Migration between countries and within countries

There is currently a major migration crisis in Europe, because there are so many people from Africa and the Middle East who want to come into the EU. The USA have a similar problem with large numbers of people from Mexico trying to cross the border into USA. The consensus is that the problem will be solved by tightening up the border controls. However, I think that the problems might eventually be solved better by allowing free migration to all.

I know this might seem counter intuitive but I think that this lesson comes from a smaller scale migration crisis which we have within Ireland. Basically too many people want to move from relatively poorer areas in the west of Ireland to the greater Dublin area in the East where jobs prospects are better. Everyone agrees that the scale of the migration is unsustainable and it has led to unsustainable growth in rent pries which makes it difficult for people on a normal wage to afford to live.

The big difference with this local migration crisis and the larger one is that there is no international border involved. Hence, nobody is proposing to introduce border controls at the M50 junctions. Instead politicians seek out much more positive steps to solve the crisis e.g. giving companies special grants and/or tax breaks to relocate to an economically disadvantaged part of the country.

It is no longer considered OK to discriminate against people based upon their race or gender, but for some strange reason, it is generally accepted that it is still OK to discriminate against people based upon where  they happened to be born. I know that I am very lucky because I was born in USA to parents who were in turn born in Ireland. This means that I am free to live almost anywhere I like in Europe or North America. But, wht are people who happened to be born in Mexico or Syria denied that right?

Perhaps the same solution could work on a global scale or maybe I am just dreaming?

Do we need imigration controls?

Society is increasingly interested in treating everyone fairly. As our sense of fairness has evolved, we have had campaigns against racism, sexism, agism etc. However, most countries operate an immigration policy which is highly unfair without any public outcry.

All countries have some form of rules about who is allowed to live in the country. Occasionally the rules will include some criterion which might be considered fair e.g. your criminal record, your professional qualifications , etc. - but the most important factor in most countries decision is the totally arbitrary fact of where you and/or your parents were born. Surely the location of where you were born has very little bearing on whether or not you will be an valued member of society.

I appreciate that there are circumstances where the number of people wanting to live in a certain area is above what can be catered for. For example, in Ireland there was until recently a problem where too many people wanted to live in the greater Dublin area and this put strain on the infrastructure. However, when the migration is happening within the country the proposed government response is normally a positive one (e.g. improving job prospects in the relatively under populated west) - imagine the outcry which would result if the government proposed that only people born in Dublin could live in Dublin and put immigration controls on the main roads leading to Dublin.

When too many people from Eastern Europe are migrating to the more developed countries in the West, why does everyone assume that the solution is to put unfair restrictions in place on immigration. Why not instead focus on making living and working conditions more attractive in Eastern Europe? I do realise that there are concerns about the potential for people to abuse social welfare systems, but we could put reasonable restrictions on who is allowed to qualify for social welfare payments without the need to maintain complex immigration controls.

If we abolished immigration controls, the only real losers are the people who have the boring job of checking passports in our airports. If too many job seekers came to Ireland looking for work, they would soon realise that they were in an overcrowded job market and naturally choose of their own accord to move somewhere where they had better employment prospects.