Immigration - The Scapegoat for the Rich

STOP THE HATE

A recent study by academics from University College London’s Migration Research Unit revealed that over the past decade migrants have made a net contribution of £25 billion to the economy, with migrants from the EU making the largest contribution of all; according to the study they have paid on average 34 percent more in taxes than they received in benefits between 2001 and 2011.

One of the co-authors of the report, Professor Christian Dustmann,  told The Guardian: “Our research shows that in contrast with most other European countries, the UK attracts highly educated and skilled immigrants from within the European Economic Area (EEA) as well as from outside. What’s more, immigrants who arrived since 2000 have made a very sizeable net fiscal contribution and therefore helped to reduce the fiscal burden on UK-born workers.” He continued, "Our study also suggests that over the last decade or so the UK has benefitted fiscally from immigrants from EEA countries, who have put in considerably more in taxes and contributions than they received in benefits and transfers. Given this evidence, claims about 'benefit tourism' by EEA immigrants seem to be disconnected from reality.”

The idea of implementing a 5-year ban on migrants being able to claim benefits contains its own logic in the context of austerity, wherein a crisis of greed and recklessness in the private sector has been turned into a crisis of public spending. Immigration offers an easy scapegoat for the pain being felt by millions as a result of the extreme cuts being made to public spending, with the poor and low waged bearing most of the burden. Anti-immigration sentiment has grown in popularity, which has been created by the government’s dogged determination to implement austerity, regardless of the damage it has done and is doing. It has given rise to fear, anger, and alienation among a large section of the population, making people more receptive to the scapegoating of immigrants as a consequence.

At the beginning of 2014 Britain is one of the most unequal societies in the developed world, with one in three children living in poverty, millions suffering fuel poverty, and the number of food banks multiplying up and down the country in response to growing demand.  This state of affairs is not the fault of immigrants or immigration. This state of affairs is the fault of the rampant greed of the ruling class.

  It illustrates the extent to which mainstream politicians have failed to learn the lessons of history. During the last great global depression in the 1930s, the scapegoating of foreigners, and national, ethnic and religious minorities led to the rise of fascism. The fact that the normalization of anti-immigrant sentiment in Britain and elsewhwere has reached the point where it has been embraced by the government itself has to be a matter of deep and growing concern.

The enemy of people is neither immigrants nor immigration. It is the rich and the governments that govern on their behalf.

Adapted from here