The Liberals like immigration because immigrants tend to be Liberal supporters.
And here, the Democrats like immigration because the largest fraction of immigrants by far are illegals from Mexico. Periodically, the gov't gives up and legalizes the latest batch of wetbacks. Then those of them that get citizenship vote Democratic.
Canadians are supposedly the 2nd largest group of illegal immigrants to the US (and we are probably your biggest supplier). I've wondered how the gov't knows that, though. Illegal immigrants don't go to the post office to register.
It's conventional wisdom that the fact that the birthrate is below replacement level spells doom for the economy.
Reminds me of the simplistic approach to world population. If the 3rd world gets better agriculture, it grows more food and has more kids, resulting in more population, resulting in more population, ....
Except that other things- -like better standards of living and education- -usually accompany that better agriculture. And as living standards rise, population growth drops.
At some point Canadian population would stabilize. Maybe not at 30 million; maybe at 20. But it would stabilize.
Now they settle in cities, and there are cases where the immigrant communities have attained critical mass, so that members can avoid interaction with the broader society if they choose. E.g. in Richmond, B.C., where you don't need English at all in your daily life, you can get by in Cantonese.
The same thing has happened here. It is possible in some areas, say San Francisco, to survive knowing only Cantonese. Some people do just that. The majority, though, learn English because that's where the opportunities are.
The Hispanic community is entirely different. Not knowing English is fairly common and looked at as desirable by many. They resent the greater affluence of the surrounding Anglos, but will not take steps to correct the situation. At least no positive ones. (These are generalizations; some do. I know some who have.) Getting even a high school diploma is looked on as discarding your Hispanic heritage and trying to prove you are better than your family and friends. A college degree is definite proof.
There are now so many Hispanics in southern California we would probably be better off giving it back to Mexico than trying to manage the problems. |
