Immigration

Real Life Economics

This episode of Real Life Economics focuses on immigration and the impacts it has on the U.S. as well as experiences from other countries. To properly understand its impacts, we explain the mechanics of labor market theory as well the mechanics of long term trend growth. With that primer, we discuss Professor George Borjas work on immigration economics which strongly suggests that there is a heavy redistribution effect when immigrants first join the workforce which drives prices down and increases profits for corporations. However, in an interview with Michael Clemens economist at the Center for Global Development highlights that a blue-ribbon panel of economics on this subject do not uniformly subscribe to that view. In fact, Clemens points out that it is not a zero-sum game. In fact, immigration has significant positive benefits that are often ignored in the basic research. Listen in to hear the full discussion.