A postscript to my Bloomberg Opinion column on the notion, which I’m seeing pop up here and there, that we need more immigration to fight inflation: Supporters of high levels of immigration have spent years arguing that immigration doesn’t reduce wages, and may not reduce wages even for low-skilled workers. Now we’re hearing that letting in more immigrants will “help ease inflationary pressures on wages.”
Sometimes you can see this tension play out in the work of an individual. Jennifer Rubin has changed her mind about a lot of issues in the last few years, but she has been consistent in favoring more immigration. According to some non-exhaustive Googling, in 2013, 2015, 2015 again, 2015 a third time, 2016, 2016 again, 2017, 2018, and 2021, she wrote in the Washington Post that immigration boosts wages, doesn’t reduce wages, or at worst has a tiny negative effect on a subset of wages. In 2022, though, we have high inflation. So now it turns out that more immigration “could also help alleviate the excessively tight labor market, which drives up wages and is then passed on to consumers in the form of higher prices.” One need not be up on the literature on the effects of immigration on wages to wonder whether they are quite so convenient.