02/17/2006
Allan Wall’s Memo From Mexico today points out that Mexican immigrants are not coming here because they're desperately poor byMexican standards. They're frequently people who have jobs and money, and want more. People, in fact, who want the American Dream enough that they're willing to steal it.Exactly the same point was made about some emigrants from Europe by Arthur J. Todd. In 1914.
The conclusion of the Immigration Commission as to the causes of the new immigration is that while “social conditions affect the situation in some countries, the present immigration from Europe to the United States is in the largest measure due to economic causes. It should be stated, however, that emigration from Europe is not now an absolute economic necessity, and as a rule those who emigrate to the United States are impelled by a desire for betterment rather than by the necessity of escaping intolerable conditions. This fact should largely modify the natural incentive to treat the immigration movement from the standpoint of sentiment, and permit its consideration primarily as an economic problem. In other words, the economic and social welfare of the United States should now ordinarily be the determining factor in the immigration policy” of the Government.[Labor: “True Demand” and Immigrant Supply,A Restatement of the Economic Aspects of Immigration Policy, By Arthur J. Todd, The Unpopular Review, July-September, 1914]
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