SMART DIPLOMACY: Biden to Germans: You are xenophobic.
He described three things the United States needs to do to “keep our edge” in the global economy. One of these priorities is passing comprehensive immigration reform . . .
“We have to pass an immigration bill,” Biden said, as quoted by the Washington Examiner, which also obtained a recording of the segment. “Look at Germany, look at the rest of the world. We’re the only non-xenophobic nation in the world that’s a major economy.”
Claims of xenophobia aside, is his economic point even right? See Steve Sailer’s post “Germany, U.S., Spain: Unemployment and Immigration”:
Why has Germany’s unemployment rate fallen 3 points since the end of 2007, while America’s is still 2 points higher? . . .
Germany’s population fell by about 100,000 (-0.1%) from 2000 to 2008. Germany used to have a lot of immigration from Turkey, but the country has been quietly cutting back on that as it turned out that the Turks quickly stopped working and went on welfare. . . .
In contrast, the population of the U.S. grew by about 21,800,000 from 2000 to 2008 (+7.8% in just 8 years). . . .
During the 2000 to 2008 period, in contrast to tightening-up Germany, the U.S. . . . focused on importing large numbers of Latin Americans.
The first article says that immigration to Germany has surged in the past few years. But much of that consists of fellow Europeans, not the Muslim Other. Plus, the Germans are not as free with welfare as other European states. See the WSJ article, “Immigration to Germany Surges in Wake of Euro-Zone Crisis” [$]:
Government data released Thursday showed immigration rose 13% to 1,226,000 last year, mainly due to an influx from Poland and crisis-hit southern European countries such as Italy and Spain. . . .
Chancellor Angela Merkel said in comments published Thursday that Germany doesn’t want to pay unemployment benefits to EU citizens who move to Germany for the sole purpose of looking for work.
“The EU isn’t a social-welfare union,” Ms. Merkel told the Passauer Neue Presse newspaper.
What a novel idea. Allow people to come in who aren’t opposed to your culture and refuse to give them free money.