How immigration is making Canada - and Europe - poorer

[I am Groot]

One of the problems with discussing immigration in Canada is the dearth of statistical information the government makes available. This government, in particular, which promised to be the most transparent, the most open, open by default government in history is actually the most tightly closed in history. It either won't give out information or makes it very hard to find, requiring multiple access to information requests from researchers. Canadians have come to know, broadly, that immigration is making us all poorer, increasing housing costs, and making it hard to find a doctor. But there's little in the way of government stats to back up this clear realization.

Things are a bit better in the UK, though, which is facing the EXACT same situation we are, with huge numbers of largely low-skilled people coming in from North Africa and the Middle East, increasing housing costs and making it very hard to get doctors or other services. They, however, sometimes have access to better statistics, and other European countries are less shy about divulging the problems immigration has caused.

And in short, immigration as presently constituted in Canada and Europe is 'hollowing out' our welfare states and making us poorer. Almost every immigrant who comes in through any means other than direct skills costs us money. How much? We don't know in Canada because the government won't tell us. We only know that asylum claimants cost us $82k per year per claim because a tory MP managed to dig into various books and pull the numbers free. We do know from government stats that regular immigrants, especially family class do more poorly than Canadians, but there's no dollar cost to the state attached.

But Matt Goodwin has been doing some research in the UK and has come out with a lot of information valuable to Canadians.

But what was also interesting about this report is that, unlike what usually happens, it did not point to mass immigration as the answer to these problems. Why? Because even the technocrats at the OBR have finally realised that the current model of mass immigration that we are pursuing in the UK is weakening, not strengthening, the economy. In short, the very kind of immigration that our hapless political elites on both the Left and the Right have been encouraging since Brexit—low skill, low wage, non-selective immigration from outside Europe— is the most economically damaging.

https://www.mattgoodwin.org/p/the-economic-case-for-mass-immigration?utm_source=publication-search

[NAME REMOVED]

Trudeau admitted far too many migrants to Canada over the last 3 years. I've lost track of the exact number, but it is over 3 million. That rate of population growth I unsustainable. We do not have the infrastructure, health care, educational facilities, and most important, housing.

The new migrants will also unintentionally drive down wages, as many companies, especially larger ones, will prefer to hire migrants, as they are not familiar with our labour laws, and less likely to complain about working conditions, and will not complain about pay. I am not sure what Trudeau was thinking, but our quality of life has taken a hit after 3 years of this.

[Michael Hardner]

1 hour ago, DUI_Offender said:

 

The new migrants will also unintentionally drive down wages, as many companies, especially larger ones, will prefer to hire migrants, as they are not familiar with our labour laws, and less likely to complain about working conditions, and will not complain about pay.

It's a logical fallacy that such things reduce the wealth of a nation.  Lower wages mean lower costs, therefore lower prices and higher profits.  That's how a market works.

[I am Groot]

2 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

It's a logical fallacy that such things reduce the wealth of a nation.  Lower wages mean lower costs, therefore lower prices and higher profits.  That's how a market works.

This, of course, is based on early beliefs that don't really apply to a welfare state. And I'm not sure they apply that well even without them. Lowering the overall education and skill level of the workforce cannot lead to more wealth in the country. That makes no logical sense. Yes, businesses get cheaper workers but those workers are less productive and can't afford to buy the goods of that business (or others), and often have to be subsidized by the state through various tax and benefit programs.

We are paying tens of billions each year to support poor people with few or no saleable skills. The cost of taking care of the quarter million 'asylum claimants alone is over $20 billion per year. Then we have millions of former applicants as well as family-class immigrants who are now on welfare or working in minimum wage jobs or the likes of Doordash or Uber, or in prison. All of them consuming scarce and expensive healthcare resources.

Edited December 23, 2024 by I am Groot

[Michael Hardner]

2 hours ago, I am Groot said:

This, of course, is based on early beliefs that don't really apply to a welfare state. And I'm not sure they apply that well even without them. Lowering the overall education and skill level of the workforce cannot lead to more wealth in the country. That makes no logical sense. Yes, businesses get cheaper workers but those workers are less productive and can't afford to buy the goods of that business (or others), and often have to be subsidized by the state through various tax and benefit programs.

We are paying tens of billions each year to support poor people with few or no saleable skills. The cost of taking care of the quarter million 'asylum claimants alone is over $20 billion per year. Then we have millions of former applicants as well as family-class immigrants who are now on welfare or working in minimum wage jobs or the likes of Doordash or Uber, or in prison. All of them consuming scarce and expensive healthcare resources.

Where do you get the bit about education being lowered?  What are you talking about?

Look, there are plenty of negative effects of immigration, and I myself have turned against the idea at the levels we've seen. This is thanks to posters like you, and the fact that I actually have an open mind. 

However, your arguments have to be real. They are bringing a ton of foreign students, Indian kids and so on and they are well educated and getting more education here. That's not the problem.  My father in law is retired and the TFWs working the cash have chemistry and science degrees.

The Indian workers make the same minimum wage as Canadian workers, but not the contractors you're right. I don't know about these programs to subsidize them. 

And the classic is mixing refugee with immigration. They are handled differently. 

Sometimes it sounds like people are making a case against inequity, but I find it hard to believe you'd be in favor of raising the minimum wage or increasing employer taxes.

So yes, go ahead and make your case. It's pretty easy to do so. But don't muddy the waters. Most of us on here are smarter than that.

[CITIZEN_2015]

Large immigration also gives the false impression of growth in economy. Trudeau increased immigration to insane values past 4 years just to do that, If it wasn't for millions of immigrants past few years Canada would have been in deep recessions since 2021 but because of millions of immigrants all of which becoming consumers Canada's economy avoided negative growth over past few years while the standard of living of most Canadians declined. Then Trudeau presents himself on news conference and admitted he or his government made a mistake in admitting so many immigrants. Yes you made a mistake, then this alone is reason enough to get lost but he stubbornly stays on in spite of massive calls from within his own party to get lost.

[herbie]

That.s not a false measure at all. "The Economy" is not a simple matter of GDP per capita, it's a VERB, Money moving by any means of redistribution.

In no way short of absolute invasion does immigration make a country 'poorer'.
If your goal is to increase the population when the existing one doesn't want to reproduce, then there isn't much choice.

Edited December 24, 2024 by herbie

[CdnFox]

9 hours ago, DUI_Offender said:

 

The new migrants will also unintentionally drive down wages, as many companies, especially larger ones, will prefer to hire migrants, as they are not familiar with our labour laws, and less likely to complain about working conditions, and will not complain about pay. I am not sure what Trudeau was thinking, but our quality of life has taken a hit after 3 years of this.

Actually they have a lot of trouble finding work other than the very menial because most companies would prefer canadians. They would actually prefer to pay more to get canadians. There's some articles out there right now touching on this. 

Where they "bring down" the wages is that when they CAN get a job they get paid less because of that very reason.  Let's say I'm willing to pay $10 for a Canadian and $5 for an immigrant for a given job. I want the Canadian, but after hiring all the qualified Canadians I can I hire some immigrants who are desperate for the work. The Canadians get paid the same and their average doesn't change and I'm still willing to pay that for Canadians. But now the average wage falls to $7 because I've mixed in some people I don't really want usually in junior positions because I don't trust them to be skilled yet.

So it looks like wages have been lowered but in reality just the average has been lowered.

But as a result what they do bring down is the gDP per capita ratio which is what determines how much tax money our government can collect. These immigrants consume as much or more resources for education, health, etc but because they are unable to earn more they pay far less taxes and that means the government can afford to provide a lot less of these services per capita.

 

The answer is you have to bring in immigrants at a much lower rate compared to your overall population so that on average the population is still made up of people who are either canadian-born or have been here long enough to establish themselves and earn good wages. If you have too many new people you cannot raise enough taxes to pay for their well-being unless you live in a society that simply does not provide services.

[CITIZEN_2015]

1 hour ago, herbie said:

That.s not a false measure at all. "The Economy" is not a simple matter of GDP per capita, it's a VERB, Money moving by any means of redistribution.

In no way short of absolute invasion does immigration make a country 'poorer'.
If your goal is to increase the population when the existing one doesn't want to reproduce, then there isn't much choice.

It is absolutely a false measure because growth comes because of population growth not increase in productivity. If you don't understand this simple fact then study economy.

Immigrants have to eat at least never those who come with capital and invest or buy houses and goods driving up the prices. If it wasn't because of them then there would have been negative growth (instead of weak 1% to 2% false growth) which would have meant recession.

Immigration on massive scale harms everyone and only benefits the government in power to manipulate growth. They drive up food and housing prices and hit the poorest in the society (which unfortunately excludes Trudeau and his surroundings) not to mention the increased load on our already overloaded heath and education (again the most vulnerable, the sick and elderly and children will be hit most) and overshadow on superior culture which is based on equality for women, freedom and respect for other religions.

Edited December 24, 2024 by CITIZEN_2015

[I am Groot]

16 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

Where do you get the bit about education being lowered?  What are you talking about?

At present, only about 13% of those we bring in (probably less) are assessed for skills, education, or even language ability. As the vast majority of newcomers are coming from the third world they, at the very least, almost certainly have poor language skills. The Stats Canada figures on immigrant earnings and refugee earnings attest to this. The only group that earns a decent living here are the principal applicants under the 'skilled' category.

16 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

 However, your arguments have to be real. They are bringing a ton of foreign students, Indian kids and so on and they are well educated and getting more education here.

Well educated? Well, some do. But thanks to the government, the student visa program has become a principal route to immigration, and the 3rd world, especially India, has noticed. A lot of these young people are NOT well-educated, and can barely speak English. They have fake documents attesting to their previous education and language skills, and then fake how much money they have by taking out a very short-term loan in India for just enough time for it to go into a Canadian bank and for the government to verify it's there. Then it goes back.

Then they come here and wind up working 40 hrs a week at minimum wage jobs while taking some cheapo administration course at a community college - assuming they even show up for classes.

16 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

That's not the problem.  My father in law is retired and the TFWs working the cash have chemistry and science degrees.

And what good are those degrees if they're not recognized here, or if their language skills aren't adequate for them to work in those fields? The language skills needed to work the cash are a far cry from those needed to read, digest, and write complex scientific papers and reports.

16 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

And the classic is mixing refugee with immigration. They are handled differently. 

Not really. Basically, almost all refugees are immigrants. We have an 85% acceptance rate. Those few rejected just stay anyway because we don't keep track and don't have any way of booting them out. I don't even know why we don't just shut down the Immigration and Refugee board and wave everyone straight on in. Probably save us money.

16 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

Sometimes it sounds like people are making a case against inequity, but I find it hard to believe you'd be in favor of raising the minimum wage or increasing employer taxes.

 I don't believe in raising the minimum wage. I believe the market should handle that. And I'm not sure what taxes have to do with this. From my perspective, minimum wage jobs are for people with minimal abilities and experience. They're generally the kind of thing you do when just getting out of high school, and which you progress through as you gain more experience and valuable work skills. Foreign workers screw with that paradigm. So do refugees because they rarely rise up given their poor communication skills and lack of education.

 

21 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

It's a logical fallacy that such things reduce the wealth of a nation.  Lower wages mean lower costs, therefore lower prices and higher profits.  That's how a market works.

Higher profits for business but higher costs for government, which means higher taxes. So much for those profits.

[I am Groot]

14 hours ago, herbie said:

That.s not a false measure at all. "The Economy" is not a simple matter of GDP per capita, it's a VERB, Money moving by any means of redistribution.

In no way short of absolute invasion does immigration make a country 'poorer'.
If your goal is to increase the population when the existing one doesn't want to reproduce, then there isn't much choice.

From the cite:

But surely the economic contribution that immigration is making outstrips these costs, right? Nope. As I’ve been arguing for years, the OBR has finally looked at the fiscal impact of different types of immigration into Britain and concluded that the very kind of low-skill, low-wage migration that our hapless politicians in Westminster are now encouraging is a net fiscal cost, not benefit, to the economy and taxpayers.

As the OBR analysis finds, an average low-wage migrant costs the taxpayer about £150,000 by the time they reach 60, about £465,000 by the time they reach their 80s and about £1 million if they live to 100. The OBR also find that tweaking different kinds of migration makes little difference to our country’s growing debt problem. In short, mass immigration is simply not the panacea the expert class want you to think it is.

 

[Michael Hardner]

@I am Groot okay, there are a lot of points here. I'll have to investigate these over time. Thanks.

[eyeball]

As usual in these sorts of discussions what's missing is any acknowledgement of  a big invisible elephant in the middle of everything - the impact of growing populations, by any means, on our planet's environment.

I notice mention about a lack of statistical information and applying old beliefs to the issue of immigration/population growth in the discussion above.

The biggest hole in our information stems from two particularly old beliefs that say 1. the natural environment is external or outside our human economy and really neither here nor there and 2. The world practically goes on forever.

It's a Cornucopian worldview crippling our ability to see we're driving blind and unaware of the cliff we're approaching.

 

 

[Moonlight Graham]

10 minutes ago, eyeball said:

As usual in these sorts of discussions what's missing is any acknowledgement of  a big invisible elephant in the middle of everything - the impact of growing populations, by any means, on our planet's environment.

I notice mention about a lack of statistical information and applying old beliefs to the issue of immigration/population growth in the discussion above.

The biggest hole in our information stems from two particularly old beliefs that say 1. the natural environment is external or outside our human economy and really neither here nor there and 2. The world practically goes on forever.

It's a Cornucopian worldview crippling our ability to see we're driving blind and unaware of the cliff we're approaching.

We're at global over- capacity for a sustainable environment, but Canada isn't the cause since we're a country with low birth rates importing people from countries with high birth rates.

[Moonlight Graham]

1 hour ago, I am Groot said:

At present, only about 13% of those we bring in (probably less) are assessed for skills, education, or even language ability. As the vast majority of newcomers are coming from the third world they, at the very least, almost certainly have poor language skills. The Stats Canada figures on immigrant earnings and refugee earnings attest to this. The only group that earns a decent living here are the principal applicants under the 'skilled' category.

Well educated? Well, some do. But thanks to the government, the student visa program has become a principal route to immigration, and the 3rd world, especially India, has noticed. A lot of these young people are NOT well-educated, and can barely speak English. They have fake documents attesting to their previous education and language skills, and then fake how much money they have by taking out a very short-term loan in India for just enough time for it to go into a Canadian bank and for the government to verify it's there. Then it goes back.

Then they come here and wind up working 40 hrs a week at minimum wage jobs while taking some cheapo administration course at a community college - assuming they even show up for classes.

And what good are those degrees if they're not recognized here, or if their language skills aren't adequate for them to work in those fields? The language skills needed to work the cash are a far cry from those needed to read, digest, and write complex scientific papers and reports.

Not really. Basically, almost all refugees are immigrants. We have an 85% acceptance rate. Those few rejected just stay anyway because we don't keep track and don't have any way of booting them out. I don't even know why we don't just shut down the Immigration and Refugee board and wave everyone straight on in. Probably save us money.

 I don't believe in raising the minimum wage. I believe the market should handle that. And I'm not sure what taxes have to do with this. From my perspective, minimum wage jobs are for people with minimal abilities and experience. They're generally the kind of thing you do when just getting out of high school, and which you progress through as you gain more experience and valuable work skills. Foreign workers screw with that paradigm. So do refugees because they rarely rise up given their poor communication skills and lack of education.

 

Higher profits for business but higher costs for government, which means higher taxes. So much for those profits.

We do deport failed refugee applicants.  Some do disappear and stay illegally forever.

I don't think your numbers on skilled migrants (economic class) is correct, they make up the majority of people granted permanent resident status.

[eyeball]

30 minutes ago, Moonlight Graham said:

We're at global over- capacity for a sustainable environment, but Canada isn't the cause since we're a country with low birth rates importing people from countries with high birth rates.

And yet we've exceeded our capacity for more importation.

We're experiencing way more effect than cause.

[CdnFox]

1 hour ago, eyeball said:

As usual in these sorts of discussions what's missing is any acknowledgement of  a big invisible elephant in the middle of everything - the impact of growing populations, by any means, on our planet's environment.

No it isn't.  The people already exist. Whether they exist here or somewhere else doesn't matter as far as the planet goes.

Unless you're suggesting we let them in and then kill them or something. 

[eyeball]

31 minutes ago, CdnFox said:

The people already exist. Whether they exist here or somewhere else doesn't matter as far as the planet goes.

Sure it matters, we need to keep drawing down our natural resources and impacting our environment to expand our economy. Build it and they will come - meaning the planet will just keep sending us more people.

43 minutes ago, CdnFox said:

Unless you're suggesting we let them in and then kill them or something.

No, I'm suggesting we can't let them in because doing so is unsustainable. As evidenced by the fact we're exceeding our capacity to bring them in right now.

That's never going to stop and it's happening all around the world.

 

[CdnFox]

On 12/24/2024 at 11:48 AM, eyeball said:

Sure it matters, we need to keep drawing down our natural resources and impacting our environment to expand our economy. Build it and they will come - meaning the planet will just keep sending us more people.

 

The people will be born regardless. It makes absolutely no difference in the slightest. It's not like there's someone out there saying " Oh Canada is still accepting people I guess we can have a few more children then"  

And as far as the planet is concerned it doesn't matter if somebody consumes our resources here or someone else's resources somewhere else. The resources will still be consumed and the planet will actually be worse. In fact considering that most of the third world countries use particularly pollution heavy means of producing power and such chances are if they're living somewhere else they're producing even more than they would be with us.

But I do love that you somehow magically think that someone living somewhere else would magically stop using resources   Just like you thought that anybody paying a carbon tax with magically stop producing greenhouse gases

Quote

No, I'm suggesting we can't let them in because doing so is unsustainable

If you mean unsustainable environmentally we've already discussed how absolutely silly that is. The people exist, they'll exist whether Canada lets them in or not, the pollution would actually be the same or worse if they stay somewhere else

Edited December 26, 2024 by CdnFox

[Aristides]

Canada’s per capita GDP has declined for six quarters in a row.

[eyeball]

1 hour ago, CdnFox said:

" Oh Canada is still accepting people I guess we can have a few more children then"

1 hour ago, CdnFox said:

But I do love that you somehow magically think that someone living somewhere else would magically stop using resources   Just like you thought that anybody paying a carbon tax with magically stop producing greenhouse gases

1 hour ago, CdnFox said:

If you mean unsustainable environmentally

I mean economically as well - infrastructure, healthcare, social services etc are either maxed out or close to it.

 

 

 

[CdnFox]

1 hour ago, eyeball said:

I mean economically as well - infrastructure, healthcare, social services etc are either maxed out or close to it.

 

 

 

ROFLMAO!!!

I forgot how much fun it is to break you mentally    And how easy it is    

Can't even argue the points and can't explain how canada allowing immigration somehow makes people elsewhere have babies. And apparently that's all it took to break you  

And i love that i repeat what you say and you mock it as stupid   Well i guess if you feel that way you shouldn't have said it in the first place. 

But hey, don't worry.  There can't possibly be any global impact. I've been paying my carbon tax !!! 

[eyeball]

1 hour ago, CdnFox said:

ROFLMAO!!!

I forgot how much fun it is to break you mentally    And how easy it is    

Can't even argue the points and can't explain how canada allowing immigration somehow makes people elsewhere have babies. And apparently that's all it took to break you  

And i love that i repeat what you say and you mock it as stupid   Well i guess if you feel that way you shouldn't have said it in the first place. 

But hey, don't worry.  There can't possibly be any global impact. I've been paying my carbon tax !!! 

[CdnFox]

1 hour ago, eyeball said:

So what you're saying is you give literally everyone around you a migraine   Sounds about right

[Mathieub]

I say they are bookemissary. The reason of the price hike is the right.