Don Boudreaux (who is incidentally a professor at GMU) explains it best:
The strongest economic argument against immigration is the claim that immigrants free-ride on government-provided goods…
I understand that on pure utilitarian grounds it’s too simplistic to say “Oh, the solution is for government to stop supplying these things.” Given that government is supplying or heavily subsidizing X, Y, and Z, and given that immigrants can use X, Y, and Z, problems are indeed created.
The narrow cost-benefit solution might well be further restrictions on immigration — I say “might,” not “is” — even if, in my opinion, such restrictions are unethical because they violate the basic human rights of Americans and foreigners alike.
But even if we conclude that, on pure cost-benefit grounds, the best course of action is to restrict immigration further because immigrants overuse public-supplied and subsidized goods and services, why blame immigrants? Why point accusing fingers at immigrants? Why not blame government for supplying and subsidizing things that it ought not supply and subsidize?
The root problem is not immigration; it is government provision and subsidization of goods and services that should be supplied by the market.
And also here:
But immigrants who come to the United States are not just consumers; most are also producers. (Incidentally, even if they were exclusively consumers, if they – like Disney’s customers – paid for all that they consume, there would be no problem. Problems arise when immigrants – and citizens – free-ride on goods and services supplied by others.)
It’s here that I believe the analogy with Disneyland breaks down irreparably. Not only are immigrants not coming to America to crowd us Americans out of ‘our’ spaces and jobs, most come to produce. I support more open immigration because I am quite confident that
- the U.S. is not crowded
- the number of jobs and amount of capital per worker are emphatically not fixed in quantity
- while people, once here, free-ride on goods and services provided by government, the first step in solving this problem is to enable more foreigners to work in America legally; that way, immigrants’ contributions to the economy in general, and to the provision of public goods, will be even greater than it already is;
AND
- people, being the ultimate resource, help deepen and widen the division of labor — which is the chief source of human prosperity.
Substitute “Singapore” for “America” where necessary.
Cafe Hayek: Queuing Up for a Bad Analogy II
Cafe Hayek: Are Immigrants to Blame for Inappropriate Government Activities?
