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Sell the right to immigrate to the highest bidder?
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Steve Chiotakis: Anybody who's followed the debate over Arizona's new immigration law knows how difficult it can be. Now, an American Nobel Laureate, Gary Becker, is proposing a radical solution: Why not auction off the right to a green card? The BBC's Steve Evans reports.
Steve Evans: The idea is to sell the right to immigrate to the highest bidders. Then, argues Gary Becker, those with the ability to make money and contribute to the economy will be encouraged to offer the most.
Gary Becker: The argument is often that immigrants are getting a free ride, they're using the welfare system and health care system. But now they would be paying, and maybe a significant amount.
The U.S. currently has about a million legal immigrants a year. But Becker says if they were paying, it may want to take more. He argues that an auction would also gain money for the American taxpayer.
Becker: A skilled engineer, graduates from the IIT in India, he could make probably $30,000, $40,000, $50,000 more per year by immigrating to the United States, and similar, maybe somewhat smaller, by going to the U.K. So he has enormous incentive to come, he could repay his loan probably two years.
And if they're poor, Becker suggests they'd be able to borrow on the strength of future earnings.
In London, I'm the BBC's Steve Evans for Marketplace.
Mr. Becker must be a foreigner. Americans know the inscription "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore...“ appears on the Statue of Liberty's pedestal, implying this sentiment is the foundation of liberty. Becker's suggested $50K immigration fee is well out of the reach of the world's poor. And if oppressors in the country of origin extort the emigrant's last penny, as often happens? What then, Mr. Becker?
Let the free market prevail. The best and brightest around the world who value and cherish the freedoms and opportunities that the US Democratic system of government offers will choose of their own free will and vote with their dollars. This is an excellent example of a free market capitalist system at work, with proper oversight by a government body that must prevent illegal immigrants from disrupting the system. Please also realize that other nations are welcome to sell citizenship at a competitive rate to entice preferred candidates to their country as well. As an example, examine the existing student visa program for higher education. Tuition dollars from foreign countries are a very important part of local US economies and often attract the excellent students to further research in the fields of science, medicine, and business. If the current US education system continues to fall in global ranking, it will be imperative to recruit the best minds to our society in order to compete in the global economy.
What a great argument!
Perhaps it will cause us to rethink the value proposition of immigrants. Do we value immigrans based on the money in their pockets?
I hope we will reflect on own family fate had we been required to bid for citizenship. Consider the great contributors to american society who would have been turned away.
See EllisIsland.org and see how much your ancestor was carrying in his/her pocket. Mine had $2. His son helped create the vaccine. Pretty good ROI!
G-d bless America
I do not think Mr. Becker himself thinks that immigrants are getting a free ride, or that they are using or abusing the welfare system or health care systems. I think that what he was trying to point out is that many other people in our society do think that way. The fact that this belief is not based in fact, but is a faulty perception is not the point of the article, but it is being used to add support for his position. Mr. Becker simply feels that by charging immigrants for a green card we would be taking the wind out of the sails of the ignorant. Unfortunately, a rational argument rarely sways those who react emotionally and stupidly. Having said that, selling green cards sounds a little like the argument for selling organs for transplant or human blood. What would be the ethical difference between selling green cards and selling organs for transplants to the highest bidder?
I find Mr. Becker's comment that "The argument is often that immigrants are getting a free ride, they're using the welfare system and health care system." to be flat out wrong and to be coming from a Nobel Laureate, offensive. Legal immigrants in this country, of which iam a proud member, are not free-loaders and don't take the system for a ride. On the contrary, as long as we reside and work in this country, we pay all the applicable taxes, from income to social security to medicare. Also, most of the legal immigrants who don't want to go through the frustrating wait for many years (I've been here 10 years and still am not even close to even getting my Green Card, let alone citizenship) to get U.S citizenship and instead return back to their home countries, actually don't get a penny of any retirement benefits when they retire, be it social security or medicare assistance. So, we actually pay into the system and subsidize people who settle down here, legally and illegaly. It would help for Mr. Beck to check thh facts before rambling.
