Michael Courtman of NZ Conservative writes:
Immigrants can't find jobs, so increase immigration
The Press reports that a visiting international economist Philippe Legrain has told New Zealand that it shouldn't cut immigration during the recession
At a Department of Internal Affairs-sponsored meeting in Christchurch, Mr Legrain spouted the usual Economist-style arguments about immigrants boosting creativity and being essential to economic growth, without providing any evidence of how such growth is supposed to boost the living standards of existing citizens.
Instead of trying to protect their jobs by calling for a slowdown in immigration, he said local workers should take it on the chin and direct the blame on "the bankers in the United States," (I wonder if that includes those who lent too much money to recent minority immigrants).
He also said that New Zealand needed more Asian immigration so it could take advantage of the expanding markets in East Asia, while overlooking the fact that the country already has thousands (if not hundreds of thousands) of well-educated Chinese, Japanese and Korean speakers, should our export companies require their services.
To illustrate his total disregard for the concerns of local workers, he even admitted that thousands of recent skilled immigrants are struggling to find work as it is:
"During the two weeks he has been in New Zealand, Legrain said he had heard a lot of stories that highly-skilled migrants were unable to get jobs in New Zealand either because their qualifications were not recognised here or companies wanted people with New Zealand experience."
If recent immigrants are already being passed over by local employers, then maintaining high immigration levels during a recession will only make it even more difficult for them to find jobs.
What I think Mr Mr Legrain is really saying here is that because many immigrants are failing to find suitable employment, the country needs to bring in more immigrants to compensate for these lost "units of production," so as to maintain a high rate of economic growth that enriches our elites and avoid any empty berths in Auckland's yacht marinas.
Of course immigration-based economic growth doesn't increase per capita income unless it also lead to an increase productivity levels, and there's little evidence that productivity levels have increased much since National's neo-expansionist immigration drive began in 1990. This can be seen most starkly in the relationship between house prices and wages - since 1990 median house prices have almost tripled, while the average wage has only increased by about 40 percent.
Unfortunately while most people probably aren't particularly impressed by Mr Legrain, John Key apparently is. Recently he announced that National won't be aiming to cut immigration during the recession, and will be sticking with its expansionist target of 45,000 immigrants per year.
That may not sound a lot to overseas readers, but for a small country of 4.2 million, it represents a higher figure than most other developed countries, particularly for one which has little labour intensive industry and derives most of its income from primary production and tourism.
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