There's a big immigration debate in Washington. But forget all that. The answer to our immigration issue is open borders. Tear down the fences... Rip up the red tape. Yep, I'm embracing the open borders movement. We already have open borders for large corporations.
Want to build cars in China?
No problem. Want to make widgets in India?
Go for it.
If it's good for the global corporate rich guys, why isn't it good for people, especially the working class who want to vote with their feet and move out of corrupt or mismanaged or impoverished nations to go to countries that work for them.
I can hear your arguments now. This would hurt us economically.
Wrong. The open borders movement and some economists say this idea would double the world's GDP.
As for our country, immigration helps us. Taxes collected. Goods and services bought. Revenue added. And immigrants tend to be entrepreneurial, starting businesses nearly twice as often as native born citizens. Over the past decade, immigrant-founded ventures have created more than 450,000 jobs.
You may have heard of some of these companies: Google, yahoo!, Intel and eBay. High-skilled immigrants are crucial to America succeeding in the knowledge-based economy.
And what about wages? Well, folks, economists note that immigrants have a positive impact on the wages of Americans who have finished high school. They don't compete with U.S. workers. They complement them, helping them do their jobs better.
And then there is the terrorist card. Open borders and all those bad guys would flood in! I remind you that the 9/11 hijackers and the two brothers in Boston entered our shores legally.
But open borders attacks the root cause of Muslim extremism--young, impoverished men in Muslim countries. Men with no future are more easily radicalized. Muslim poverty is what threatens our security, not our immigration system.
Giving these men the chance to work here could diminish their poverty, their anger, and their misunderstanding of the U.S. before they are radicalized.
Just like corporations without borders have given the fat cats a better bottom line, people deserve the chance to be a full part of the global marketplace.
Open borders will improve the world.
I like what the gang of eight is doing but only by empowering the workers of the world just as the one percenters are empowered to go anywhere in search of a buck, only by thinking globally can we solve global problems.