The Economic Impact of Immigration Reform

The Congressional Budget Office released a new report detailing the economic effects of the proposed immigration reform. Their findings:

"In sum, relative to current law, enacting S. 744 would:

• Increase the size of the labor force and employment,

• Increase average wages in 2025 and later years (but decrease them before that),

• Slightly raise the unemployment rate through 2020,

• Boost the amount of capital investment,

• Raise the productivity of labor and of capital, and

• Result in higher interest rates."

We often hear how liberalizing immigration will harm American workers and the American economy. But this isn't true, while some workers will see lower wages as a result of this action...some will see higher wages too. Furthermore, increased immigration will boost the rate of economic growth eventually increasing average wages across the country.

Given that we are a nation of immigrants, given that more liberal immigration policies will boost economic growth, and given that we should welcome those individuals--regardless of nationality--who want to come here to work, I am a strong supporter of S. 744. It's not perfect legislation by any means, and I wished it would go even further to open opportunities to many more potential Americans, but it is progress. For that, I hope the U.S. Congress makes this bill a law.

Six years ago, in one of my blog posts I called for something similar:

The reason we have so much illegal immigration, is that we have made it unnecessarily tough to become a legal immigrant. Therefore, a helpful immigration reform bill will make it easier for economic immigrants to enter this nation legally. We should once again open our doors to those impoverished people who want to work hard...doors that have been closed for too long.

This is still true today.