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Comment by lr4444lr | Hacker News Reader

What's the incentive here? A rotating cast of high income earners paying state and local taxes without the benefit the pension system(s)? The country has about 1.73 births per woman with a barely positive net migration. Maybe they should think about getting interested people on a citizenship path.

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> Maybe they should think about getting interested people on a citizenship path

One thing you'll find out is that the EU member states (along with Canada, Australia, New Zealand, etc.) are really not very friendly or welcoming in terms of "path to citizenship".

One thing I'd like to see actually is open immigration and potentially more free trade between the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the UK. I'd add Ireland but I think EU status would be a problem.

I don't know about other countries, but immigration targets in Canada are trending towards attracting 500,000 immigrants per year by 2025. Just because we have alot of openings doesn't mean it's easy though... there are several paths, and most of them are designed to favour folks who will integrate well socially and economically (and that doesn't just mean rich white folks, it means more along the lines of skilled labour and the means to sustain your family while they get settled).

It is way easier to get a work visa (and later citizenship) in any of the countries you named than it is in the US.

> along with Canada, Australia, New Zealand, etc.) are really not very friendly or welcoming in terms of "path to citizenship".

About 30% of New Zealand and Australia’s populations are immigrants. I don’t think we could let many more in! As a comparison, the US is about 15% population of immigrants - and look at the stink over there about there being too many! The places with more immigrants than NZ/Oz by percentage are mostly either small island populations, or Arab states (where you are not actually an immigrant, since you don’t have citizenship rights, and slave labour conditions are rife).

One resulting issue is that some major parts of the NZ/Oz housing markets are already some of the most unaffordable in the world (think San Franscisco, but earning less so even less affordable)! The five most expensive cities in the world by unaffordability are Hong Kong, Vancouver, Sydney, Auckland, Toronto : e.g. Sydney: average monthly income of $6,100 with median house price of $1.4 million. Auckland median house price is $1.1 million, whereas the average individual monthly income is $4,269. We have the land, we just need to build a lot of houses to keep up.

The path from Permanent Resident to Citizen in Canada is pretty straightforward in my eyes and most Permanent Residents eventually do become Citizens [0]. Given that there are many pathways available for people to immigrate to Canada and Canada also looking to increase immigration in the coming years I am not sure what you mean by "not friendly or welcoming". Are you referring to the fact that there is a selection process in place and not everyone may qualify due to it?

[0]: https://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-recensement/2021/as-sa/98...

I do admire Canada’s open mindedness. Anyone who completes an undergraduate degree in a Canadian university is eligible to apply for a work visa which rapidly leads to PR status. And, that converts to citizenship pretty quickly.

Canada grants citizenship after 3 years of residency.

Downright hostile attitude towards "path to the citizenship" if you ask me.

Sure, just get residency first ;-)

Iceland has a steady population growth due to immigration already. That said there has been talk in the last month or so of changing up the visa situation to make it easier to recruit tech workers outside of the EEA:

https://northstack.is/2023/03/13/the-icelandic-government-in...

Those people would not be Icelandic. The purpose of a nation is to serve their people, not to replace them with other people.

bigoted take

OK, I dare you to support replacement immigration / colonization against any native people who are not Europeans. The world agreed that it was a horrible thing when it was done against American natives, against Aboriginals and against other people. Why do so many cheer on doing the same thing against European natives?

Slavers used to defend the trans-Atlantic trafficking with the argument that the American natives were too few, didn't produce enough and didn't breed enough. I hear a lot of similar arguments being used against native European peoples today. Should we always repeat history?

Allowing immigration is a long way short of the dystopian scenario painted by the racism of the replacement theory. Iceland willingly calling for people to move there is nothing like the European colonization of the Americas.

The commenter I responded to literally called for replacement. It is a down right evil policy, responsible for an immense amount of suffering and loss throughout the world. But of course it has been a favorite of various rulers - and they've always had some clergy handy to drum up support for the cause.

It was the killing people and colonization that was bad. A country letting people move there is not either of those things, that is a terrible argument. No one is saying "Let's force Iceland at gunpoint to let everyone in".

Every country having open borders would be cool though.

If every country had open borders then in a few generations every country would be essentially culturally identical (and English-speaking), massively reducing the cultural diversity and vibrancy of the human race as a whole.

I doubt "vibrancy" would be lower. And there are major cultural differences within countries, including countries that have existed for a very long time. I agree that cultures would merge more, but that is not a bad thing. The same thing is going to happen over a longer time scale with closed borders anyway.

People have the right to want to preserve their culture rather than becoming globalized. The US has chosen the path of being a melting pot and that is great for us but Icelanders have every right not to make the same decision if they don’t want to.

>A rotating cast of high income earners paying state and local taxes without the benefit the pension system(s)?

Did you expect something different?

That's literally the goal of every "DiGiTaLnOmAd" (you're a migrant worker, dickhead) visa scheme everywhere in the world. They want short-term renters eating out every night and racking up airport fees.

edit: unless you're super-wealthy in which case "Velkominn, Willkommen, いらっしゃいませ, Bem-vindo, 欢迎, Bienvenu, Tere tulemast, etc...."

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