Why not keep the talented?

As we head into the New Year, there are signs that Congress may finally allow an increase in legal immigration. Specifically, it now appears that Congress is becoming increasingly aware that it is folly to kick out foreign students who achieve science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) degrees.

In fact, both Republicans and Democrats have now sponsored bills to reform immigration laws to encourage STEM workers to immigrate here. And a very recent report by the Information Technology Industry Council, the Partnership for a New American Economy, and the US Chamber of Commerce provides ample evidence that the time is ripe for reform.

The report, “Help Wanted: The Role of Foreign Workers in the Innovation Economy,” looked at three questions: Is there a STEM worker shortage? If so, how bad is it and in what fields is it the worst? Does hiring foreign STEM workers take jobs away from native-born workers?

Take the issue of whether there is a general STEM worker shortage. A number of the report’s findings indicate there is indeed such a shortage, and that it is pervasive across the various STEM fields. Remember that economists typically hold that an overall unemployment rate of about 4% represents essentially full employment (with people who are out of work being mainly in transition between jobs in a fluid market). Our current national unemployment rate has hovered around 8% for four years, which is high by recent standards (those of the 1990s and 2000s).

Well, the report notes that the unemployment rate for American citizens with STEM PhDs is only 3.15%. For those with STEM MS degrees it is only 3.4%.

As to whether foreign-born STEM workers are taking jobs from American-born workers, the data the report surveyed show no such effect. While only 6.4% of non-STEM workers with PhDs are foreign-born, 26.1% of STEM workers with PhDs are foreign-born. (For workers with Master’s degrees, the figures are 5.2% of non-STEM versus 17.7% of STEM.) But even though a higher percentage of STEM than non-STEM workers are foreign-born, STEM workers still have a lower overall unemployment rate.

The job market is not a zero-sum game. There is no set-in-stone number of jobs, so that if an immigrant takes one, there is one less for you or me.

In some STEM fields, the figures are especially dramatic. While 25% of medical scientists are foreign-born, medical scientists generally have a 3.4% unemploymnent rate. In fact, the unemployment rate is lower than the general STEM average of 4.3% in 10 out of the 11 STEM fields with the highest percentage of foreign-born workers.

Moreover, the data indicate that immigrant STEM workers on average earn $3,000 per year more than equivalent native-born workers, putting paid to the myth that they “drive down wages.”

The reason none of this should be surprising is that the job market is not a zero-sum game. There is no set-in-stone number of jobs, so that if an immigrant takes one, there is one less for you or me. No, talented immigrants create jobs, by starting new companies, creating new products, or making our industries more competitive than foreign ones.

In this regard, the study argues that every foreign-born student who graduates from an American college and stays here creates an average 2.62 jobs for native-born workers. At the top 10 patent-producing American universities, more than three-fourths of all patents awarded last year were invented or co-invented by an immigrant.

Why can’t the Republicans and Democrats at least agree on removing the obviously counterproductive caps on foreign students who graduate from American colleges with STEM degrees and who want to remain here to work?

In short — why send the most talented and innovative students home — to start businesses that will only compete with ours?

SOURCE





British human Rights laws stop Algerian terror suspect with links to gas plant massacre group being deported because he is suicidal

An Algerian terror suspect has been allowed to stay in Britain because a judge believes he may commit suicide if he is forced to go back home.

The 43-year-old, who cannot be named for legal reasons, does not dispute he is a risk to Britain's national security and is believed to support one of the terrorist groups which carried out the deadly attack on an Algerian gas plant earlier this month which claimed the lives of 39 hostages including six Britons.

He is also suspected of providing fake passports and travel arrangements to terrorists.

But in another blow for the Home Office, the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (Siac) has allowed the married man to remain on British soil today because deporting him would breach his human rights.

Making his ruling, Mr Justice Mitting - who recently allowed hate preacher Abu Qatada to stay in the UK - said: 'We must look at the totality of the psychiatric evidence in the round.

'We are persuaded by it that the risk that G would commit suicide, especially after arrival in Algiers, is very high.

'It may be containable in the UK but no special arrangements have been negotiated with Algeria to cope with it.'

In the same judgment, Mr Justice Mitting told six other Algerian terror suspects they must leave.

But the senior immigration judge warned there was still 'no end in sight' in attempting to put the men on a flight home because they are likely to appeal the decision.

Among the six men were two fundamentalists with links to an alleged 2003 plot to commit mass murder using the poison ricin and cohorts of hook-handed preacher Abu Hamza.

The decision comes after a dramatic terror attack last week on a gas plant in Algeria, which claimed the lives of at least 39 foreign hostages, including six Britons.
Hostages at the In Amenas gas facility during the siege earlier this months which claimed the lives of 39 foreigners including six Britons

Hostages at the In Amenas gas facility during the siege earlier this months which claimed the lives of 39 foreigners including six Britons

Siac said the judgment was drafted before the In Amenas attack and it was too early to say if it would have an impact on its assessment of Algeria.

In the wake of the crisis, Prime Minister David Cameron pledged to put terrorism 'right at the top of the agenda' for Britain's presidency of the G8 nations in 2013.

The successful appellant - who was referred to as "G" - claimed asylum in 1995 when he was caught entering the UK on a fake passport.

A previously published open judgment revealed he did not dispute the Home Secretary's case that he poses a risk to national security.

He is a suspected supporter of Groupe Islamique Arme (GIA), an Islamist organisation that wants to overthrow the Algerian government, and the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat, which is now known as Al Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb.

And he is understood to have supplied passports to terrorists and been involved in fundraising and providing travel to extremists undertaking jihad and terrorist training.

But the extremist was diagnosed with a major depressive disorder and is known to have made a suicide attempt in 2005 when he was found hanging in a cell in Belmarsh prison.

Experts concluded that medication would not stop him from committing suicide and he instead required round the clock supervision.

Mr Justice Mitting concluded that the UK would be in breach of Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights - that no one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment - if he were deported in his present condition.

The six suspects ordered to leave the country claimed they would be at risk of torture or degrading treatment if returned to Algeria.

Among them is a regular visitor to the Finsbury Park mosque, who sided with hate preacher Abu Hamza, and a senior member of an Afghanistan training camp.

But Mr Justice Mitting said the court was 'satisfied that the Algerian state's assurances can be relied upon' in the case of these men.

He added that the relations between Algeria and the UK are strong and the North African country has a good record with other men who have previously been deported.

However, in a sign that the six men are expected to drag out their fight against deportation, Mr Justice Mitting warned that after seven years of litigation there was 'as yet, no end in sight'.

The Prime Minister pledged support to international efforts to track down and tear up the terror network behind last week's attack on the In Amenas gas plant.

Mr Cameron said that the world was involved in a 'generational struggle' against al Qaida-inspired Islamist terrorism in North Africa.

Siac upheld Qatada's appeal against deportation to Jordan, where he was convicted of terror charges in his absence in 1999.

The Government will appeal against the decision next month but Qatada remains in the UK on bail conditions including a 16-hour curfew, wearing an electronic tag, not using the internet and not contacting certain people.

A Home Office spokesman said: 'We are pleased Siac has dismissed the appeals of six of the individuals in the 'W and Others' case against their deportation, recognising the strength of our assurances with Algeria. We intend to remove them as quickly as possible.'

SOURCE