Immigrants Haven't Hurt Pay for Americans

As President Donald Trump’s push for immigration restriction continues, his supporters among the pundit class continue to make economic arguments for closing the country’s gates. That’s only understandable -- it’s easy to blame immigrant competition for economic woes. But very often, it’s wrong.

On a recent appearance on Fox News, classicist and historian Victor Davis Hanson started off with some good and important points about the need for a shared culture to bind together the U.S.’s multiracial society. But he then continued to make some very dodgy economic arguments. Hanson asserted that “the Trump miracle [is] giving empowerment to the working … classes,” and that this empowerment was also being driven by “a radical curtailment [of] illegal immigration.” Hanson credits reduced illegal immigration with lower unemployment and increasing competition for workers.