Immigration: A Long View
December 7, 2007 – 11:01 pmAnd now for something completely different. From time to time, we at optionARMageddon like to talk about subjects besides real estate. Below a piece about immigration. Your editor will share his own views on the matter in a comment to be posted in a few days.
Enjoy!
Immigration: A Long View
By John Winkler
In the Republican debate at the end of November the candidates wasted no time pummeling each other on the issue of illegal immigration. And they repeatedly descended into silliness with their accusations of “sanctuary city” versus “sanctuary mansion.” For a while you got the idea that there aren’t any other important issues.
We can safely assume the Republicans are doing this because polls show this is THE issue for likely GOP primary voters. And it is an emotional issue– raising questions of illegality, crime, use of scarce resources.
But I have never heard anyone discuss the longer term implications of a situation that has come close to destroying other countries, which in a few years could become an unslayable dragon. Call it the Canadian/Belgian paradigm.
It was not so long ago that Canada was nearly riven in two by the social and linguistic divisions among its two primary population groups– francophones and anglophones. The Parti Qebecois became a real force in national politics and came close to winning a vote in favor of national schism. More recently the French speakers have come to their senses, realizing they get much more from the Canadian federation than they lose. But if they had won that vote we might now have two countries just to the north of us.
The Belgians are not doing as well. Flemish speakers in Flanders comprise 60% of the country’s population, with French speaking Walloons the rest. The government has been in crisis for months, as repeated attempts to create a coalition government have failed.
There are obvious similarities between the two countries. In Canada the linguistic split is a proxy for something much deeper. French speaking Quebec is generally poorer, less developed, and its people by and large have lower prospects than their English speaking counterparts. And that has engendered significant anger and jealousy.
In Belgium the government is paralyzed. It is still being run by parties who were thrown out in June, because their designated successors have been unable to form a coalition. As in Canada, the French speakers have fewer economic prospects. Unemployment among them is double, and twice as many Walloons as Flemings have government jobs.
In both countries the basic issue is the same– a nation riven by lingustic differences which are symbolic of economic divisions in which one group feels disenfranchised by another and in which the two linguistic groups tend to congregate in restricted, well-defined areas
It doesn’t take a trained futurist to see the possible similarities in this country. Spanish speakers, illegal or not, are by far the fastest growing population group in the US. And they are beginning to have a huge influence on business, culture and politics. Even though many do learn English, there is a strong tendency to stay within their culture rather than assimilate.
Spanish speakers are distributed around the nation– not confined in a single geographical area. But there is a huge and growing concentration in parts of the west and southwest. Go into any store in Nogales and you will not have an easy time finding a clerk who is fluent in English. I’m not talking about Nogales, Mexico but Nogales, Arizona. The stores on the strip malls all have American names, but most of the people in them, both customers and workers, speak Spanish.
It is a reasonable assumption that in 10, 20,30 years the culture and politics of the area will be controlled by Spanish speakers. Nothing wrong with that. But there is always the danger of the great What If. What if the Spanish speakers do not fully participate in the American economy in equal measure to other groups? What if they become a permanent underclass? What if, in their anger and frustration, those people decide they are more Spanish than American, that their real national home is not the US but Mexico? And what if they decide to have a plebiscite on secession, or on transferring the southwestern states back to Mexico where they came from not that long ago? And what if they decide in the affirmative?
Mr. Winkler is a writer at ABC 7 News in Chicago. Prior to that he was a producer on World News Tonight with Peter Jennings. He’s been with ABC 36 years.
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One Response to “Immigration: A Long View”
Yes, assimilating immigrants is important. America is at its best when new immigrants are thrown in the melting pot.
So I’m sympathetic with concerns that say Spanish language instruction in schools, for instance, discourage Mexican immigrants from becoming fully American. Yet at the same time, legislating English only laws strike me as ridiculously provincial. Sometimes I wish all Americans were at least bilingual, the way some Europeans are tri and quad(?)-lingual.
Also, I disagree substantially with folks who say we need to slow down or even stop the flow of immigrants into the U.S. Besides the obvious, that America is the land of opportunity and should welcome with open arms anyone who comes to work hard, there’s also the China argument.
Economic growth is a function of two things: population growth and technology growth. Economies get bigger when there are more people to demand more stuff and when producers are able to supply more goods/services without using more resources in their production.
In the long-run, if we want to stay competitive with China, with its domestic market over 1 billion people, we’re going to have to keep bringing in more immigrants. More people in America means more demand for American goods.
And immigrants also help the supply side of the growth equation. They sell their labor cheap, which keeps prices down for all of us. A great way to ignite inflation would be to deport all 12m illegal immigrants (as so many in Republicans’ xenophobic camp want to do) and have Americans fill those jobs. Eating out will stop being economical if bus boys are demanding the same wages as waitresses.
And I have to come back to the “land of opportunity” argument. Shouldn’t we, as Americans–whose parents and grandparents came here to work hard and make a better life for themselves and their children–be sympathetic to the desires of Mexican immigrants who are doing the same thing?
Obviously continued growth in population presents its own problems. As population grows, it’s harder to govern, especially at the federal level, which is so far removed from everyday life. The solution to inefficient government, I think, is to return more power (and more tax dollars) to the states and to municipalities. I’m not saying we need less government so much as I’m saying we need less FEDERAL government.
By RW on Dec 21, 2007