What do you do when work is drying up in your country, and there aren’t enough jobs to go around for the local population, let alone the immigrants who’ve landed in better times? If you’re Japan, the Czech Republic or Spain, you pay them to leave. Would you pay immigrants to leave your country?
Japan is offering around US$3000 to each Latin American national living there, plus the cost of the airfare to go home. (They’re not offering the same to US or European nationals though-make of that what you will). It’s proving to be pretty tempting for many of the low-paid workers who came in the boom years, but are now finding themselves out of a job.
Spain set the example. Since late last year, in a bid to get around 100,000 immigrants to leave, its government has offered six months of unemployment benefits, around $18500, to foreign nationals who in return promise not to come back to Spain for three years. Some 4,000 people have taken the cash so far.
The Czech Republic is offering just under $1000 per migrant to leave.
All these cases have to do with the economic downturn, but of course, when work is scarce, and violence flares up between immigrant and local communities, there is a social knock on. In Northern Ireland this week the government there is paying for the airfares home of around 100 Romanian Gypsies who’ve been the victim of racist violence.
And in the UK a one million pound government scheme to help rejected asylum seekers to return home has resulted in just one family leaving Britain. Critics have called the project a scandal.
Would you like to see your government pay to send immigrants home, especially if they are out of work? If so, how much? Is the six months of unemployment benefit Spain is handing out too generous, or does it need to be that high to ensure those who’ve left stay there?
This article in The Economist argues that it’s a short term solution that doesn’t really address the main problem. Is this just a populist solution, or do you think it would really help to improve the economic outlook in your country?
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Id leave my country, If my government will offer me € 1,000,000.
John: That would be my ideal thoughts if the government pays me that much money….
~Dennis Junior~
I can’t imagine the USA paying for anyone to leave. We are a nation built from other cultures. The number of Hispanics has decreased enormously in my area. There is less than half of the number of day works on the street corners here these days. So many have just gone back to Mexico or farther south, due to the lack of work.
We already do – those buses taking deported illegals back into Mexico aren’t free, y’know.
Not in the US, cuz they will just come back after.
No, if they came on their own, they can leave on their own. Why should we be the great ‘do all’ for the rest of the world? Life ain’t fair or predictable. Get over it.
I will say once again, we can not get ahead trying to stop the illegal immigrants. We need to severely prosecute those that give illegal immigrants work. That will stop the flow. As for legals that are too short sighted to plan for a possible need to return, it must suck to be stupid.
As trees are covered by bush,human being are covered by another humans being.So there`s no needs to pays someone who`s around u to go to his/her original place as long he/she remain loyal to the country,people and it leadership.It is wrong in moral terms.I cant do such.
I don’t want my government paying people to leave. Such tax dollars can be better spent elsewhere. Most immigrants here take the jobs no one else will do. If there is no work they will leave; no need to pay them to do something they will do on their own.
No Vanessa, those jobs pay so little because illegal immigrants are so desperate that they will accept the ridiculous wages. Start fining the people that hire them and the wages will get to a point that a local can afford to do them. The illegals will disappear too. But then will you want to pay 4 times the money for your strawberries? I would.
You are just spouting Bush’s favorite misleading line.
So Tom, you want to pay immigrants to leave and you don’t think the money can be better spent elsewhere? Perhaps our education system that is slowly disentigrating? As far as taking jobs no one else will take, do you have experience in that? I certainly do; I’ve worked in berry fields and no, I don’t have an issue paying higher prices for berries picked @ fair wages. I already responsibly buy food from my local farmers but that is kinda beside the point. Bottom line, minimum wage for hard work is something most Americans are too lazy to do no matter how dire their own financial situation is. I’ve seen that as well. Last time I checked berry picking is not a $20 an hour job either.
But we are paying American’s ( supposedly ) to drive the buses, maintain the transportation, do the paperwork, watch the Borders and capture the illegals. That’s tax money at work paying American’s. No one’s putting money in the illegals pockets to leave. They are just helping us spend more to do more that we wish we didn’t have to spend. At least it’s providing some jobs and those employees are putting taxes back into the system. No taking it to another country to spend!
That practice is so demeaning and it doesn’t solve the problem. Why are “they”, if “they” can, fleeing their country in the first place? Fight the problem at the source and don’t fight the symptoms. Any goverment paying people to leave is just putting a number on life itself.
Well said Konstantin!
In the early 1930’s, roughly a million Mexicans and Mexican-Americans were rounded up and deported back to Mexico. Why? Because lots of angry and unemployed whites blamed them and did it. This is STILL not taught in most U.S. schools.
Will this happen again? The real unemployment rate in the States is around 18%. If it’s gets worse, nothing would surprise me.
I agree – People generally exhibit the amount of morality that they can afford…
@ John of the million Euros: I hear your frustration!
At the end of the day, at least in the United States, you see a pretty good cross-section of humanity on the unemployment rolls. There are not enough immigrants holding “our” jobs that we need to fret, folks. Of those I know who have jobs, all three arrived in this country about fifteen years ago. One was a military spouse. The other two were transferred in with their firms. That’s not the sort of immigrant I’d be seeing at the job centre, let’s say, or the Salvation Army.
Besides, if the economy’s so awful that we can’t support our own working population, I cannot see my government spending the money to pay a non-citizen to leave. Like everyone else who “can’t make it here anymore”, either he stays here indigent or he finds his own way elsewhere.
No you can’t pay them, they’ll just come back and use the money you gave them to live a little longer in your country.
leaving the country if am paid to all depends on how much they are willing to pay me and what prospects i will have in the country that i am going to next.
PAYING TO REVERSE IMMIGRATION
There is a good PR and abusive PR. There is a good image creation and a bad one. What I think these countries are trying to avoid is the creation of negativity because they care. See the partern? None of these countries are English speaking. Remember too that probably these individuals were underpaid due to the types of the jobs that were on offer.
Secondly most of the reactions coming from citizens of the developed world are symtomatic of the extent of economic rot. I can understand the feelings of one who is not paid those handouts simply because he is not an immigrant. Jelous is the answer because of the sense of entitlement. I feel jealous to but at the same time I feel this is justified since it is a voluntary philanthropic gesture.
For the now disoriented immigrant, the point is not the handout per se. It should be on how you will adopt to life back home and to transform your lot so that you can reverse the false notion that every promise you hear was made with you in mind.
Best thing is to keep illegal migrants out in the first place.
IMO countries, such as the US, Britain and Spain, that structure their economies so as to be dependent a cheap labour pool provided by illegal migrants are acting immorally – its not much better than serfdom. Such countries deserve all the problems these policies create, except that its the migrants who suffer of course.
Australia cops a lot of criticism for its immigration policies, but I’m fairly confident that people who migrate here legally or who are accepted as refugees will never be paid to leave.
It’s populist dangerous nonsense, sure to stir up and validate the the passions of bigots, racists, and those who simply cannot or will not see the real issue at stake, i.e. an global economy that keeps millions of people in poverty and insecurity. I can feel a rant coming on, so I’m going now…
I think I agree with the Economist, it is a short term solution. The money which is being used to pay immigrants could be used for far more productive things like investing to provide jobs to locals rather than bribing the immigrants.
I believe that the immigrants would themselves go back when they realise they arent enough work around especially in an economic downturn. Most of my friends who came to UK to study with me a few years ago have given up due to the poor job prospects and gone back to their developing economy where there are more job prospects. I dont think the immigrants need to be paid to be sent back, most of them are voluntarily going because they realise the risk of staying in an environment where job prospects are scarce which leads to favouring the locals rather than immigrants.
Maybe I have generalised the attitude of the immigrants here but I still feel paying someone to leave the country is not the way forward.
But there is a bright side to it i think, at last the immigrants will get the fair money that they have always deserved but never got!
What? Are they in the country legally to fill a need? Then why ask them to leave? Are they in the country illegally causing an adverse affect on the community? Then round them up and send them home to get in line behind the people trying the legal route.
While we are at it, why not pay drug dealers to stop dealing drugs, bank robbers to stop robbing banks, sex offenders to stop raping people? Hey, I will be checking my mail everyday for my payment for not speeding or driving erratically?
[i]
Interesting question. You pay them to leave, fine. Then who does the jobs that keeps the economy going? Consider all the mexican immigrants leaving the United states, or all the immigrant workers at the BBC worldservice returning home? there would be serious gaps in some cases total collapse. Funds meant to pay off immigrants could find better use else where. Immigrants form the core of any civilization. Anywhere.[/i]
This sounds as though its directed at legal migrants. That would be wrong. For people to enter a country lawfully, settle there and become part of a community only to find themselves singled out in an economic downturn is quite immoral; only acceptable to racists like the BNP or the Japanese.
Like RightPaddock I think it best to avoid this situation by keeping out illegal immigrants; throwing out promptly – without a penny’s compensation – illegals who get through; reducing or freezing legal immigration; and limiting asylum only to a very few hundred people a year.
@Ann: ‘…a global economy that keeps millions of people in poverty…’? Please! Have you ever heard of a country whose people were characterised by intelligence, hardwork, thrift, self-sacrifice, public spirit, inventiveness, respect for property rights and the rule of law, and an ability to think in terms of the long-term and the national interest who, despite all those qualities, were poor? Cultivate those virtues as a nation and you’ll be rich on a barren piece of rock (like Japan); without them you’d be poor even if your country sat on gold, diamonds and oil.
Victor – maybe I’m being a bit dense (I can be sometimes – cognitive problems because of illness) but I’m not sure I get the point you’re making here. Are you saying that a nation is poor because it lacks those virtues? If so, do you think that applies to individuals too?
Would I take money to leave the country? It would depend on why I left my country in the first place. If my country of origin was a dangerous place to live, you probably couldn’t give me enough money to go back.. If it was strictly an economic problem, if I was given enough money where I could set up a business or invest in something that would give me some income long-term, I would probably go home. Most of the immigrants I have met plan on going back home anyway once they have enough money saved up, but with the economic woes, I guess people are looking at encouraging them to go back home sooner.
In America every wave of immigrants has helped to rebuild/re-fashion this country keeping us fresh, vital and alive.
Except for the extreme elements of America no one can belive that we would pay any immigrant to go “home” as America IS their home and losing them would sap us of our vitality.
The loss recently of Hispanics is the illegal immigrants who came here for the economic opportunity that no longer exists in such abundance and so they chose to go home to Mexico.
@Nelson Isibor June 24, 2009 at 13:34 – sorry, but that’s nonsense. No country needs immigrants that badly. In their absence the wage rate for the jobs that natives supposedly don’t want to do would simply rise till someone wanted to do them. Americans made their country the kind of place that Mexicans wanted to come to, and even before the flood of European immigration at the turn of the 20th Century Americans had already made their country a worthwhile place, without the help of immigrants. The same with Britain.
You also ignore the question of the quality of immigrants. No country needs unskilled migrants and few countries of the world are sufficiently developed to provide anything that’s on average better. There isn’t much of an argument for mass migration (at least from a national point of view – individual corporations may find benefits, but no country ought to be run with a view to corporate interests).
Sorry Victor – don’t mean to pick on you but that really isn’t the case. I know of many countries where the only people employers can get to do unskilled work/low paid work are migrants. When I lived in Spain, most of the field workers were Moroccan or of African origin because local people would do those jobs. The highlands of Scotland too – hotels can’t get staff, Perthshire in Scotland – your strawberries will be picked by Polish migrants because the local people think this work is beneath them! And I know I lived there until recently and have picked strawberries.
And then idea that if we keep out migrants wages will go up, sadly just doesn’t happen. There were no immigrants where I grew up, but sadly my parents broke their backs all their lives for a pittance of a wage.
Ann Victor is 100% correct. Maybe you wouldn’t do the work if it paid reasonably well. I understand, I wouldn’t do food service work , even for ‘good pay’. But many will. Immigrant labor, especially illegals, drive down wages to the point that locals can’t afford to do the job.
I’m all for importing skills and education, but we have enough unskilled and uneducated people already! We don’t need to import any more.
At first the notion did smack of nationalism, if not racism. But in Dubai, poor workers have been lured by promises of good pay and
the chance to send money home but, upon arrival, have had their passports taken and are forced to live in horrible labor camps
working for a fraction of the pay they were promised. Now the bubble has burst and some of their employers have up-staked
abandoning their workers without pay or passports. IF they could go home, they’d still owe the loan sharks the $2-3,000 fee that
they borrowed to pay the “job broker”. In cases like that, a stipend of a few thousand dollars could begin to restore a life. So I’m
thinking that the notion of paying immigrants to go home is not inherently bad; I will, however, be pleasantly surprised if such
programs can be administered without abuse.
@ Vanessa
That’s not exactly true. While many takes jobs that people in certain areas won’t take, it depends on the area. Where I live, there are very few if any native born people working in fast food. In fact, at the salad place across the street where I occasionally go, I basically have to order in Spanish. But if you go to Indiana, you will see nothing but blond haired, blue eyed teenaged girls working at McDonalds. It depends on the location..
Also, there are plenty of Americans that would love to work in construction, but for the past many years, it’s been illegals only. One of the requirements for the architects and engineers on site supervising construction is that they speak Spanish. Construction is not work that no local wants, it’s good work, and pays well. They just pay less to illegals.
I don’t advocate hiring illegal immigrants, they need to go back to their country and get in line with everyone else. As far as paying lower wages – isn’t that a private employers right? If they are meeting the correct requirements in that state they should be able to hire who they wish. I know I’ve lost out on jobs because I was unwilling to accept a lower wage; on the flip side the employer got someone with less experience.. That’s how business works.
Venessa, if by ‘correct requirements’ you include a legal worker status, you are absolutely correct. That has been the key point.
Yes Tom, I mean legal employment. Illegal workers need to be sent back until they can comply with laws and they need to get in line with everyone else seeking citizenship. I haven’t been clear in all of my posts articulating that point.
I’ve read the opening synopsis and the associated links, and found but one minor reference (in the Wall Street Journal, about the Czech Republic) about whether the immigrants in question are legal or illegal. I see some of the posters above are jumping to conclusions about that, but without the information, this is a pointless discussion topic since we’re not all talking about the same thing.
Are we talking about people who have legitimate work visas? People who overstayed legitimate work or tourist visas? People who were given permission to immigrate? Immigrants who have become citizens? People who illegally crossed the borders in the dead of night? Where is the quality reporting on this issue?
The failure to leave out such a vital piece of information is either a glaring omission of incompetence, or one more example of neo-marxist journalism attempting to rouse the masses into disassembling laws and rules that have successfully defined our society and kept the peace for hundreds of years.
Please further define what this discussion is about. We’ll never get anywhere if we hide from the truth out of fear of hurting someone’s feelings, or worse yet, fear of retaliation. Let’s be brave please.
Hi Steve,
In all the cases discussed (Japan, Czech and Spain) the immigrants were legal. That was pretty clear from the articles I thought. And the reason we haven’t specified one or the the other is that it is interesting to get your views on paying both legal and illegal immigrants, and to see whether it differs. It has nothing to do with seeking to gloss over the issue or not.
Madeleine
Taban Alfred from Southern Sudan/ Juba.
with the power of immigrants the first has become the richers World today, so for me in Southern Sudan we have may immigrants from East Africa, they are infact doing better than the Southners, I will never pay tham to leave Southern Sudan since they are doing development in my Country.
A lot of interesting comments here, but let’s separate illegal immigrants from legal immigrants. In the case of Czech, Spain and Japan they are paying people who all had legal work visas to leave. Does it change your view if the immigrants are fully paid up legal?
Madeleine
@ WHYS
In that case, only in countries where they don’t worry about political correctness would that happen. I cannot see that ever being allowed in the US or the UK. However, Japan, given they have no multiculturalism, and openly discriminate against non Japanese people, I can easily seeing this happen there. I know a Pakistani/Canadian working in Japan teaching English, and they offered him money to go home, but he refused.
If you’re speaking of guest workers rather than legal or illegal immigrants, the fair thing is to pay them to come in times of worker shortage and pay them to leave in times of worker excess.
Legal immigrants are just that–legal. They have chosen a permanent move and the country that accepts them have accepted them on that basis. To ask them to leave in hard times would be ridiculous..
Illegal immigrants have no rights except to be deported and, simply because they are human, too, be handled in a compassionate way.
I will also be willing to push immigrants who are unproductive and unimportant to the development of my country.
Its always to follow the advice of the holy bible: if one arm causes u to sin, cut it off.
so, it will be better to cut off what is biting your butt.
Hi Esau, what is your country?
Paying people to leave a country would only work for legal immigrants. For illegal immigrants, it would be an INCENTIVE to continually, repeatedly, violate immigration laws. That would be a reward for them making it to your country, then the cost of deporting them, and then they would just come back because you are offering free money…
This would be arguably a WORSE situation than currently, because at least illegal immigrants work now, even if they send large amounts of money back to their home country. If we rewarded them for getting in the country by handing out money, they wouldn’t bother to work… they’d just get here, take their handout, return home, then do it again…
My husband entered the US illegally in 2001. His original plan was to work like a madman for 2-3 years, then go back home with enough capital to start a business. Colombia was in a very bad state at that time, no jobs, a lot of violence. We met and plans changed, we decided to get married. We thought it would be easy from there, but after 9/11, immigration became a lot more difficult, even for people married to a US citizen. He had to leave the country and we have been waiting 4 long years for a yay or nay from immigration. The happy ending is that immigration finally responded and said yay, and he should be coming home at the end of this year.
Once again, it’s really all about a person’s long-term plans. After four years and a small fortune paid to immigration to get legal, I doubt you could give my husband enough money to go back home.
@ Viola
But what about legal immigrants/guest workers, with no path to citizenship, like Turks in Germany? You could be third generation born in Germany, and you are not a German citizen, with no hopes of becoming a German citizen.
Hello Steve,
In your note you explain that a person can be third generation born in Germany and he/she are not a German citizen. If you have any document or any website that I gather more knowledge about this issue I appreciate you sent them to me
regards
Maurice
@WHYS – whether they are legal or illegal makes no difference to me. If people are illegal migrants then they are not entitled to state benefits, this means they have to work to make a living. I have no problem with that.
If I lived in a country wrecked by civil war, poverty, ethnic cleansing etc and had to flee, then I would hope that I would be treated with some humanity and respect.
If we pay people to leave who are here legally, how long will it be before they are replaced by more (legal) immigrants? Probably not long. Paying people to leave is an exercise in futility, and it’s a waste of money.
@ steve
I worked at a construction company in the Midwest before I moved out here a few years ago…as for the laborer positions, the Mexicans were much harder workers than the few American laborers they had. Also, it was fantastic pay by Mexican standards, but by American standards, it really wasn’t. I would definitely say it was a case of the Mexicans wanting the jobs more.
@ Roy, on air comment
Technically, if the government is paying immigrants with worker visas to go home they can also deny them work new worker visas. if companies cannot afford to pay its workers the company should not be importing more people.
This discussion has divide the topic. You need two topics. Racial persecution/xenophobia and immigration. Each on its own is a good topic. But illegal immigration is winning out over the persecution in Ireland.
This global downturn is a test to humanity, look at the world & it chameleon tactic!!!!!
If we are talking about legal guest workers I don’t see the point. Here in the US it is not easy to get a work VISA so I can’t see the point of paying tax dollars to ship them out. Money would be spent better on creating sustainable jobs for US citizens.
I think this is a lame topic and we should be doing the Burqua show instead.
Immigrants who are legally settled in a country must be accepted to live, work and remain in the country with eqal rights of abode. They must not be forced out against their will but given the option of payment as compensation should they agree to leave. Illegal immigrants can be told to leave as they do not have the right to remain.
@Ann: my apologies if I didn’t express myself as clearly as I should have.
Economic prosperity is a collective, market-based, enterprise, and so what applies to a nation (despite its being individuals viewed in the aggregate) needn’t apply as strictly to an individual (especially where distorting factors apply to market incentives and rewards – see the succeeding paragraph). But I still think that the following would hold good: of two individuals situated in the same economic climate, the one who possesses the qualities I’ve indicated will, as a rule, do better than the one who lacks most or all of them.
Re migrants and wages: I have to disagree with you. It’s a basic matter of supply and demand, unless intersected by additional factors like minimum wage regulation and the level of welfare payments. Where minimum wage laws apply, but the minimum wage is below the market rate for a job, and where welfare payments, singly or in combination with a minimum wage, are below the market rate, then a reduction in the supply of labour (e.g. a sudden departure of migrant workers) will lead to a rise in wages.
Thank you Victor – I think the fault was mine, but you have given a very clear and persuasive argument – and I’m nearly in agreement with you 🙂
Okay Victor if I accept your arguments here, then does this not mean that there ARE structural inequalities in our collective market based economy? That is to say, the very things that drive capitalism (supply and demand, profit above all else etc) actually create low wages, job insecurity, poverty and ultimately economic migrants moving around within a international and ruthless economic market place. How would you propose we stop this happening? Are the countries that are ‘inviting’ migrants to go home simply blaming the victims? Because that’s what these proposals like to me. How do we create stable economic conditions in which people would not feel the need to migrate (leaving aside the other causes of migration)?
@Steve: the Germans no longer conflate citizenship with blood descent.
Those born on German soil can now become citizens, even if born to non-German parents.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turks_in_Germany
I think it can be a fare policy,if the workers are legally eligible for work to begin with;and have legal identification.
Then paying enough to move back home is o.k.;but if they are not legally in the country,they should be punished under law and sent back empty handed.
As for those who believe that certain jobs are only done by immmigrants because those jobs are considered somthing below standard;here in the USA,many of the jobs taken by immigrant workers are because employers,operating in a free market get people to work for as little as possible.
No matter if the job is construction or manufacturing,when it comes to labor;cheaper is better.The wages paid are less than the real cost of living.
All industrialized countries need better control over immigration to better serve their citizens needs and less the needs of companies.
Workers migrate legally or illegally in response to employers’ desire for profit-maximizing cheap labor. Assertions that a particular country “needs’ them are ludicrous. Migrants often bring only the most basic skill sets, usually not as developed as those available in the local population. Comments that migrants will perform menial tasks that natives will not are similarly flawed, as they never reference pay scales. The current question suggests specific employers should benefit during periods of economic growth, while general tax payers should foot the bills during an economic downturn. This seems unfair to me. Perhaps it would be better if every employer wishing to hire guest workers enters into a surety bond agreement with said workers and with the government. Let those who profit most bear the greater costs of an economic downturn.
g
– Just my two cents on the issue of illegal immigrants taking jobs that American workers need, about 50% of my co-worker’s husbands are out of work, they were mostly working in construction. I heard most of them say, with my own ears, list all the jobs they would not do, most of which were jobs that immigrants, legal and otherwise, do. Most of them would not pick strawberries or tomatoes, in fact a lot of them said they would not work at a 7-11 because they would not make enough, they said they might as well keep getting unemployment. Of course, I know this is not true for everyone, but this is how it is in my corner of the world. When my husband was here, there was nothing he wouldn’t do, and when he gets back, it will probably be the same.
The biggest issue with immigrants isn’t so much the jobs they take but the burden their children are putting on our health and education systems.
The adults who come here find work that needs to be done so how about taking the money we would have to spend educating and providing health care for each child they might have and giving a portion of that to each immigrant couple who agree not to have that child. If they then change their minds they would have to pay that money back with interest instead of getting the credit that other taxpayers get for having a child.
Depending on where you live in Switzerland, from one in six to one in three residents is not Swiss. There are some illegals, but due to the strict controls they are few.
Switzerland does not have the same immigration problems that exist in my native California–but Switzerland is a small, fragile country that’s full up. I am a citizen, I speak the local language and have been assimilated. A lot of immigrants have not. The Swiss–myself included–are fed up with the cultural dilution that is due to immigration. Some people interpret this as racism, but it isn’t: the Swiss just want to preserve their cultural identity and heritage.
I wish the government WOULD pay to return some of the immigrants to their homelands. Since they won’t, I and a lot of other Swiss who are liberals like me do the only thing they can by voting for right-wing anti-immigration political parties.
Why should anyone be paid to leave a country they live in legally? It just sounds absurd. These people have a right to make a living as much as Most likely an immigrant took the time to get citizenship in another country because their own country is in the toilet. Nice how people want to send immigrants away because someone born in the country can’t find a job.
It’s not always the case that immigrants take jobs locals wont touch. I have been looking around for something for just a pay check and have found that despite being an educated local I am often told that I am not qualified while a recent arrival with no language skills often fills such positions, so that argument doesn’t really carry much weight if you look into it. But such a scheme would undoubtedly be abused, what is to stop an increase in immigration to cash in on such a proposal?
If the gov’t has so much money to give out, why not give it to the people who are out of work and in need, rather than bribing immigrants to leave.? If the work dries up, it seems that those in need will move to more abundant areas. I live in a valley where loggers are essentially permanently out of work, because the cost of wood products has plummeted. Rather than pay others to leave with the idea of improving the limited market, why not pay to retrain people like these loggers to do other jobs. That way the stability of local economies will bolster the flagging urban jobs and industry, by making it possible for people to survive without having to commute into the cities to find work…..
@ Venessa
But it’s just a choice. They aren’t being forced to leave, they are being paid to live. I think some native born citizens would take the money to leave as well if they could get work elsewhere.
Steve –
Then they can choose to leave on their own. I’m not keen to finance someone else’s move or kick a legal immigrant out because I am a native citizen that can’t find work. Perhaps if I can’t find work I should evaluate my skills or the type of work I am seeking. These legal immigrants are also tax paying citizens and are contributing to their local economies; why should they be penalized because they have a job or are employable and were born elsewhere in the world. We all compete in the job market regardless of where we come from. Blaming one section of the population for economic problems and lack of work is absurd.
This is an interesting subject and all, but didn’t NORTH KOREA JUST SAY THEY WERE GONNA WIPE THE U.S. OFF OF THE MAP?!?!?! Maybe we shopuld drop this one till tomorrow, because thats pretty scary stuff. Hello WWIII, lets start taking sides. I’ll take the EU, India and Britain, but who’s gonna get China, thats what I want to know!!!
-Anthony, LA, CA
Spanish Ministry of Labour’s officials say the initiatives are to soften the consequences the crisis has on immigrants who were hired for unqualified jobs and now find themselves without any working expectation suffering thus more than any other group.
The reason that goes underneath is nothing but a desperate attemp from the government to make-up the dreadful rates of unnemployment.
It sounds tempting, dangling some carrot before the horse, you mean? I think the paying off of immigrants is a big hole for tax payers. At the same time the money is good to have them settled in their respective countries. Between a rock and a hard place, Iam.
Height of selfishness! What forced those countries to allow in immigrants in the first place? What about the lessons on integrating with local culture. And what about englishmen telling how they don’t like Pakistani immigrants in UK supporting Pakistan cricket team while playing against England? When I tell some thing, it is right. When I tell the opposite, it is also right – An Englishman. I was told that foreigners working in gulf countires are always treated as foreigners. That is a better way to deal with immigrants.
Your doing it backwards.
We treat Mexican seasonal workers who come to Canada the same as other Canadians and charge ‘ unemployment insurance ‘, or ’employment tax’ to the Mexicans.
If I were living illegally in the US or Britain I’d take the money go home and return with more family members so that you’ll have to pay them to leave to.
What a great way to live a state sponsored life.
oops that was meant to read…
“because that’s what these proposals smell like to me”.
What do you guys think about the highly skilled imigrants?
I’m one of those and I’m moving to the UK soonly. My visa strated on May 2009.
How does the British people see this kind of imigrants in such a turbulent time?
I’d sure chip in to send US Conservatives back to wherever they and their ancestors came from, they have wrecked our economy so many times that they have worn out their welcome, if they were ever welcome at all!
The more I think of it, the worse the idea of paying people to leave your country sounds.
1) Paying people to leave your country means that money will be leaving your country with them. This has been a large problem for America in the last couple decades – people immigrating to the US (legally or illegally) and sending much of their paychecks back to their home countries to support families. That money is taken out of the local economy and no longer helps to fuel it – that’s a net loss.
2) When you’ve got a problem, multiple problems, often you can use them to solve each other. Right now, the world is in an economic crisis. Its also got a pollution crisis and an energy crisis. And in the US at least there is an infrastructure crisis. The pollution and energy crisis can be a huge job sink (installing new types of energy generation – wind, solar, etc etc), as can the infrastructure crisis. And new jobs help combat the economic crisis. Far better to use $$ as start up money for infrastructure and green energy businesses – sound investments for investors who are nervous about the financial market I might add – than dump the money into someone’s pocket to live off of for a few months until it runs out and they are left in the same situation.
As the old saying goes, give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime.
Ok, if the question is ‘is it a good idea to pay a legal and productive immigrant/migrant worker to leave?’, I say no. To me it would be a politician trying to look productive at the cost of a free global market. It is a question of globalization or capitalism or protectionism depending on which aspect you choose to look at.
A comment about what happenend in Northern Ireland:
‘In Northern Ireland this week the government there is paying for the airfares home of around 100 Romanian Gypsies who’ve been the victim of racist violence’…
Seems like a strange solution to me. Send the victims home?? How about making examples out of the offenders by imposing harsh penalties for such behavior! This behavior is intolerable!
My question: Doesn’t sending the Romanian’s home give the wrong message to the offenders and their empathizers?
I worked in Japan in the 1990’s and met some of these workers. I think that they will probably need help to repatriate. The Japanese government gave them a good opportunity to work there during the boom times, but I don’t think that it had a long-term strategy for their return.
Many of these folks have kids in the Japanese public school system, etc., and will have a lot of adjusting to do to get their families reestablished in Brazil.
$3,000 is a ridiculous lowly amount. A typical legal immigrant working in a first world nation for approx 10 years would land up paying at the very minimum about $20,000 in Social security and medical taxes. Will they be paid back this amount that they are no longer eligible to reap benefits of?
It is absurd to try and defend the local residents who cannot hold on their jobs coz of their lack of skills. This is not a solution for recession – it is a step towards depression
Many immigrants see the amount of money offered as dismal as it can’t help them to survive in their home countries for more than a year. Only those with substantial saving can return to set up at least small projects to keep their heads above water.
Other immigrants find it difficult to return because of their children who are still at school. I will be difficult for them to fit in the school of their parents country of origin because of language and curriculum. There is the example of Moroccan parents whose children have been studying in Spanish and they will find it difficult to study in Moroccan schools where lessons are largely in French and Arabic.
Would you pay immigrants to leave your country?
There are about 20million illegal Bangladeshi immigrants in India,I don’t think the government of India could afford repatriation.
Canada should pay the French to leave ,they can afford it.
Do the latin Americans mix into Japanese society at all? Do they keep to themselves? Are they prevented from mixing in? I was in Nagoya for 10 days in 2004, though I was only in the downtown area, and didn’t see a single person that was not Asian other than the Americans I was with, who were just there for a short period of time.
Your caller in Mexico is talking about illegal immigrants, many of which are bankrupting hospitals and states like california because of the costs they incurr, they also aren’t paying taxes because they are being paid illegally under the table. The sales taxes they pay don’t compensate for the costs, plus they remit a lot of the money they make back to their homes in Mexico or wherever in central America they are from.
Please BBC, on air, make the distinction of legal vs. illegal immigrants like you have on the blog.
Strange thinking I cannot imagine the west doing the same if they can be confronted with the same question by developing nations. Human beings are interdependant there is no need of pushing people around just because this world doesnt below to anyone. Naked we came the way we shall leave mother earth. This is being uncilivised and having no focus,instead the governments should invest the money in creatng jobs. Politics of the 19th century are useless and we not help the world in anyway. All what the governments should start doing is revive the allocation systems of wealth. The gap between the poorest person and the richest has grown much bigger and wider.
It seems like the comments, especially from the US, are confusing the legal status of immigrant workers that may be compensated to return to their country. I imagine that restrictions have already been placed on the work permits available to act as a control against people abusing this system and that a person must have a valid work permit to receive compensation. The immigration debate in the US centers around undocumented workers and this seems to be clouding the views of my countrymen in this discussion.
The Spanish deal to South American workers seems quite humane because they get a % of their wages and after five years, they allowed to come back as a fast track immigrant.
I am almost appalled by previous posters from the United States. I am a citizen and have been all my life. We are a country built on immigrants and I think as a nation we fail to recognize that. We throw areound the term, “illegal Immigration” all the time like it is something new. We have always had this issue. The term WOP was given to many italians at Ellis Island. The term meant “Without Papers.” We could use that term to identify my grandparents. However, I am a working member of our society. I think that those who have paid into our social security system could be given 3 months of their benfits and forfeit the remainder and be given a free ride home. With the contract stating they may not return for 7 years. We need to figure out how to stop what has started in this country as far as the immigration policy. Immigrants are here because our labor force refuse to pick our agricultural produce, process meat, and be hotel maids. We have decided this kind of manual labor is “beneath us.” If we are serious about immigration issues we need to hold those companies and corperations accountable. But to hate those who are here, like our grandparents, to provide a better life for their children, is appalling, racist, and demeaning to me as an American.
I think that the countries government is allowed to do this so long as they aren’t forcing the people to take this option. So long as it remains a free choice for the people then the government is just trying a new “outside of the box” method of helping to reduce their unemployment rate
What are the comparative costs of deporting these immigrants? When you tally the cost of the man hours it takes to deport one immigrant, and the cost to hold the individual, is it more less or equal to paying the individual to leave the country?
There already are controls on the types of work visas allowed in I would imagine every country, so that if the type of employment allowed under the visa is not available, then the worker would basically be kicked out anyway. Is this basically a way out for the gov to rescind visas?
In my opinion, we have no business at all hiring migrant workers, especially for agriculture. Here in the United States, it has resulted in an underclass of people who do much of the difficult, dirty, or low-paying work while the rest of us grow fat and lazy. This can’t be good for us Americans, and it can’t be good for the countries from which the migrants come. Aren’t their skills needed where they come from? Shouldn’t we in the developed world do our own dirty work instead of importing people to do it for us?
01. WHOMSOEVER invites immigrants should pay an advance repatriation deposit with the Home Affairs department which should not renew the work-permits when they expire for non-vital immigrants.
02. The Royal Air Force should deport those who remain beyond the expiry of their work permits.
03. The Home Affairs department should not allow relatives of approved workers to settle except perhaps the immediate family (excluding arranged marriages).
04. Better to pay immigrants to leave than pay the same amount over and over on housing, social services, taxpayer handouts, court cases and appeals etc.
Otherwise the problem increases exponentially. The money should be deducted from the (abused) Foreign Aid budget wherein funds go to India and Pakistan which can afford nuclear weapons.
Since your limiting it to legal immigrants, then I can’t see any justification to pay someone to leave. If they don’t want to be citizens of the country and they are no longer needed, remove their legal status and have them leave. If they desire to change citizenship, let them stay, make the change and help improve the society!
I think it is violation of UDHR:
Article 13.
(1) Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state.
(2) Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.
We have to discuss education for chilren of migrants who are studying in Japanese schools. They grew up in Japan and they might speak only Japanese or they are learning Japanese as a second language. Who are going to be responsible for them?
This is so stingy for the Japanese government just to give the immigrants money to go back to “their country,” (and when they give them working permit, the government give it because they are Japanese descent) and now they are throwing away because they don’t need them anymore. Just like they did to their ancestors.
Lower paid jobs would be taken by local UK citizens if refusal to accept those jobs meant their taxpayer funded money gets cut off. Thus there is no need for non-European immigrants to do such jobs so they must go back, voluntarily or otherwise.
Workers should not be sent back at all.Its not fair to squeeze them dry in more than one way.Not just financially, The citizens of the so called developed countries should thank them! Not USE AND THROW them.Paying them to go back home should not be a question at all!!
Re: Would you like to see your government pay to send immigrants home, especially if they are out of work?
Well, I am sure they would just use the money to get some new “papers” and come right back. And, they receive services already. So, it’s a waste of money.
LISTEN TO THE CASTAWAYS
To the immigrants legal or not, the best decision you can make is to go back home based on what I have observed on this blog. It is not your fault nor the fault of your foreign hosts. It is simply bad leadership in the entire world. Reading on this blog, gives me the scary feeling that all of us have been failed by capitalism and democracy, socialism, and communism. You can clearly read here the epitaph to the International community too. Who created a first, a ……. and a third world?
I lose words to give analysis of the prattle coming of genuine human minds and hearts. Never mind, its always the terminal stage alone that can have the power to attack one’s own gramma and get away with it. The whole planet is defrauded east or west and ordinary mortals can no longer avoid feasting on one another.
I’m with you Arthur, in your heartfelt comments here. Sometimes I watch the goings on of the world and it breaks my heart. So much delusion, so much fear, so much blaming and so much suffering. It takes all the strength I have not to become cynical, for if I do then I become swallowed up by the forces of negativity that destroys us all. So I refuse to give up on the idea of humanity’s inherant goodness.
Please keep posting – I love reading your thoughtful comments.
MY RESPONSE TO AN ON THIS BLOG
Thank you my sister. Its not for nothing that sometimes I wonder if I sound funny to some people on this blog. We have been pumelled with so many goody ideas which when you sift through them, you won’t be supprised why some of us have lost the sense of self worth or our natural innocense. Life is but a block of time and it comes with a label which has the initial date and expiry date. A country can afford to do mistake for 300 years, but honestly should a small chiled delude him/herself that he/she will be here a another hundred years. No but they do. It is in this respect that I feel that ordinary people in the so called first world and to the worst extent the third world have been reduced to continue wallowing with a distorted view of reality. They are made to chase a mirrage.
Have you seen people wounded in unpatriotic wars? You and I and many others are all walkig wonded spiritually. This is not a metaphor; it is reality. We are all like some helpless birds whurled inside some gigantic turbine which has left us dazed with illusion. It is time for ordinary people to reach out for each other and lend support. Kindness of spirit can take us far than the ever elusive goal.
Finally it is good for all citizens of the world to cultivate self worth and be optimistic about peace and future. True peace can never be stolen from you without your consent or complicity wherever you are. Remember too that sometimes we land in a ditch through our sense of trust that is often abused by those who should know. I admire your views too because I read everyone. For now put a tape or disk on you machine and let your bold spirit dance; whatever the music.
I had to go through a strict and long vetting process in the US to prove that my job could not be done my an American national. In many cases guest workers are simply filling roles that nationals can not or will not do.
Many guest workers are there simply because there is no work for them at home. I moved my family to Houston because I could not find work in my field in London. If I were asked to leave the US I would have to find a new career to support my family.
Please identify the governments and/or companies which INVITE “legal” immigrants to do low paid jobs? Those issuing invitations know such immigrants fail to leave during recessions. Simply keep them out. but alas common sense is very scarce
No chance in the United States. We are a nation of minorities, immigrants. The only group that can rightfully ask for everyone else to leave are the Indian Americans.
Perfectly reasonable from an economic perspective (In Europe), after all, you’re mostly concerned about your country and it’s traditional inhabitants and their economic well being. The USA? Forget about it.
TO THE ‘MIGRANT WORKERS’
‘For I have to go to England and be a lord.’
explained Cedric sweet-temperedly.
[FRANCES HODGSON BURNET]
But the gods have curtailed the dream of migrants. I feel sorry for them too but I have no regrets because this not the worst that can happen to an individual. Don’t forget that,if not all some have contributed to the brain drain in some quarters and that is why the world is lopsided and has lost the sense of balance. It might be a time for some honest payback to your mother or father countries.
What is all this apprehension of going back home? You have an advantage because of good connections and extensive skills to give you a new start. Go home and spur another third world tiger nations by improving your home economies. The bell tolls for you to do something. You are not though being asked to go home and take part in riots to destroy your home countries. Take the opportunity,
Take the money and run;
Your home is Rome too.
Hello again
And hello everybody. There are too many human beings on our planet. We are crowding out the things we need to survive. We are destroying the rain forests. We are using up the natural resources. We are poluting our atmosphere. The seas are being emptied of fish. And still we are ever increasing our numbers. The people who live on the front line of this human disaster are trying to flee. They emmigrate to places where they think they have a chance of surviving and I’m sure that any amount of money will not persuade them to go back to where they came from and stay there.
Being a pantheist I cannot propose any solution to save humanity but I’m sure humanity will be absorbed by nature and put to good use for the continuation.
Jim
The reason people migrate is for food and work. When the economy turns down and those become competitive with the natural citizens of that country, the government of that country should have the immigrants leave without paying them. Of course, who leaves and who stays depends on economic contribution to the economy. But then again, politics weigh heavily and governments usually do the wrong thing.
Arthur, you have touched my heart and made me cry. I’m fortunate not to have personally seen the results of war, but grew up watching 16 years of alcoholism and violence in my own home. Poverty, shame, squalour and the terrible effects of bitterness, despair and rage. It was kind of war you could say. I’ve also know what it is to be an ‘outsider’ and to suffer the indignity of being looked down upon and unwanted, just as those poor migrants must feel. Growing up like that gives one a sense of empathy with all the other people who are suffering. And the world is suffering as Jim Newman says, and we foolish yet wonderful humans squabble over what’s left. Like you, I wish we could all wake up and realise that the only way forward is through tolerance, kindness and seeing beyond the barriers of language, skin colour and territory.
Enjoy your beautiful mountain my friend – I’m no longer living in Scotland, but we have some lovely mountains there too 🙂
@ Ann
Thanks you so much. It makes me realize that what I see on this blog is not some fogery by BBC but real stuff from real people like you. You are real and you make feel real instantly now. Without you all am not real.
Hey, I appreciate all the comments and it is an honor to find this kindly reciprocative gesture. The truth is I normally go through what all of you are saying since you have become part of me world. I will cotinue to be part of this team which is like a family to me. Oh, I know sometimes I can be noughty even though I cannot tell. Thankfully you are my mirror through whom I perceive my self. If I am too notorious, don’t anyone hesitate to hurl your best shoes at me provided they are muddy enough.
The mountain? Thats another surprise from you. I had forgotten that there is such a thing. Its a true beauty even though it resembles an exotic glass of beer and I thoroughly enjoy seeing it every morning. Its a gift to humanity and on your behalf, I am keeping a dedicated watch for you all.
Thats my genuine say on the BBC WHYS. I am real.
There could be a more equitable and long term solution than paying them a single lump sum and that is to offer them a life pension in a country of their choice. which of course could be terminated if ever they come back again.
To legal immigrants that would be a way of returning the charges they have paid as guest workers.
A similar solution could be worked out for the illegals.
After all they are just intruders and law breakers.
Again: Immigration is a form of invasion of a country. Race notwithstanding.
Some twenty years ago a plane landed at Plaisance airport, Mauritius with 275
asylum seekers on board. The plane was turned away forthwith.
Every country in the world is a nation of immigrants. To kick out immigrants at the point of a gun or with a fat paycheck is like slapping yourself in the face with ignorance and hypocrisy.
Give me your tired your poor
Your huddled masses yearing to breathe free
The wretched refuse of your teaming shore
Send these the tempest tossed to me
I lift my lamp beside the golden door
The people you other countries cast off as the rejects, trash, the losers, the great unwashed to your societies, their unwanted presence en mass one of your nation’s worst nightmares are the very strength that built the greatest civilization that ever existed on planet earth. All we ask is that they come legally from all the corners of the earth at a rate we can absorb them at without sudden dire impact to the rest of our society. They and their progeny will be America’s greatest assets in the future just as they have always been for the past 400 years. That is why no matter how things look at any given moment, in the long run America is unbeatable.
Yes, I would agree that my country pay for immigrants to return to their country of origin. Different countries have different problems. Australia is 75% arid, we are already verging on over-population. Perhaps too, some of the returning people could explain to their own country that it is possible to live in a peaceful place, shop without bombs going off. Wouldn’t that be fantastic, for them to influence their own.
I also think that the Islamic people would be happier living with their fellow Muslims. They are such racists and hate us Christians. How hard it must be for them to live amongst us and other Infidels.
My comment got taken off so I’m rephrasing it so maybe it will be left up.
If they are illegal they should leave and just feel lucky they didn’t get caught and get in trouble. To pay them to leave is just crazy. Heck then they will just come here so they can get paid to leave. What a dumb Idea!