Immigration: When Is It Too Much of A Good Thing.

From Don Pittis, CBC News.

A well-known economic theory says that when it comes to people, you can get too much of a good thing.

As thousands of asylum seekers come across the Canadian border from Trump’s America, there are many Canadian voices, including mainstream Conservatives, who believe we may have reached that point.

A glance at internet comments and letters to the editor shows that some Canadians are reacting emotionally to media reports on the influx of new arrivals. But what about the economics?

Diminishing Returns.

In the economic principle sometimes called the law of diminishing returns, there is a text book example which describes an increasing number of workers coming to help dig in a garden of limited size.

Link to the rest here.

Thank you for reading.

Opinion. If anyone had ever asked, we would have said that something like 280,000 to 300,000 people immigrate to Canada each year. It is also true that the country could probably absorb 500,000 immigrants each year without major social disruption. It is also our opinion that immigration is a good thing for all of the reasons stated in the story above.

 

Image Credit. Above: Sikh New Year, by Joel Friesen - originally posted to Flickr as Sikhs on the move!, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4655560