The Case for Open Borders

by John Washington

Michael Clemens, who, like Borjas, has dedicated much of his career to the economics of migration, re-reevaluated Card’s initial study and concluded: “The evidence from the Mariel Boatlift remains as found in David Card’s seminal research: there is no evidence that wages fell, or unemployment rose, among the least-skilled workers in Miami even after a sudden refugee wave raised the size of that workforce by 20 percent.” The dispute lingers, but even if Borjas is right, and, after adjusting for the different statistical models, Black male high school dropouts were negatively impacted by the enormous labor shock, the precarious position they hold in the first place is due not to immigration trends but domestic discrimination. They should—and could—be treated better, and be more fairly compensated, by both employers and the government.

Of course. What do you expect from an economist? Economics ignores the phone calls to politicians by their constituents. Modern Economics ONLY looks to aggregate numbers. Lived reality, you must remember, does not appear on graphs.