By: Bill Walker
Immigrants have become more, not less important as technology grows more complex. Immigrants in the 1800s built the nation’s railroads, but today’s immigrants have built the information economy. 60% of our 25 largest tech companies were founded by first- or second-generation immigrants. Apple, IBM, Google, Oracle, Amazon, Intel, Ebay, EMC, Texas Instruments, VMware, ADP, Yahoo!, are all children of the Statue of Liberty. Most of our best jobs are the result of immigrant brainstorms… even to look for a job we use LinkedIn, founded by an immigrant.
Scapegoating Immigrants: Good Politics, Bad Logic
So why are immigrants blamed for our economic problems? Because as politicians before and after Hitler have known, scapegoating “foreigners” is the easiest path to political success. Also, it’s the safest… it takes no bravery to attack working-class immigrants, rather than facing up to the wealthy corporate-welfare interests.
So, let’s go through the various economic fallacies used to blame working people for the collapse of the US economy…
We are all immigrants or children of immigrants, whether our ancestors traveled by 747 or walked across the Bering Land Bridge. If we are going to fulfill the Founding Fathers’ dreams, we will do it as a nation of immigrants.
Bill Walker of Plainfield, New Hampshire is a member of the Sullivan County Republican Committee. His ancestors immigrated from Prussia in 1870.
