Let me in and I’ll enrich you

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I was born in the Soviet Union in 1973. The life of most residents of that totalitarian state was one of poverty and oppression. Several of my relatives had been victims of the government’s repressive policies. In ad­dition, as Jews they often felt the weight of the regime’s institutionalized anti- Semitism. I was freed of all that because my parents and I were able to leave the USSR for the United States in 1979. I am, as a result, vastly better off than my peers who stayed in Russia. But virtually all of the difference between my life and theirs is the result of the differ­ence between American institutions and Russian ones, not any merit of mine. Had I remained in Russia, I would likely still be poor, and might well have become a victim of Vladimir Putin’s repressive policies, or been caught up in his brutal war of aggression against Ukraine. My life is just one of many transformed for the better by migration. More people should have the same opportunity.

The idea of “open borders” migration may seem impossibly radical. Most people take it for granted that governments have the right to restrict immigration. But more careful consideration shows that an “open borders” policy is a natural outgrowth of liberal democratic ideals of liberty and equality. Moreover, immigration has enormously beneficial effects for natives, as well as immigrants themselves. There can be negative side-effects of migration. But most can be dealt with through “keyhole solutions” that do not require migration restrictions.

«An ‹open borders› policy is a natural outgrowth of liberal democratic ideals of liberty and equality.»

Today, almost everyone condemns the system of medieval feudalism, under which nobles could migrate freely, but serfs could only move if they got their lord’s permission. We similarly condemn racial and ethnic segregation of the kind imposed by South African apartheid, or the segregation of blacks in many parts of the United States, for much of its history. We recognize that race, ethnicity, and being born a serf are morally arbitrary characteristics over which people have no control. Thus, they should not be a basis for restricting people’s liberty, and should not determine where they are allowed to live and work.

Immigration restrictions inflict much the same kinds of injustice. They too restrict people’s liberty based on who their parents were, or where they were born. If you are the son or daughter of a US citizen or were born in the US, you can live and work there freely. If not, you can only do so with the government’s permission, which in most cases will be denied. Most European nations have similar policies.

Productivity boom

Many immigration restrictions were and are explicitly justified on racial and ethnic bases. Historical examples include American discrimination against Asian immigrants, and the “White Australia” policy. Today, right-wing nationalist immigration restrictionists in Europe and the US often explicitly target non-white migrants from Asia, Africa, and Latin America for exclusion.

But even racially neutral immigration restrictions have similar flaws. Like race and ethnicity, parentage and place of birth are morally arbitrary characteristics that people have no control over. They should not determine where you are allowed to live and work. Medieval serfdom, of course, was also racially neutral. Most serfs belonged to the same racial and ethnic groups as nobles. That did not make the system any less unjust.

The injustice is especially great when we consider that immigration restrictions often consign people to a lifetime of poverty and oppression. Think of migrants unable to escape oppressive regimes such as those of China, Cuba, Russia, and Venezuela, or Syrians and Yemenis fleeing war and mass murder.

Migrants are not the only victims of immigration restrictions. Native-born residents of receiving countries suffer too. Economists estimate that abolishing immigration restrictions throughout the world would double world gross domestic product. That’s because so many millions of people are trapped in countries where they have little or no chance of escaping poverty, no matter how talented they might be. Given the opportunity to move to freer and wealthier societies, such as the US or Europe, they can become vastly more productive. Many of the benefits from that productivity would flow to receiving-country natives, as well as immigrants.

«Economists estimate that abolishing immigration restrictions

throughout the world would double world gross domestic product.»

Data from both the US and Europe also show that migrants disproportionately contribute to innovation and entrepreneurship. They are, on average, more likely than natives to start new businesses and develop new technologies. That, obviously, benefits natives, too. For example, immigrants and children of immigrants from poor nations played key roles in the development of the first two successful Covid-19 vaccines (Pfizer and Moderna). By so doing, they saved millions of lives (including many native-born Americans and Europeans). By keeping out people who would make similar breakthroughs if given the chance, immigration restrictions lead to massive needless suffering, death, and disease.

Who “owns” a country?

A standard objection to migration rights is that the native population within a jurisdiction has a right of self-determination that entitles it to keep out migrants. Perhaps the most common justification for a power to restrict immigration is based on the rights of distinct ethnic, racial, or cultural groups. Thus, it is said, France is the rightful property of the French, Germany of Germans, and so on.

As already noted, such ethnic discrimination is unjust for much the same reasons as domestic racial and ethnic segregation: both restrict liberty and opportunity based on morally arbitrary characteristics people have no control over. Another problem with self-determination rationales for restriction is trying to determine which group has the “right” to control which territory. Perhaps such rights are created when a group that has acquired previously unoccupied territory, and then developed it, without forcibly displacing anyone else. But, if so, virtually no actual government can claim such a right, as nearly all are the products of repeated conquest and coercion, and most rule territories occupied by multiple ethnic groups, not just one. Who are the true native “owners” of Britain? The Normans who conquered the Anglo-Saxons after 1066? The Anglo-Saxons who previously conquered various tribes who lived there before then? There is no good answer.

In addition to group rights claims for states’ authority to exclude migrants, there are also theories that analogize the nation-state to a private house or club. If a homeowner has the right to bar outsiders from her property, the same reasoning gives a national government the power to exclude migrants.

But the house analogy has severe flaws. It appeals to property rights. But it actually ends up undermining private property. Far from protecting property rights, immigration restrictions abrogate the rights of property owners who want to rent their property to migrants, associate with them, or employ them on their land.

If taken seriously, the house analogy has totalitarian implications for natives, as well as migrants. If a state has the same powers over land as a homeowner has over his house, then the state has broad power to suppress speech and religion the rulers disapprove of. A homeowner, for example, has the right to mandate that only Muslim prayer will be permitted in his house, or that only left-wing political speech be tolerated within its walls.

Similar problems bedevil attempts to justify migration restrictions based on the supposed rights of democratic majorities. But if such majorities are not allowed to restrict internal freedom of movement based on parentage and place of birth, why should they be allowed to impose similar restrictions on international migration? If the answer is their supposed property rights over land, then it must be explained how they acquired those rights (given the history of conquest behind the formation of almost all governments). Also, any such claim to sweeping collective property rights is open to the same objections as the house analogy.

Keyhole solutions

Even if there is no general right to exclude, perhaps governments are nonetheless justified in restricting migration in order to forestall specific negative side-effects, such as overburdening the welfare state, increased crime and terrorism, and undermining of a nation’s political institutions by new citizens who vote for harmful policies. We should use a three-part framework to address such issues.

First, we should ask whether the problem exists, at all. Many of the standard objections to free migration are significantly overblown. If there is little or no problem to begin with, there is no need to bar migrants to “solve” it. For example, data from both the US and most other OECD countries countries show most migrants actually contribute more to the public fisc than they take out. Data from the US Congressional Budget Office show that increased migration since 2021 is likely to reduce the federal budget deficit by some 1 trillion dollars over the next decade.

Second, where migration creates genuine problems, it is often possible to deal with them by means of “keyhole solutions” that minimize the risk without barring migrants. For example, if immigrants really are overburdening the welfare state, the obvious keyhole solution is to restrict their eligibility for welfare benefits, as many countries already do. If immigrants seem likely to be bad voters who support terrible government policies, we can postpone eligibility for the franchise. In the US, legal immigrants are already barred from becoming citizens with voting rights until five years have passed, and they pass a civics test most Americans would fail.  There are similar keyhole solutions for a wide range of other possible problems.

Finally, where keyhole solutions are inadequate, policymakers should consider tapping the vast wealth created by expanded migration to mitigate negative side-effects that cannot be addressed in other ways. For example, if (contrary to most available evidence), immigration increases crime rates, we can tap some of the wealth it generates to increase the number of police officers on the streets; studies show that can greatly reduce crime. Indeed, if the United States would simply divert the billions of dollars currently devoted to enforcing immigration restrictions, we could hire tens of thousands of new police. If we believe (again, contrary to most evidence) that immigration reduces the wages of substantial numbers of native-born workers, we can tap the wealth created by migration to increase wage subsidies (such as the US Earned Income Tax Credit), to whatever category of workers may be shortchanged.

I do not claim this approach can solve all conceivable problems potentially caused by migration. But the framework can be effectively applied to a wide range of issues often seen as strong justifications for migration restrictions. At the very least, given the grave harm and injustice caused by migration restrictions, we should refrain from imposing them unless there is overwhelming evidence they are the only way to address a grave danger that cannot be fixed otherwise.

Open borders doesn’t require completely unrestricted freedom of movement. Some restrictions can be justified regardless of whether the person in question is a migrant or native. For example, governments can detain people who are traveling for the purpose of committing acts of terrorism or crime. But justice does require a strong presumption that such restrictions should not discriminate based on ancestry or place of birth. We readily see that it is wrong to impose such discrimination within countries. The same logic applies to international migration.