Jeune Street

...and Giovanni Peri, a resident scholar at the San Francisco Federal Reserve, has the numbers to prove it. Here's what he says about the economic impacts of migrants on the US economy:

Statistical analysis of state-level data shows that immigrants expand the economy’s productive capacity by stimulating investment and promoting specialization. This produces efficiency gains and boosts income per worker. At the same time, evidence is scant that immigrants diminish the employment opportunities of U.S.-born workers.

His report has turned a few heads, including at Reuters and the Wall Street Journal.

Peri isn't the only respected scholar to report this finding (or something similar), and yet populist responses to immigration gain traction in so many societies. The national interest of these countries would be served much more effectively if the principle of unity in diversity were applied in public discourse on migration issues. Because at the heart of populist opposition to immigration, I believe, is a problem of discomfort with diversity.