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Comment by axefrog | Hacker News Reader

Any economics experts around? What would hypothetically happen if all countries lifted all immigration laws and allowed people to come and go wherever they liked?

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Pretty much all economists will agree that it would be a good thing. Unfortunately, laws are dictated by politics, not economics.

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_trade and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protectionism

Ah, free trade. Pretty much all economists agree that the economic pie will get larger, but they are silent about how the pie will be split. Therein lies the problem.

Most economists will trumpet the increase in societal or collective well-being but will not give you a straight answer about who accrues the gains, who accrues the losses, and what amends -- if any -- should be made towards the economic losers to encourage them to support the proposed schemes. When asked about these matters, most economists claim that these are outside their science. They are then surprised that their science is less than relevant and that people refuse to go along with their plans.

EDIT: If you disagree with my assessment please explain your reasons instead of downvoting.

EDIT: Added the second paragraph for clarification.

Can you elaborate into how that could be a problem?

Most economists will trumpet the increase in societal or collective well-being but will never give you a straight answer about who accrues the gains, who accrues the losses, and what amends -- if any -- should be made towards the economic losers to encourage them to support the proposed schemes. When asked about these matters, most economists claim that these are outside their science. Then they are surprised that people refuse to go along with their plans for maximizing societal well-being.

The problem that exists where I live - Finland - is that a society that develops itself to a point where they are a first-world country where even the most unfortunate resident can enjoy a secure (if not good) life provided by the state can easily be taken advantage of by someone from a second world country.

Once you have enough people taking advantage of such a structure, the equation no longer works. Taxpayers resent immigrants taking advantage of the safety net without at least giving the trapeze a shot.

I suppose that's because it would be easier for people to move around to where the bigger slices are as well.

Free trade will make us all better off in the long run - but in the long run we are all dead.

Rambling anecdote, bear with me: In the 1920's my grandmother and her sister were sent from Scotland to study in Berlin. The requirement to have a passports was very new then. My great grandfather thought they were a ridiculous idea and sent his teenage daughters off on their own to travel across Europe without them. Much to his surprise and horror, they were arrested and jailed for a week in Germany until the whole thing was eventually sorted out. Before WW1 there were no real passport or immigration controls in Europe, the free exchange of people and ideas around Europe was probably pretty key to the industrial revolution. Just think, if Britain had turned away Brunel's family, his engineering innovations would have happened elsewhere, if at all.

Also, the United States had practically free immigration before 1920. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3eyJIbSgdSE

I asked myself the same question the other day and found a document presented at the General Population Conference in 2001. It's titled "Why Borders Can Not Be Open".

I don't want to introduce any bias giving my thoughts about it, but I recommend you to read it your self: http://www.populationenvironmentresearch.org/papers/Colemanm...

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