I suspect we will agree that not enough is being done to socialize and train them to be contributing members of society (I’d also argue that the same could be said about your average American). We might disagree about what to do, as my response would be “we should do more” while yours might be “let fewer through.”
In this particular case, due to a network of charities, churches, and municipal government, there is quite a bit being done. For most, it might not be enough: my guess is that being uprooted and tossed into a new country and culture is a difficult experience, and one which for many will take several years to recover from.
I have no nativist tendencies, and I think that’s the beauty of America: that I’m as American as my Chinese colleague who just got her citizenship. That’s also a powerful weapon in the race for brainpower.
I do support more strategic immigration policies with more focus on the extreme ends of the spectrum. I wish to welcome those who need sanctuary and shelter the most, regardless of what they contribute. It is a moral consideration, not an instrumental one. But I also want to open our doors wide to all who are most capable of contribution. Make room and streamline the process for those with PhDs from a legit school or those with a graduate degree in a STEM field. I’d much rather have a Malaysian engineer with an MS from Nanyang Technological University than a Californian with an MS from Cal State Long Beach. Will it drive down the cost of human capital? Absolutely, and the labor market will adjust while productivity increases. For those worried about socialization, immigrants with high levels of education generally have no issue socializing due to their work (a Hungarian biologist will, on average, be much more socialized than the Hungarian owner of a world food market)
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Though this is a thread about one of our members temporarily falling into destitution
As for falling into middle class destitution, the author of this thread needs to get married and have a couple of kids and then he will experience the true meaning of earning more and yet have less disposable income as an individual....but's it's still not destitution.
Most international businesses are opened to the pick of the world's graduates. Most of my clients have feeder companies now in India and infuse themselves with the Indian Knowledge Export. They're not committed to training or sourcing local talent. They pay the Indians on short term contracts, so they pay minimum local tax, but also there is the 30% tax ruling for specialist expats. It use to be 10 year, when I got it, then 8, now it's 5 as the stream of Indian labour had become unsustainable.
There's also a number of my competitors who are using Eastern Europeans on short term assignments to reduce tax burden and rates. They're now attempting to pass that on to the locals.
That's globalisation in action: it favours the big global organisations and the local entrepreneurs are basically left economically unviable as they cannot compete against the global footprint of massive corporations who can move labour around the globe with ease.
I actually do have a number of ex-refugees working for me. They'll all Iranians in mainland Europe, all extremely well educated and at the peak of their profession. I've poached them all from my competitors and instead of ripping them off, I've paid them the going rate. The Iranian diaspora is top notch, absolutely well educated, Westernised and deliver.
But the problem is, they're not the norm. I don't have any other non-Western immigrants on board, except some Indians who came over the early 1990s. And I don't see that changing, the latest knowledge export seems to be sadly lacking, but want everything because they think they've managed to hood-wink the West to accepting the caste system by the back door.
We have to be vigilant and yes, we should USA and Europe accept only immigrants and refugees as we need, weighted towards high-knowledge-hard-scientists-engineers and genius types who can deliver something of value.
