For instance, 44 percent of the 1920 population was estimated to be of British ancestry, so about 44 percent of the 150,000 available visas (or 65,700) were given to Great Britain” (55). This sounds like a decent policy when restricting immigration within reason, but then something happened in 1965 called the Civil Rights Movement. Deeming the national origin quota system to be too discriminatory, it was then decided that preference would be given to visa applicants who already had relatives in the United States (55). Here we see a shift from a factual, statistical restriction on immigration to “moral,” neo-humanist restriction. As to “how we got here,” this was the beginning of the immigration catastrophe we see nowadays. “The family preference system is now responsible for about two-thirds of legal immigration” (56).
The second half of the chapter has to do with illegal immigration. Illegal Mexican immigration in particular became a problem with the Bracero Program, which was meant to allow agricultural workers from Mexico to temporarily work in the United States. This program stipulated that a bracero (a temporary worker from Mexico) could not replace a domestic worker. It turns out that this was rarely enforced. The program ended up being discontinued, thanks again to all those involved in the civil rights movement. To make matters worse, many American capitalists preferred the cheap labor of Mexican immigrants, rather than hiring their own domestic citizens (side note: who are these capitalists that only care about profit and lobby in favor of open borders?) They valued profit over nationalistic values, similar to what we see today (58). The same people complaining about immigration are the same people who complain about having to pay Americans a certain wage.
But There Are Good Immigrants
“Not all immigrants are bad” you might say. “Some of them are highly skilled and contribute to society.” Borjas quotes Tony Blair regarding immigration: “A simple way to take measure of a country is to look at how many want in, and how many want out.” This was already covered in the chapter Lennon’s Utopia, that it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that people leaving a subpar country are one of the primary reasons why it had become so terrible. And so if they are leaving a terrible country for one they see as better, they are only going to destroy the country that they migrate to. Borjas notes that the media is very deceptive, however, with how they portray immigrants.
Rather than calling immigrants what they are, which at best would be cheap labor for rich corporations, at worst an illiterate welfare leech prone to violence the media calls them brave, determined, excited, etc (67). An immigrant opening up a food stand on the streets of Los Angeles is apparently an indication that they are some kind of entrepreneurial genius.
With that being said, it is also true that many countries including the United States do have some sort of filtration system to attract highly-skilled workers. There is a form of “self-selection” as Borjas notes. But even with this self-selection, there are problems. First of all, others who may not fit the criteria may slip through the cracks - think back to the law allowing families to migrate; say an engineer migrates to the United States, but several of his low-skilled, illiterate family members come with him. Is that a trade-off worth taking?
Secondly, the immigration process in most developed countries doesn’t necessarily attract the best foreign workers. Much of this has to do with relocation costs. Moving to another country on average will cost about ten times the worker’s annual salary when accounting for travel, housing, vehicles, essential items, etc (72). Even amongst more well-off migrants, these may still be deterrents because the prospect of potential gain may still not be worth it. If they come from a country where they are a big fish in a small pond, migrating to a wealthier country where there is more competition, even if they provide a higher salary, may not be the smartest decision.
Finally, Borjas points out that not all immigrants are equal. An immigrant's country of origin plays a huge factor in their assimilation or lack thereof. His national origin will affect his education level, his English proficiency, his religion, his ethics, etc. Some countries are more compatible with others. It is naive, Borjas points out, when looking at data graphs and spreadsheets, to assume that the people from all countries around the world are the same. You may not care about an immigrant’s ethnicity, but they do.
Conclusion
While illegal immigration is a huge issue in today’s world, it is largely a smokescreen for the main problem, which is legal immigration. This issue exists for those on both the left and the right of the political spectrum. Leftists in the past would always appeal to the humanitarian reasons to allow immigrants, however, recently even staunch liberals have come to acknowledge the dangers of cultural enrichment (meaning, migrants have finally started to negatively affect affluent liberal neighborhoods). With that being said, they refer to the economic arguments to save face. This book is a refutation of such arguments.
Conservatives love to tell others how they are in favor of legal immigration because it is supposedly an American value. They believe that handing someone a piece of paper magically turns them into a person that holds the same cultural and ethical values as them. And since many conservatives have become libertarians, they end up convincing themselves that infringing upon a person’s right to migrate is an overstepping of the state. Two things will die with the boomers: Zionism and Libertarianism.
If there is one book you ever read on immigration, it should be this one. Borjas addresses every argument in favor of immigration and shows it to be at worst a lie, and at best a huge reach. He makes data and statistical information very accessible for the average reader. He exposes the lies of other “experts” and politicians. Additionally, he inserts some humor and isn’t afraid to say politically incorrect things. This is by far one of the best books I have ever read.
Overview
After Ben Shapiro told a crowd of college students that there is no such thing as white European culture, he went on about how legal immigration is a good thing because it attracts people from around the world who are talented. As long as we have some sort of vetting system to filter out the bad guys, legal immigration is great for the United States for economic reasons (that cultural and demographic replacement stuff doesn’t matter).
In the intro, Borjas explains that the purpose of this book is to demonstrate that it is naive and ignorant to view immigrants simply as labor and not as people. But migrants are people, and not just workers. In other words, after immigrants finish their day at work, they go home in the same neighborhoods as locals, send their kids to the same schools, participate in politics, attend local events, win the lottery, and assimilate in virtually every factor of life. And since they always have an in-group mentality, even if they do not have nefarious intent, they are bound to negatively impact native-born citizens due to the cultural difference. “But what about the economic benefits?” you may ask. This book is the answer to that question.
Data Manipulation
Economists who favor immigration like to pretend the data supports their case, but in fact they are very deceptive and manipulative when it comes to “the facts.” Here just a couple examples out of many that he gives:
Argument: Open borders would allow for equal and evenly distributed wealth throughout the world.
Response: Borjas points out that economists make assumptions about the initial wage gap between developed and developing countries, as well as the change in wages between both of these hypothetical worlds (38). If we use the numbers open-border economists use, it is true that overall world GDP increases, but with certain consequences. One of these absurd consequences is that 95% of the workforce in the developing countries would have to move to the developed ones, and that number does not even include their family members (39). In a world without borders, the entire body of developing countries would become almost completely empty, and where would they go? He rightly points out that these advocates conveniently leave out consequences like this when discussing these policies (40).
Argument: The children of immigrants end up becoming more educated and more skilled than their parents, and end up becoming a net-positive for society. The upward trend is documented by economists.
Response: Statistics are given to demonstrate this, but if you couldn’t already guess, Borjas shows how they are very misleading. “...the family ties between the first and second generations identifiable in a census snapshot are very tenuous. The typical second-generation worker in the 2000 snapshot was forty-two years old. But about 90 percent of the working immigrants enumerated in 2000 had arrived after 1970, making it impossible for them to have US-born children in their thirties or older. In other words, the average immigrant in 2000 cannot possibly be the parent of a working second-generation person enumerated at that same time…” (114-15). Two experiments are cited, one in Sweden and one in the US, that show ethnic conclaves have a huge influence on the economic outcomes of the immigrants. If the conclave is not educated and works low-skilled labor, then the odds of the children in the enclave following suit are very high. The inverse is also true. This means that no matter how much government policy tries to steer these communities, their ethnic loyalty will influence their societal outcome in a far greater way (122-23).
The Beginning of the End
When did this immigration disaster begin? For most of the 19th century, immigration in the United States had little if no restriction at all. A large portion of them were German and Irish. Later on around 1875, more strict measures were starting to be put in place, such as restricting entry for “Chinese laborers and… idiots, lunatics, and persons likely to become public charges to the list for good measures” (52). Prostitutes and convicts were later added to the list. These rules may not seem that strict, but compared to today’s immigration policy where illiterate felons are let in everyday, they are in retrospect. These initial waves of immigrants participated in a lot of low-skilled labor, such as factory and automotive work.
Congress eventually passed the “national origins quota system” in the early 1920s. This basically meant that the ratio of ethnic citizens must be in proportion to the same amount of ethnic immigrants. “For instance, 44 percent of the 1920 population was estimated to be of British ancestry, so about 44 percent of the 150,000 available visas (or 65,700) were given to Great Britain” (55). This sounds like a decent policy when restricting immigration within reason, but then something happened in 1965 called the Civil Rights Movement. Deeming the national origin quota system to be too discriminatory, it was then decided that preference would be given to visa applicants who already had relatives in the United States (55). Here we see a shift from a factual, statistical restriction on immigration to “moral,” neo-humanist restriction. As to “how we got here,” this was the beginning of the immigration catastrophe we see nowadays. “The family preference system is now responsible for about two-thirds of legal immigration” (56).
The second half of the chapter has to do with illegal immigration. Illegal Mexican immigration in particular became a problem with the Bracero Program, which was meant to allow agricultural workers from Mexico to temporarily work in the United States. This program stipulated that a bracero (a temporary worker from Mexico) could not replace a domestic worker. It turns out that this was rarely enforced. The program ended up being discontinued, thanks again to all those involved in the civil rights movement. To make matters worse, many American capitalists preferred the cheap labor of Mexican immigrants, rather than hiring their own domestic citizens (side note: who are these capitalists that only care about profit and lobby in favor of open borders?) They valued profit over nationalistic values, similar to what we see today (58). The same people complaining about immigration are the same people who complain about having to pay Americans a certain wage.
But There Are Good Immigrants
“Not all immigrants are bad” you might say. “Some of them are highly skilled and contribute to society.” Borjas quotes Tony Blair regarding immigration: “A simple way to take measure of a country is to look at how many want in, and how many want out.” This was already covered in the chapter Lennon’s Utopia, that it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that people leaving a subpar country are one of the primary reasons why it had become so terrible. And so if they are leaving a terrible country for one they see as better, they are only going to destroy the country that they migrate to. Borjas notes that the media is very deceptive, however, with how they portray immigrants.
Rather than calling immigrants what they are, which at best would be cheap labor for rich corporations, at worst an illiterate welfare leech prone to violence the media calls them brave, determined, excited, etc (67). An immigrant opening up a food stand on the streets of Los Angeles is apparently an indication that they are some kind of entrepreneurial genius.
With that being said, it is also true that many countries including the United States do have some sort of filtration system to attract highly-skilled workers. There is a form of “self-selection” as Borjas notes. But even with this self-selection, there are problems. First of all, others who may not fit the criteria may slip through the cracks - think back to the law allowing families to migrate; say an engineer migrates to the United States, but several of his low-skilled, illiterate family members come with him. Is that a trade-off worth taking?
Secondly, the immigration process in most developed countries doesn’t necessarily attract the best foreign workers. Much of this has to do with relocation costs. Moving to another country on average will cost about ten times the worker’s annual salary when accounting for travel, housing, vehicles, essential items, etc (72). Even amongst more well-off migrants, these may still be deterrents because the prospect of potential gain may still not be worth it. If they come from a country where they are a big fish in a small pond, migrating to a wealthier country where there is more competition, even if they provide a higher salary, may not be the smartest decision.
Finally, Borjas points out that not all immigrants are equal. An immigrant's country of origin plays a huge factor in their assimilation or lack thereof. His national origin will affect his education level, his English proficiency, his religion, his ethics, etc. Some countries are more compatible with others. It is naive, Borjas points out, when looking at data graphs and spreadsheets, to assume that the people from all countries around the world are the same. You may not care about an immigrant’s ethnicity, but they do.
Conclusion
While illegal immigration is a huge issue in today’s world, it is largely a smokescreen for the main problem, which is legal immigration. This issue exists for those on both the left and the right of the political spectrum. Leftists in the past would always appeal to the humanitarian reasons to allow immigrants, however, recently even staunch liberals have come to acknowledge the dangers of cultural enrichment (meaning, migrants have finally started to negatively affect affluent liberal neighborhoods). With that being said, they refer to the economic arguments to save face. This book is a refutation of such arguments.
Conservatives love to tell others how they are in favor of legal immigration because it is supposedly an American value. They believe that handing someone a piece of paper magically turns them into a person that holds the same cultural and ethical values as them. And since many conservatives have become libertarians, they end up convincing themselves that infringing upon a person’s right to migrate is an overstepping of the state. Two things will die with the boomers: Zionism and Libertarianism.
If there is one book you ever read on immigration, it should be this one. Borjas addresses every argument in favor of immigration and shows it to be at worst a lie, and at best a huge reach. He makes data and statistical information very accessible for the average reader. He exposes the lies of other “experts” and politicians. Additionally, he inserts some humor and isn’t afraid to say politically incorrect things. This is by far one of the best books I have ever read.
September 28, 2025
This book was incredible. Most books about this subject ideological in nature, but Borjas goes through both the ways immigrants positively and negatively affect the American economy.
March 19, 2017
Fantastic read; this book should be required reading for all policy makers that are interested in immigration. Particularly in today's charged political climate, in which the US and other major industrialized countries are rushing to shut their borders down.
The main question I wanted to get clarity on when reading the book was: are people who are anti-immigration right? I've always been super pro-immigration, as my father being a refugee. But there are a lot of people that are upset right now; why? I've listened to a couple different points of view (This American Life had a great podcast on St. Cloud, MN is a great one), but wanted to know more about the theory of immigration. Who wins? Who loses? Why all the fuss?
The central theme of the book: there is no free lunch. Economists that claim that there are free $1 trillion bills lying around if only we opened our borders are naive and not considering very obvious side effects that are easily measured and for which there are numerous provable examples.
Immigration benefits some, and hurts others. The winners are losers are determined by the specific kinds of immigrants, the context of their immigration, and other factors.
One great example: when the Soviet Union collapsed, a number of PhD mathematicians emigrated to the US. When that happened, it became very hard for American mathematicians who were in the same specific fields the Soviets studied to get jobs, because of increased competition in their specific field. So even though the US was likely better off as a whole - better mathematicians willing to work for less! - specific individuals that had planned careers in mathematics had to find something else to do.
I found what I was looking for: low-skilled workers in the US are definitely worse off because of the level of low-skilled immigration in the last 30 years, the scale of which is unprecedented in history. In other words, they do have something legitimate to complain about.
I'm still pro immigration, but Borjas makes a compelling case that we must do more to help those that are hurt by the policy.
It's also important to note: Borjas himself is not anti-immigration; far from it. He's a refugee from Cuba (like my dad) that believes whole heartedly in the dream of America, and specifically how it gives people from all over the world a fresh chance.
The main question I wanted to get clarity on when reading the book was: are people who are anti-immigration right? I've always been super pro-immigration, as my father being a refugee. But there are a lot of people that are upset right now; why? I've listened to a couple different points of view (This American Life had a great podcast on St. Cloud, MN is a great one), but wanted to know more about the theory of immigration. Who wins? Who loses? Why all the fuss?
The central theme of the book: there is no free lunch. Economists that claim that there are free $1 trillion bills lying around if only we opened our borders are naive and not considering very obvious side effects that are easily measured and for which there are numerous provable examples.
Immigration benefits some, and hurts others. The winners are losers are determined by the specific kinds of immigrants, the context of their immigration, and other factors.
One great example: when the Soviet Union collapsed, a number of PhD mathematicians emigrated to the US. When that happened, it became very hard for American mathematicians who were in the same specific fields the Soviets studied to get jobs, because of increased competition in their specific field. So even though the US was likely better off as a whole - better mathematicians willing to work for less! - specific individuals that had planned careers in mathematics had to find something else to do.
I found what I was looking for: low-skilled workers in the US are definitely worse off because of the level of low-skilled immigration in the last 30 years, the scale of which is unprecedented in history. In other words, they do have something legitimate to complain about.
I'm still pro immigration, but Borjas makes a compelling case that we must do more to help those that are hurt by the policy.
It's also important to note: Borjas himself is not anti-immigration; far from it. He's a refugee from Cuba (like my dad) that believes whole heartedly in the dream of America, and specifically how it gives people from all over the world a fresh chance.
October 5, 2019
Mr. Borjas presents a succinct discussion of the economic impacts of immigration that is easy to read and insightful. His stated purpose is to "summarize in a very accessible way how we know what we think we know about immigration." In particular, his emphasis is more on the "how we know" component rather than the "what we know" - much of the book is simply description of how economists measure dimensions of immigration like assimilation, how it affects the wages of domestic workers, and the extent to which immigrants contribute to as well as draw on public welfare. In explaining these, Mr. Borjas shows the importance of understanding the method employed in such measurements by teasing out how seemingly minor differences in method can lead to highly different conclusions regarding the impacts of immigration. For instance, he highlights how economic theory predicts that if supply of workers increases by way of immigration, then domestic wages will fall, and yet much research claims that this effect has not born out in practice. Mr. Borjas shows that this may appear to be true if one measures the impact on all workers taken together, but that if one distinguishes between low- and high-skill workers, then the decline in wages quickly re-appears, particularly for domestic low-skill workers. While such nuances in method may sound like tedious reading, Mr. Borjas uses engaging historical episodes to detail them such as the events of the Mariel boat lift in which thousands of Cuban immigrants made their way to Miami following the Cuban Revolution. Another particularly interesting episode was the immigration of Russian mathematicians to the United States and the impact they had on productivity of American mathematicians. By discussing methodology against these historical backdrops, "We Wanted Workers" makes for a read that is informative and engaging.
Where Mr. Borjas does venture into more normative territory, he does so in a way that I believe is fair both to those who would agree with him and to his critics.
Where Mr. Borjas does venture into more normative territory, he does so in a way that I believe is fair both to those who would agree with him and to his critics.
November 24, 2020
Carefully considered in its approach. Yet pointed and concise in its message. Borjas does a great job examining the decades' long political and ideological veneer and in some cases, outright dishonesty, in the academic study of immigration. From the statistical misdirection of immigration's economic benefits. To the politically motivated misinformation regarding demography. Borjas goes chapter by chapter carefully dissecting each topic with the utmost prudence towards academic professionalism and also demonstrating great empathy and humility towards the well-being of the immigrants discussed. You'll finish this book wanting more of his insight. While also having much more skeptical look at the narratives surrounding US immigration, and Immigration policy.
It's a must read for anyone looking to deepen their understanding of US immigration.
It's a must read for anyone looking to deepen their understanding of US immigration.
May 24, 2020
George "Big Man" Borjas writes with a rare combination of nuance and clarity, peeling back the curtain to show the cogs and gears that maintain current views on immigration. He often plays the role of economic detective and shows the subtle ways in which data can be manipulated in order to service any particular point of view.
November 11, 2016
Well balanced detailed book
This book is a well balanced approach looking at the consequences of immigration in the US. It is based on some well researched facts, some modeling, and some basic logic. Other incalculable aspects are also reviewed. This was also an easy read.
This book is a well balanced approach looking at the consequences of immigration in the US. It is based on some well researched facts, some modeling, and some basic logic. Other incalculable aspects are also reviewed. This was also an easy read.
January 5, 2017
Measured and accessible book
This a balanced analysis of the many questions that immigration entails. The authors give a measured an accessible summary of what it is known, while emphasizing what it isn't established yet
This a balanced analysis of the many questions that immigration entails. The authors give a measured an accessible summary of what it is known, while emphasizing what it isn't established yet
November 5, 2016
Well written and comprehensive presentation of one perspective on the economics of immigration, but not the only word on the question.
May 7, 2017
This book made me rethink much of what I (thought I) knew about immigration.
December 7, 2023
Among academic economists, George Borjas, a professor at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, has a reputation as an iconoclast. His stance on immigration is often reviled, but Borjas came to his views empirically, not from any prejudicial notions . Borjas left Cuba in 1962, after the Castro government confiscated his family’s belongings, and he himself was a beneficiary of American immigration policy.
Borjas now believes that most of those who claim to study immigration—in academia, journalism, and politics—are mostly advocates for it. President Joe Biden, as a candidate, indicated he would urge immigrants to surge the border, and would offer welfare and health benefits for all comers. Of late, 12,000 immigrants from 180 nations are arriving daily, very few of whom care about assimilation. Unlike my friend- a Special Education Director in Wyoming- who advocates for open borders and unfettered access to all social services, Dr. Borjas has given serious thought to these issues.
Borjas studied whether immigrant labor pools cause a deterioration in labor quality over time, a subject he was advised not to evaluate. The studies most widely circulated in academia, journalism and government are marked, Borjas believes, by arbitrariness, questionable data and investigator bias.
In, “We Wanted Workers,” Borjas argues that much of the conventional wisdom with respect to immigration is false. Most of the statistics provid ed by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) are bald-faced lies. DHS asserts the border is secure, and then employs census surveys and slight of hand numbers which include legal immigrants to arrive at their preordained conclusions.
Borjas is not an historian. As an economist, his discussion of the subject tends toward the quantitative, and he avoids broader cultural questions. But recent developments in our cities and on our campus points to a role for social science to investigate these matters.
Borjas was first drawn to immigration economics by his curiosity about how immigration pools evolve; namely, are immigrant pools deteriorating and causing externalities that our nation cannot sustain.
Whether democracy can prevail in a land without democrats is a question answered by Weimar. The University of California warned faculty in a memo that to call America a melting pot is to commit a “micro-aggression” against minorities; this on a campus that has supported Hamas jihadis.
Incentives matter. Today's newcomers are learning English less quickly and working less than their predecessors. The growth of ethnic enclaves and multicultural ideology have exacerbated this trend. Economic assimilation has slowed down largely due to social policy, inflation and flat economic growth. Borjas’s skepticism about the standard immigration narrative is important because he is an honest researcher and a scientist.
Borjas’s conclusions may reflect more pessimism than those of his colleagues, but his data is not falsifiable by ad hominem attacks. His data has identified several inconvenient truths:
1.) The Census Bureau’s Survey of Income and Program Participation, finds that 46% of households headed by an immigrant resort to welfare.
2.) Competition from immigrants dramatically reduces the wages of workers. A fact that only a partisan would dispute.
3.) The effect of immigrants is a regressive redistribution of income and wealth among natives. As Borjas has found, immigration is not about wealth creation, nor is it about entrepreneurship or diversity. It fosters redistribution from the poor to the rich.
However, because Dr. Borjas is a serious man, he is mostly overlooked today. The 24 hour news cycle, social media, and partisan cheerleaders have no time for nuance. This is precisely why Borjas and his book should attract our concern and attention.
Borjas now believes that most of those who claim to study immigration—in academia, journalism, and politics—are mostly advocates for it. President Joe Biden, as a candidate, indicated he would urge immigrants to surge the border, and would offer welfare and health benefits for all comers. Of late, 12,000 immigrants from 180 nations are arriving daily, very few of whom care about assimilation. Unlike my friend- a Special Education Director in Wyoming- who advocates for open borders and unfettered access to all social services, Dr. Borjas has given serious thought to these issues.
Borjas studied whether immigrant labor pools cause a deterioration in labor quality over time, a subject he was advised not to evaluate. The studies most widely circulated in academia, journalism and government are marked, Borjas believes, by arbitrariness, questionable data and investigator bias.
In, “We Wanted Workers,” Borjas argues that much of the conventional wisdom with respect to immigration is false. Most of the statistics provid ed by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) are bald-faced lies. DHS asserts the border is secure, and then employs census surveys and slight of hand numbers which include legal immigrants to arrive at their preordained conclusions.
Borjas is not an historian. As an economist, his discussion of the subject tends toward the quantitative, and he avoids broader cultural questions. But recent developments in our cities and on our campus points to a role for social science to investigate these matters.
Borjas was first drawn to immigration economics by his curiosity about how immigration pools evolve; namely, are immigrant pools deteriorating and causing externalities that our nation cannot sustain.
Whether democracy can prevail in a land without democrats is a question answered by Weimar. The University of California warned faculty in a memo that to call America a melting pot is to commit a “micro-aggression” against minorities; this on a campus that has supported Hamas jihadis.
Incentives matter. Today's newcomers are learning English less quickly and working less than their predecessors. The growth of ethnic enclaves and multicultural ideology have exacerbated this trend. Economic assimilation has slowed down largely due to social policy, inflation and flat economic growth. Borjas’s skepticism about the standard immigration narrative is important because he is an honest researcher and a scientist.
Borjas’s conclusions may reflect more pessimism than those of his colleagues, but his data is not falsifiable by ad hominem attacks. His data has identified several inconvenient truths:
1.) The Census Bureau’s Survey of Income and Program Participation, finds that 46% of households headed by an immigrant resort to welfare.
2.) Competition from immigrants dramatically reduces the wages of workers. A fact that only a partisan would dispute.
3.) The effect of immigrants is a regressive redistribution of income and wealth among natives. As Borjas has found, immigration is not about wealth creation, nor is it about entrepreneurship or diversity. It fosters redistribution from the poor to the rich.
However, because Dr. Borjas is a serious man, he is mostly overlooked today. The 24 hour news cycle, social media, and partisan cheerleaders have no time for nuance. This is precisely why Borjas and his book should attract our concern and attention.
March 14, 2020
George Boras' book on the economics of immigration is one of the best works of social science I have ever read, maybe THE best. Borjas is an economist at Harvard, specializing in the subject of his book, and the "immigration narrative" he wants to unravel in the book's subtitle is the one that claims "immigration benefits everyone." If you are someone who favors high levels of immigration for moral reasons, you may find that alarming, but you shouldn't. Borjas is mostly talking about economic claims for immigration, and his book is a model of constructive academic criticism and of how to simplify a very complex subject for a lay audience.
Borjas, who himself is an immigrant from Castro's Cuba, makes a simple argument: immigration creates winners and losers, like any public policy. At a minimum, some groups of people benefit less than others, and in other cases actively are harmed by policies which benefit others.
Much of his work is taken up criticizing economists (most of whom are libertarian leaning) who ignore the costs of immigration. His main criticism is implied by the title of his book, which quotes the Swiss playwright Max Frisch, who commented on Turkish immigration into Europe saying that "we wanted workers but we got people instead." What Borjas means to criticize is the tendencies to treat immigrants as if they were merely laborers who did nothing but work and pay taxes, rather than human beings, who bring their histories, habits, customs and needs with them, with all the unintended costs they might entail to the society that receives them.
From this observation, Borjas moves through several key points in this "narrative," showing how it serves to cover up this basic dynamic (of winners/losers) with regards to why immigrants choose to immigrate, how successfully they assimilate into their host society, the impact they have on the labor markets they enter into, as well as their overall impact on the economy. In all these areas, he points out shortcomings with studies that have argued immigration is basically universally beneficial for everyone, in ways that illustrate not only some of the pitfalls of "the dismal science" of economics, but of social science in general. He demonstrates how the use of mathematical models can dictate answers that fit the narrative, and how data can be lifted out of context by activist groups to promote their immigration stances.
The book is a wealth of detail and knowledge, which is not easily summarized, but I learned a great deal which I did not know of before reading "We Wanted Workers." The most impressive aspect of the book is Borjas' humility: though he clearly is a master of his subject, he recognizes the debate over immigration is at root not about money about beliefs, and it is refreshing to hear an economist proclaim, as he does at the book's end, "the immigration debate is about much more than numbers." Borjas does not claim that reconciling our differing moral perspectives on this issue will make it go away or produce easy solutions; indeed, he puts for very few recommendations himself. But if clarifying what is possible to say for certain about immigration and making clear the stakes of the debate in moral terms can do anything toward those ends, then we should all be grateful for Dr. Borjas' contribution. My highest recommendation.
Borjas, who himself is an immigrant from Castro's Cuba, makes a simple argument: immigration creates winners and losers, like any public policy. At a minimum, some groups of people benefit less than others, and in other cases actively are harmed by policies which benefit others.
Much of his work is taken up criticizing economists (most of whom are libertarian leaning) who ignore the costs of immigration. His main criticism is implied by the title of his book, which quotes the Swiss playwright Max Frisch, who commented on Turkish immigration into Europe saying that "we wanted workers but we got people instead." What Borjas means to criticize is the tendencies to treat immigrants as if they were merely laborers who did nothing but work and pay taxes, rather than human beings, who bring their histories, habits, customs and needs with them, with all the unintended costs they might entail to the society that receives them.
From this observation, Borjas moves through several key points in this "narrative," showing how it serves to cover up this basic dynamic (of winners/losers) with regards to why immigrants choose to immigrate, how successfully they assimilate into their host society, the impact they have on the labor markets they enter into, as well as their overall impact on the economy. In all these areas, he points out shortcomings with studies that have argued immigration is basically universally beneficial for everyone, in ways that illustrate not only some of the pitfalls of "the dismal science" of economics, but of social science in general. He demonstrates how the use of mathematical models can dictate answers that fit the narrative, and how data can be lifted out of context by activist groups to promote their immigration stances.
The book is a wealth of detail and knowledge, which is not easily summarized, but I learned a great deal which I did not know of before reading "We Wanted Workers." The most impressive aspect of the book is Borjas' humility: though he clearly is a master of his subject, he recognizes the debate over immigration is at root not about money about beliefs, and it is refreshing to hear an economist proclaim, as he does at the book's end, "the immigration debate is about much more than numbers." Borjas does not claim that reconciling our differing moral perspectives on this issue will make it go away or produce easy solutions; indeed, he puts for very few recommendations himself. But if clarifying what is possible to say for certain about immigration and making clear the stakes of the debate in moral terms can do anything toward those ends, then we should all be grateful for Dr. Borjas' contribution. My highest recommendation.
September 24, 2017
Enjoyable social science ... relatively brief, very little jargon and to the point!
Borjas is himself an immigrant, is at Harvard, and has spent much of his career on the technical aspects of the immigration debate - all things that lend credibility to his voice when he concludes that immigration does NOT benefit everyone, as the common narrative holds.
One of the key arguments in the book, and the most interesting for me, is how Borjas recognizes that the United States lets in a lot of very low skill immigrant and a fair number of high skill immigrants. These two groups impact the domestic labor market in the way that one would expect -- increased supply of workers drives down demand for those workers and decreases wages, a la Econ 101. There ARE real gains from these additional workers -- but those gains are largely captured by corporations through increased profits derived from those lower wages.
So what immigration does is:
Provide huge economic benefits to the immigrants themselves (over 98% of the economic benefit)
Increase corporate profits
Harm those with no high school diploma
Harm those with postgrad degrees (largely through increased competition from foreign PhDs and tech workers)
Provide economic benefits to those in the "middle" (high school diploma or college); those benefits outweighs the harms to individuals by $50 billion or so per year (0.3% of GDP).
Borjas' last chapter is where he reveals his cards, but he is far from a immigration hardliner, and his sympathy to the plight of many immigrant is real. Ultimately, it was good to read a rational, non-emotional, economic analysis of an issue that is increasingly divisive.
Borjas is himself an immigrant, is at Harvard, and has spent much of his career on the technical aspects of the immigration debate - all things that lend credibility to his voice when he concludes that immigration does NOT benefit everyone, as the common narrative holds.
One of the key arguments in the book, and the most interesting for me, is how Borjas recognizes that the United States lets in a lot of very low skill immigrant and a fair number of high skill immigrants. These two groups impact the domestic labor market in the way that one would expect -- increased supply of workers drives down demand for those workers and decreases wages, a la Econ 101. There ARE real gains from these additional workers -- but those gains are largely captured by corporations through increased profits derived from those lower wages.
So what immigration does is:
Provide huge economic benefits to the immigrants themselves (over 98% of the economic benefit)
Increase corporate profits
Harm those with no high school diploma
Harm those with postgrad degrees (largely through increased competition from foreign PhDs and tech workers)
Provide economic benefits to those in the "middle" (high school diploma or college); those benefits outweighs the harms to individuals by $50 billion or so per year (0.3% of GDP).
Borjas' last chapter is where he reveals his cards, but he is far from a immigration hardliner, and his sympathy to the plight of many immigrant is real. Ultimately, it was good to read a rational, non-emotional, economic analysis of an issue that is increasingly divisive.
December 1, 2022
Alright, this book, the racism? The judgement? Odd for a writer who is an immigrant himself, but not so odd seeing that he is quite privileged.
Explanations are quite reasonable here and there, for example the culture enclaves. But his prejudices are way too present. Also way too much theorizing instead of proof.
Borjas also theorizes a lot without acknowledging important aspects. For example the fact that he states that immigrants cannot say they earn less due to discrimination, without acknowledging different groups vulnerable to this discrimination. He ONLY acknowledges Korean and Indian immigrants. Very disappointing.
Explanations are quite reasonable here and there, for example the culture enclaves. But his prejudices are way too present. Also way too much theorizing instead of proof.
Borjas also theorizes a lot without acknowledging important aspects. For example the fact that he states that immigrants cannot say they earn less due to discrimination, without acknowledging different groups vulnerable to this discrimination. He ONLY acknowledges Korean and Indian immigrants. Very disappointing.
December 26, 2018
Cogent. An important work by a serious economist that should be read by anyone interested in the thorny immigration policy debate.
But more importantly, Borjas warns about special interest groups shrouding their subjective views in ‘fact-based’ research. In his own words: ‘the claim that mathematical modeling and data analysis can somehow lead to a scientific determination of social policy is sheer nonsense. The notion that the science is settled is as far-fetched an assumption as one can make in a politically contentious research area’.
But more importantly, Borjas warns about special interest groups shrouding their subjective views in ‘fact-based’ research. In his own words: ‘the claim that mathematical modeling and data analysis can somehow lead to a scientific determination of social policy is sheer nonsense. The notion that the science is settled is as far-fetched an assumption as one can make in a politically contentious research area’.
August 25, 2019
Really nice book to help understand and frame the ongoing immigration debate. Bottom line: immigration policy is rooted in who we what to be as a country. It would be in everyone’s interests if we could ensure that the costs and benefits are more equally distributed, rather than an argument over how much immigration affects wages or how much the fiscal burden amounts to.
June 11, 2020
An excellent, realistic discussion of the immigration question. The author is himself an immigrant to America from Cuba, but his education by Marxists taught him to be wary of slavish devotion to ideology. Hence, he rejects the open-borders arguments of partisan Leftists and Libertarians in favour of realism.
June 14, 2023
Borjas explains in clear, accessible language, the many assumptions and methodological decisions that influence economic research. Most importantly, he highlights from the title that immigration policy cannot be based on economics alone, specially since the field of economics relies heavily on ideological assumptions.
January 2, 2019
All throughout, the slow addition of variables always feels like I'm being led asking to a predetermined conclusion. Much like a used car salesperson.
I think the final section could have stood alone.
I think the final section could have stood alone.
January 21, 2023
Very good book, surprisingly very non partisan, with fair and impartial writing. Very glad that he basically unveiled that statistics are incredibly manipulative, and that the solution simply depends on ideology. Kinda epic…
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 2, 2021
If you want to understand immigration in the United States from a point of view that is neither left or right, and is backed up with statistical evidence, then you need to read this book.
January 22, 2023
Far too empirical, solid statistics with problematic conclusions taken somewhat arbitrarily
October 26, 2024
Easy political read
February 6, 2017
Kind of a mess of a book. Very narrowly focused and too academic. The author makes the common academics' mistake of providing a history of the profession rather than an introduction to the topic.
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