… Some may respond, “If Americans won’t work, let’s bring in immigrants who will.” But consider the implications of this argument. It’s well established that the decline in labor-force participation is associated with a host of undesirable outcomes: substance abuse, welfare dependency, poor mental health, crime, lack of family formation, and early death. The fiscal costs associated with all these problems are paid for by taxpayers. Furthermore, the social disorder that plagues communities where many men do not work isn’t confined to those areas. To be sure, a significant share of the millions of the less-educated Americans who have dropped out of the labor force have made poor choices in life. But they are our fellow Americans, and we have a greater responsibility for them than for prospective immigrants overseas who want to come here.
Imagine that you are a U.S. immigration officer, handing out green cards to the would-be Americans of the world. You have before you two applicants who look almost completely the same; for some arcane, unspecified bureaucratic reason, you can only approve one of them. They’re both well-educated by American standards, both bringing identical families, both passed their background checks.
