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Immigration Boosts GDP

Immigration Boosts GDP
Immigration Boosts GDP

Immigration has a generally positive economic impact on receiving countries but the benefits depend on how well the migrants are integrated, the International Monetary Fund’s First Deputy Managing Director David Lipton has said.

Speaking at a seminar in Brussels earlier this week, Lipton noted that the politics and economics of migration were at odds with each other because like trade, immigration created winners and losers and required time for societies and businesses to adjust, Asharq al-Awsat reported.

“We have found that immigration has significantly increased GDP per capita in advanced economies because skill levels … boost labor productivity and because in some places an influx of working-age migrants helps counteract labor shortages arising from demographic developments,” Lipton said.

“Although the top 10% benefit most, the gains from migration are shared across all income groups. Moreover, inequality does not increase as a result of the entry of migrants into the workforce,” he said. “We find no significant negative effects on the middle or lower income groups in receiving countries,” he said.

Europe is struggling to contain a migration crisis that started in 2015 when more than a million people entered the 28-nation EU from the Middle East and Africa seeking safety and better economic prospects.

Immigration has triggered a popular backlash in the EU that has boosted far-right and nationalist parties and was one of the main factors in Britain’s vote in June 2016 to leave the European Union.

 

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