O Intermitente
(So long, farewell, auf weidersehen, good-bye)

terça-feira, setembro 30, 2003

Johan Norberg: Open borders for immigrants as well pt 5/8

Benefícios da emigração

And above all, the immigrants help their home economy in a very substantial way with their remittances. Most people agree that poor countries benefit from free trade, so that they can make money from exports. Labour emigration is the same thing, the only difference is that they do the work in another country, but the money is sent back home just the same. According to the World Bank foreign workers send 70 billion dollars every year to family and relatives. And the true figure may be much higher, because a lot it is sent via informal channels. Some studies suggest they send back 200 billion dollars annually. This is four times more than all western countries send in development assistance every year.

A Philippines Minister of Labour commented in 1985: ?Overseas employment has built more homes, sent more children of the poor to college and established more business enterprises than all the other programmes of the government put together.?

The remittances increase the purchasing power in poor countries, and therefore help agriculture and business, so that they can invest in better production, and it therefore stimulates the growth of the entire economy. Labour emigration may well be one of the most effective ways to conquer world poverty

posted by Miguel Noronha 4:26 da tarde