oh wow politics. absurd! ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

had some late night talks about mass migration since it's 2024 and it seems to be the talk of the day. usa / eu / etc. you get the gist. i wanted to see particularly how it can help reduce global poverty.

immigration is great. it enriches societies by attracting raw hungry talent.

but let's see the stats to see if it can be a viable solution to world poverty as the narrative says:

now imagine this "X"

this represents the one million legal immigrants that the u.s. has taken in every year on average since 1980.

so, who are we really trying to help? the world bank measures extreme poverty by those who make less than $2.15 a day. let's break it down:

• sub-saharan africa: ~426m
• india: ~34.4m
• china: ~0 (extreme poverty nearly gone)
• rest of asia (minus india and china): ~29m in east asia and pacific
• latin america and caribbean: ~22m

altogether, that's about 512 million people living in extreme poverty. that's 512 "X"s and each year, we take in one million immigrants:

"X" = 1 million people

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the thing is, we aren't drawing immigrants from these extremely poor populations. these people are often too sick, too isolated, and too poor to make it here. instead, our immigrants tend to come from the better-off poor. mexico, for example, is where a large portion of our immigrants originate, and even mexico is considered poor to the us standards.

mexico remains the largest source of immigrants to the u.s. despite mexico being considered a developing country, it is not among the poorest nations globally.

how many people live in countries with average incomes lower than mexico's? as of 2023, the average gross annual salary in mexico is approximately $12,100 usd. the world economic forum indicates that the poorest half of the global population earns just $3,920 annually on average​ (world economic forum). that's 511 million plus another 3.3 billion people based on estimates. that's over 3.8 billion people, or 3,800 X's

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so, what is it that the narrative is telling us? they're telling us that when we take this one million immigrants, we somehow are tackling world poverty. we have to do it regardless of the effect on our unemployed, the working poor, the most vulnerable members of our society, and regardless of the effect on our natural resources. even if we went by the most radical proposals in washington, which are to actually double, triple, or quadruple our immigration, which would totally overwhelm our physical, natural, and social infrastructures, we couldn't make a noticeable difference...

in fact, we may be really hurting the impoverished people of the world. the millions that we do take in are among the most educated, energetic, and certainly the most dissatisfied people. if they did not immigrate, they would potentially be citizens for change to improve their people in these countries. the true heroes in the global humanitarian field are those who have the wherewithal to immigrate to another country but instead stay in their countries to apply their skills to help their fellow countrymen.

our immigration system, however, tends to lure these potential heroes away. making even a tiny dent in global poverty seems impossible when last year alone, many countries saw an increase of more people in poverty due to an increase in births over deaths. making the solution even less viable.

yet u.s.a. want to increase it...

illegal immigration adds another layer to the issue. there are about 11 million unauthorized immigrants in the u.s. as of 2023, with hundreds of thousands more coming in each year. they often come from impoverished backgrounds as well, seeking better opportunities but further highlighting the inadequacy of immigration as a solution to global poverty.

however, there's hope to this solution. notice china and india? whether the stats are legit or not, it's obvious these countries have become big players in the global economy. just look at their cities and the money they're pouring into building stuff. it's pretty clear people there are living way better than they were a few decades back.

let's compare the progress in reducing extreme poverty in china and india:

| year | china | india |

| 2000 | 358.4m | 437.0m |

| 2010 | 160.9m | 405.9m |

| today | ~0 | 34.4m |

don't you guys see? immigration can never be an effective or significant way to deal with the suffering people of the world. they have to be helped where they live. 3.8 billion of them will never be able to immigrate to a rich country. there's no hope for that. they have to bloom where they're planted. the only place that 99.9% of these people can be helped is where they live.

considering the challenges faced by european countries, it's evident that mass migration presents complex issues. given the number of x's, even with 100 years, it's an impossible solution.

again, immigration is great. just dont use it as a solution to global suffering.

so let's help them there.

-- david