Is Canada's Immigration System Ideal?

[Lexicus]

On the subject of brain drains: The immigrant will be better off, the new nation will be better off, and the brain that was drained frequently remits enough money to family members back home so that they aren't really worse off either.

I don't think it's quite this simple, unfortunately. The arguments of Friedrich List come to mind. If every nation just seeks comparative advantage it may look good on paper, but from the perspective of a nation trying to develop its own industries this can be a problem. I just don't think that having a bunch of doctors sending back money is as good for a developing country as having those doctors there to take care of people.

 

[Cutlass]

I don't think it's quite this simple, unfortunately. The arguments of Friedrich List come to mind. If every nation just seeks comparative advantage it may look good on paper, but from the perspective of a nation trying to develop its own industries this can be a problem. I just don't think that having a bunch of doctors sending back money is as good for a developing country as having those doctors there to take care of people.

If your best shot at making yourself and your family better off is to get skilled enough to get out of where you are to someplace better, and then someone says you can't go someplace better, why would you bother getting the skills in the first place?

 

[EgonSpengler]

No no, the US is full of long-term consequences. Really, the whole US is kinda a long-term consequence

Pretty much.

Basically, the US is IMO missing this whole fuzzy spirit of being a group of solidarity. Which works great for immigration, because people neither need to adapt to such a spirit, can not feel excluded by it and last but not least, solidarity costs money, a lot of money, and hence immigrants cost money, a lot of money, unless they are excellent immigrants. The USA does not have those problems with immigration. Because, I say, it is a nation build on immigration. But you know, it has all the problems that come with not having that ingredient of togetherness and solidarity. So let's see:

[NOTE that those problems are not unique as such to the USA; but unique in their extend and depravity when compared to other countries with similar (often even smaller) wealth]

Ghettoization
Gentrification in general living conditions, living place of course, education (a big one), you name it.
Poverty and all kind of fracked up misery
Bad labor protection
Terrible social security
A culture heavily building on superficiality
A culture heavily building on an egocentric ideology.

Of course these problems exist in the US, but if they were the result of immigration, wouldn't they be spread evenly across groups? Our African-American population, for instance, are mostly not the descendants of immigrants (I don't care what Ben Carson says ). Any lack of solidarity wrt them has little to do with our immigration policies.

In a nut-shell: All the bad developments we can see through-out the Western world, the US has on steroids. (except unemployment and economic contraction, there the US is doing pretty alright, I guess)

I don't see the causative connection between those things and our long-term immigration policies. I do think they may be correlated, though. For example, our European populations of the 19th and early-20th Centuries were often employed in factories before there were labor unions or labor laws. I think the primary cause of ghettoization and poverty and bad labor protections was the factory owners, not the immigrant workers. The Triangle Shirtwaist fire leaps immediately to mind as one famous example. I know I'm not as well-versed in US labor history as I should be, but I think many of the labor protections we do have today are due to immigrants, not in spite of them.

As for immigration and solidarity, I'm not sure if anyone has really studied that. Anecdotally, it seems like immigrant groups have an up-and-down history with each other, as well as with 'natives.' I know of various stories, that are just part of local lore, of both friction and harmony between groups of immigrants. If it leans toward one, I'd guess it's probably the latter.

Now I readily agree that this is not all the result of immigration, for sure no short-term effects. The sheer size of the USA has some influence, also the sheer size of financial interests involved, I think, than there is plain historic circumstancialism and so on and on.
But, I think, it also kinda is. I think each of those things are natural outgrowths of a society geared towards immigration. American textbooks will call this The Great American Spirit or whatever. I call it a ****** Western nation.

I dunno, man. Nobody is convincing me to close our borders. Quite the opposite. The more I hear people trying to pin problems on immigrants and immigration, the more pro-immigrant I become.

 

[warpus]

The only way to fight brain drain is a long term approach in which you improve the quality of life of your citizens, improve employee protections, the social safety net, standards of living, infrastructure, etc.

 

[Lexicus]

If your best shot at making yourself and your family better off is to get skilled enough to get out of where you are to someplace better, and then someone says you can't go someplace better, why would you bother getting the skills in the first place?

Yeah, I mean, we covered this a bit upthread. USSR-style emigration restrictions are not something I'm generally in favor of. I don't know how to resolve the problem. But I do think it's a problem and it can't just be handwaved away by saying that comparative advantage will just make everything okay. Money remittances just aren't the same as developing one's own infrastructure. To use a simple analogy, purchasing all your manufactured goods or advanced services from a more advanced country may be cheaper in the short term but remaining unable to produce any manufactured goods or advanced services is not a good long-term proposition for any country.

I think the obvious question is how do you induce people to choose to stay in developing countries to help them develop. It's not something easy to address, since obviously the short answer is "develop" but you're trying to induce people to stay in the first place so you can make development easier.

It's a question that, frankly, developed nations ought to throw some money at considering their role in creating this whole messed-up world system. Perhaps some subsidizing of highly-skilled people who choose to stay in their home countries? But I can see something like that quickly becoming "bribe the brown people to stay away from us" which, naturally, I don't like the idea of.

 

[Ryika]

To be honest, I don't even see the "stealing" of highly skilled people as a problem. Do countries that are lagging behind need highly skilled workers? If so, why are they leaving?

I'm sure there are exceptions, but generally, the problem seems to be a lack of infrastructure, not highly skilled individuals. Of course the argument is that these highly skilled people will create the infrastructure, but just providing them with that infrastructure as an exchange for the immigrants you take would probably be a much more reasonable alternative, at least to the point where highly skilled individuals don't automatically try to move out of their country anymore, because the infrastructure is then in place.

The problem with that of course is that it would require some bargaining power on the side of the country that is lagging behind, which it just doesn't have. But that's also the problem with any "fair" immigration policy, it requires some amount of generosity on the side of the "superior" country. But in any case, Infrastructure and knowledge how to create it are the things that you can give to equalize the people that you take away, without having to restrict anybody's freedom to move away (unless you don't want to accept the amount of people that wants to come).

 

[Valka D'Ur]

You're always welcome to go through the process and become a Canadian, Tim. Although you might not enjoy the winters.

About degrees, yeah, my parents both have physics degrees from Poland. Neither were recognized by anyone when we came here. It was so much work to get them acknowledged that my parents just didn't do it. My dad started the process, but he would have essentially had to repeat his education. Considering that university in communist Poland was a lot more intense than what we have here, he was done with school. I think he went through one term and them moved on to other things. The institutional and cultural differences didn't help him get settled either

I am all for being strict which degrees from other countries are accepted and which aren't, but my parents' degrees definitely should've been accepted. It's so depressing to think that there are doctors getting their degrees somewhere in the caribbean, cheating their way through the system, and then moving back and making the big bucks.. all while my parents' education was pretty much ignored, for whatever reason, even though the level of schooling was higher in Poland at the time. Yes, different standards, but what happened still doesn't sit well with us. It's one aspect of our immigration experience that we thought was completely backwards.

That sounds bizarre. Physics is something that's either right or wrong, unless you're doing the theoretical stuff. Numbers and scientific principles, theories, and laws are the same, no matter which language is being used.

Let's open it up more! Immigration is a net win for everyone. And yes, that includes the brain drain. Do that too.

On the subject of chain migration: It makes it more attractive to high skill immigrants if they can reunite their family in the new nation.

That's assuming the high-skill immigrants can find a job in the field in which they're trained. There are people who were university professors in their home country who drive taxis here because their degrees are not recognized. Synsensa's mother had that problem - she was trained for a job that is definitely lacking good people right now, but her academic credentials weren't recognized.

On the subject of refugees: Refugees are a net cost to the host nation for the first decade or so. But it averages out to being a net benefit to the host nation after ~20 years. So it's a long term investment, but it pays off.

Unless the refugee decides to be a Canadian of Convenience and as soon as he gets that citizenship that entitles him to a whole host of benefits, he takes off for his original country and when he gets into trouble, yells for the Canadian government to come save him.

Granted, many of them sincerely do want to become productive citizens and stay here. But there are others who are here to grab what they can, and then go somewhere else - knowing that they can fall back on a host of services Canada is obligated to provide for citizens, no matter what situation they've gotten into.

That's why Omar Khadr was given $$$$$$$$, btw. He's a citizen, the government failed to uphold his Charter rights, so he sued. The settlement was $10.5 million. The widow of the American soldier he killed is not happy about this.

 

[Crime Doesn't Pay]

Canada's immigration system is complex. It can neither classified as "liberal" or "conservative." Indeed, it has elements of both.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

It might be ideal, if it weren't Canada.

 

[Commodore]

And only accepting highly qualified immigrants just drains the country of origin of the brightest and best people that it needs the most

Is that really our responsibility though? I mean, it's in our national interest to attract and keep all the talent we can, whether that talent be homegrown or coming from another country. If the best and brightest in Country A all want o leave for Country B because of better opportunities, is it really Country B's obligation to stop letting them in? I think not. I think the responsibility falls on Country A to incentivize their best and brightest to stay rather than seek a better life elsewhere.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Is that really our responsibility though? I mean, it's in our national interest to attract and keep all the talent we can, whether that talent be homegrown or coming from another country. If the best and brightest in Country A all want o leave for Country B because of better opportunities, is it really Country B's obligation to stop letting them in? I think not. I think the responsibility falls on Country A to incentivize their best and brightest to stay rather than seek a better life elsewhere.

Or they could just nuke country B.

While your logic works perfectly in a "one nation is all that matters on this planet" scenario, it could easily be recognized as anti-social behavior on a national scale and bad for humanity as a whole. So, is it really something to be encouraged?

 

[Commodore]

While your logic works perfectly in a "one nation is all that matters on this planet" scenario, it could easily be recognized as anti-social behavior on a national scale and bad for humanity as a whole. So, is it really something to be encouraged?

I actually think such behavior helps humanity as a whole. How? Consider this:

Let's say the next Einstein is born in, say, Iraq. Would that next Einstein really be able to reach their full potential if they stayed in Iraq, given the current situation that nation is in? Wouldn't it be better to bring that potentially great mind to a nation that actually has the resources to ensure that mind reaches its full potential and maximize the chances of that mind making the next great leap forward for humanity?

 

[Timsup2nothin]

I actually think such behavior helps humanity as a whole. How? Consider this:

Let's say the next Einstein is born in, say, Iraq. Would that next Einstein really be able to reach their full potential if they stayed in Iraq, given the current situation that nation is in? Wouldn't it be better to bring that potentially great mind to a nation that actually has the resources to ensure that mind reaches its full potential and maximize the chances of that mind making the next great leap forward for humanity?

Because one nation making a great leap forward to more advanced weapons systems than any other always works out so well?

Again, if the "object" is to produce some "pinnacle society" that leaves the rest of humanity behind but advances some sliver at the maximum possible rate, then yeah, you're absolutely on the right track. But is that really the object?

 

[Commodore]

Because one nation making a great leap forward to more advanced weapons systems than any other always works out so well?

Who said anything about weapon systems? A lot of the technological and medical advances that have been made in the West and subsequently spread to the rest of the world have been made by immigrants plucked from developing nations. Can we really say with certainty the immigrants who made those advances would have still done so if they or their ancestors had stayed in their homeland?

Hell, the original Google search engine that started the company that eventually completely changed the way we get information and communicate with each other was created by an immigrant to the US.

 

[Lexicus]

Who said anything about weapon systems? A lot of the technological and medical advances that have been made in the West and subsequently spread to the rest of the world have been made by immigrants plucked from developing nations. Can we really say with certainty the immigrants who made those advances would have still done so if they or their ancestors had stayed in their homeland?

Hell, the original Google search engine that started the company that eventually completely changed the way we get information and communicate with each other was created by an immigrant to the US.

This is interesting Commodore, I didn't know you were this kind of leftist. I certainly agree that current social arrangements, including the division of the world between imperialist centers and colonial periphery, as well as inequality and poverty within states, is preventing the majority of the population from reaching their potential.

 

[Commodore]

This is interesting Commodore, I didn't know you were this kind of leftist. I certainly agree that current social arrangements, including the division of the world between imperialist centers and colonial periphery, as well as inequality and poverty within states, is preventing the majority of the population from reaching their potential.

I've never really been an anti-immigration kind of guy, and I have advocated for the idea of a unified Earth government before.

 

[Lexicus]

I've never really been an anti-immigration kind of guy, and I have advocated for the idea of a unified Earth government before.

Another thing I wonder about is how many female Einsteins have been prevented from doing their thing by sexism, how many brown Einsteins have been prevented from doing their thing by racism, etc, etc.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Who said anything about weapon systems? A lot of the technological and medical advances that have been made in the West and subsequently spread to the rest of the world have been made by immigrants plucked from developing nations. Can we really say with certainty the immigrants who made those advances would have still done so if they or their ancestors had stayed in their homeland?

Hell, the original Google search engine that started the company that eventually completely changed the way we get information and communicate with each other was created by an immigrant to the US.

You say "spread to the rest of the world" as if the process of this spreading isn't exactly what I was talking about when I said 'produce a pinnacle society that leaves the rest of the world behind at the fastest possible rate.'

We'll take your best minds and use them to produce advanced products, which we will then trade to your oppressive leaders for the resources they enslave you to gather. That's not exactly a plan for the betterment of all humanity.

 

[Lexicus]

I suppose it depends whether you think the best minds are gonna be the best minds independent of context. Nurture vs nature. I come down pretty hard on the "false dichotomy" side of that question.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

As a "best mind*" that was born and raised in a "best environment**" and was totally wasted as far as helping humanity generally, I am perhaps not able to fairly judge the idea of moving even more of the best minds into such environments than are already there. I was raised on "pile up money," transitioned into "use your abilities for the furtherance of the ability to slaughter millions in one pop," then cycled back to that pile up money thing. My sister managed to combine the "pile money" and "further the ability to slaughter" objectives and spent her entire life on it. Overall, if we had been born in some other environment we might have done better, but could hardly have done less.


*By an assortment of traditional measures
**According to the 'most advanced nation wins' theory