One of the few concepts I disagree with liberals in the United States is their stand on immigrants; in spite of the fact that this nation was built on immigrant power. Michael Dukkakis and Daniel Mitchell in a NY Times op-ed offer an economic solution to reduce dependence on immigrants.

Basically their argument lies in raising the minimum wage. As known, the minimum wages causes disproportinate unemployment amongst the least skilled individuals and as many immigrants have a lower skill set than native, any rise in the minimum wage is likely to affect them adversely.

Alex Tabarrok, an economist at George Mason rightly points to the social injustice angle of this move by asking whether the Times would have published this op-ed if it “advocated minimum wages as a way of creating unemployment among
African Americans and raising white wages.” Probably it makes sense and even works perfectly economically but then no nation is a purely capitalistic society where concepts such as social justice is ignored completely. It is always a balancing act that varies with the times. But I guess political climate is a more influential factor.

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