Originally Posted: April 25, 2016
It’s hard to talk about the issue of immigration without getting mired into the politics or the rhetoric of the hour. But hard data is often missing from the conversation. Is there a way to understand immigration through the lens of economic data? Perhaps there is.
Pia Orrenius is the Vice President and Senior Economist at the Dallas Federal Reserve Bank, and a fellow at the John Tower Center for Political Studies at Southern Methodist University. She says there’s no need for alarm, despite the fearmongering – immigration is actually good for the economy.
“We know that when immigrants come into the economy, there’s a lot of good effects that follow from that,” Orrenius says. “It’s a larger labor supply, which means that the economy produces more output.”
That benefit is passed on to consumers, who see cheaper goods and services. READ MORE