Immigrants have been central to building America. Opportunity-seeking, energetic, entrepreneurial and freedom-loving, these new "transplants" drawn by the magnet of American opportunity have helped make the United States the most prosperous country in the world. Indeed, Abraham Lincoln gave thanks to God for the contributions of immigrants when proclaiming the second Thanksgiving holiday.
Fast forward to today. Against the backdrop of a depressed economic situation, there are a growing number of debates over immigration policies and anti-immigration sentiment, especially toward the approximately 12 million illegal immigrants in this country. Add to that the restrictions in place to keep immigrants out, even well- qualified ones who could make significant contributions to America, and the picture being painted today is totally different.
Historically, with the passage of the Immigration and Nationality Act in 1965, skilled immigrants have contributed to job and wealth creation. Adoption of a more open immigration policy that at least welcomes the most skilled can help make up our national deficit in so-called STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) degrees and reinstate America's world leadership in economic success. Indeed, a report released by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation that tracked the educational backgrounds of immigrant entrepreneurs who were key founders of technology and engineering companies showed that 53 percent completed their highest degrees at U.S. universities.
Immigration is not a zero-sum game. A talented immigrant can spawn a cycle of shared economic prosperity by creating innovation that leads to the establishment of new industries, which in turn, creates more jobs, reduces unemployment rates and boosts an ailing economy. Skilled immigrants remain a rich source of human capital that has the potential to spur productive entrepreneurship and drive the engine of innovation and economic growth.
Silicon Valley, the poster child of economic contributions of talented immigrants, represents this idea perfectly. Global technology brands often speak of an immigrant co-founder. Google was co-founded by Sergey Brin, a Russian; Sun Microsystems by Vinod Khosla, an Indian and now a leading venture capitalist. eBay was founded by Pierre Omidyar, a French-Iranian. Elon Musk, born in South Africa, co-founded four companies: PayPal, Tesla Motors, SpaceX and SolarCity. YouTube's co-founder, Steve Chen, and Yahoo!'s co-founder, Jerry Yang, are both Chinese immigrants. Andy Grove, a Hungarian, co-founded Intel.
Beyond the Valley, these patterns are mirrored across the nation. From 1995 to 2005, states with an above-average rate of immigrant-founded companies include California (39 percent), New Jersey (38 percent), Georgia (30 percent), and Massachusetts (29 percent). Nationwide, these immigrant-founded companies produced $52 billion in sales and employed 450,000 workers in 2005. Corporate leadership, too, draws from those born abroad. Muhtar Kent, Turkish-immigrant chairman and CEO of the Coca Cola Company; Indra Nooyi, Indian-born chairman and CEO of PepsiCo; Vikram Pandit, Indian-born CEO of Citigroup; and Andrew Leveris, Australian Chairman, CEO and president of Dow Chemicals are just some of the many high-profile immigrants at the top of American business.
Perhaps the single most distinctive factor that makes an immigrant tread on the path of entrepreneurship is the culture of entrepreneurship that they share. These immigrant entrepreneurs exhibited an entrepreneurial streak as they are more ambitious, independent and less risk averse than many of their peers who stayed in their home countries. They embody values such as self-discipline, hard work and dedication to success at the earliest ages. They possess the spirit of striving.
They see America as a land of opportunity that promises prosperity and success for those with a dream and the willingness to take a chance. Meritocracy, a democratic and constitutional government, established institutions and the idea of freedom and possibility, all tenets of the American Dream, have created fertile ground for their ideas to flourish - perhaps into great enterprises that generate jobs and growth.
In today's interconnected and globally competitive economy, these skilled individuals are often sought after by other countries who recognize that their unique qualifications and backgrounds are key drivers in the development of new products, services and processes that can deliver huge economic value.
Highly skilled immigrants are America's competitive advantage, and it is critical today more than ever that we woo and welcome them to our shores. It is my belief that our financial health and national security would be greatly enhanced by implementing two changes to existing legislation.
First, immigration policies need to be updated and adjusted so that highly educated and skilled immigrants, especially in the field of science and technology, are given an expedited permanent residency status in the U.S. for their current and future contributions to the economy.
Second, the reformed immigration policy should entice qualified immigrants who currently reside in this country as well as others from around the world who have access to capital, and grant them a provisional permanent residency to start entrepreneurial ventures in the United States. Immigrants with access to at least $1 million in capital and who are able to successfully start a new venture that creates at least 10 full-time jobs within 12 months, would be awarded a fast track to permanent residency.
Such a multi-pronged approach can create an influx of new talent and skills to bring much-needed growth to the U.S. economy. A progressive immigration policy that enhances its human capital pool is vital to America's sustained prosperity.
Welcoming talented immigrants would represent a return to America's heritage as an open door to those who strive to do better. By embracing the next wave of qualified immigrants, we will build an engine of entrepreneurship and innovation that can drive America's economy in the 21st Century.
Suren Dutia is a senior fellow at the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation and the Skandalaris Center at Washington University in St. Louis and serves on the boards of several entrepreneurial ventures. Previously he served as the CEO of TiE Global and chairman and CEO of Xscribe Corporation. Dutia was born in India. He came to the United States in 1960 B.S. and M.S. from Washington University in St. Louis, Mo.
Follow Suren Dutia on Twitter: www.twitter.com/kauffmanfdn
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The richer other countries become the more able they are to buy high tech American goods. And Trade is a two way street. For us to trade with other countries they have to have something worth trading for. For other countries to buy U.S. goods those countries have to be rich enough to afford them. So the better off other countries are the better off the USA is. Also, as American companies expand overseas the repatriate profits. Economic expansion does not have to take place in the U.S. for the U.S. to profit.
Hording all the jobs in the USA and then importing Immigrants to fill them can at best be described as miserly. Or worse if a country is kept poor so a rich neighbor can exploit them.
So what if a cure for Cancer is found in China rather than the USA, we all benefit. So what if someone in India comes up with a better search engine, we all benefit. What products that are made in the USA today that originated from a European workforce have destroyed the USA? None! The supposed threat to the USA posed by smart people working outside of the USA has been shown to be nonsense based on our experience with European, Canadian, Australian, Japanese, Taiwanese, and Korean economic development
After all, economies cooperate. It is businesses that compete. Are we competing against the Japanese economy? No! We compete against Japanese companies. Does one buy a Honda or a Chevy because one is better than the other for what one wants? Or does one buy the Chevy because it is made by an American company? Most people do not know that both are manufactured in the USA. And they do not know that the Honda has higher "made in the USA" content. So if one wants to help the American economy more should not the Honda be the choice?
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Apart from wealth creations and job creations by immigrants as illustrtaed in this article there are many other immigrants who have served the newly adapted country in other fields as education,research, Healthncare ,small scale industry and professional work force in all disciplines from under the roots to to the top of pyramids.
There are many others who have served the public by volunteering to work in schools, libraries
, non profits and local, state and federal govt
Public private academic passionate partnerships has been and continue to be done by immigrants regardless of their education as the spirits of entrepreuener ships from within makes it possible to be part of the society and act as good citizen and for the citizens
Commendations to Suren for letting us know .
Dinesh Patel md Boston
for a century without immigrants.
The U.S. Canada, and Europe produce 55% of the GDP of the world while only representing
one seventh of the worlds population.
Only Japan and China have a large percentage, about 30 % of the Global Fortune 500 companies.
India represents over one seventh of the worlds population but only has 1.6 % of
the Global Fortune 500 companies and none are technology companies.
From this data it apears that only europeans, chinese, and the japanese are
capable of creating major companies.
The U.S. has about a 15 trillion dollar economy and 52 billion dollars represents about
.3 % of the U.S. economy. That obviously is not much.
Dell computer was founded by a U.S. citizen and has a revenue over 60 billion dollars.
Thats more than all the immigrant founded businesses combined.
Microsoft was also founded by a U.S. citizen and it also produces more revenue than
all the immigrant founded businesses combined.
"Muhtar Kent, Turkish-immigrant chairman and CEO of the Coca Cola Company; Indra Nooyi, Indian-born chairman and CEO of PepsiCo; Vikram Pandit, Indian-born CEO of Citigroup; and Andrew Leveris, Australian Chairman, CEO and president of Dow Chemicals are just some of the many high-profile immigrants at the top of American business."
How many of the above immigrants mentioned came from across our Southern Border ?
NONE.
Immigration needs to be regulated to those who can actually contribute, and I don't mean to the landscaping and nanny industries.
Yes, the picture is much different today. These "restrictions" are called borders and they are supposed to keep out those we don't want to come in.
We no longer want your "tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me."
We have enough of those.
The "highly skilled immigrants" you speak of in such glowing terms are living in an apartment just across the street from me, and every day I see seventeen(!) people piling out of that one apartment.
The plight of immigrants in this country is just about universal: you're not a citizen, you'll never get to be one, and if you don't toe the line you'll be on a one-way flight back to Bangladesh where you (literally) came from. Or, maybe you're shipped over ... illegally or not ... to work in the avocado fields, but you don't have a green card and maybe you haven't even been told what the proper paperwork that you're supposed to have IS. You're here only because you can be strong-armed into working for cheap.
Your glowing rhetoric is the public face; my words are the harsh reality.
Our country has become one that is ruled by its balance-sheet and not by its heart. It goes to very great lengths to bring people from long distances, filling them with hopes and dreams of the promised land and treating them inhumanely once they get here. It's astonishing to see just how much this happens even in high tech. Perhaps, especially in high tech.
This is truly an example of cutting off one's nose to spite one's face. Politics is not supposed to be a mutual suicide pact. An agreement to not enforce our laws against those people illegally living in the USA in return for not choking off our access to the best and brightest from around the world is just that. Instead of trying to paint people who want our laws against illegal immigration enforced as "anti-immigrant" maybe more progress could be made by telling those in Congress who are supporting the H1-b held hostage agenda to stop doing so.
Evidence suggests that most of the immigrant visas does not go to "the best and brightest from around the world". The visas go to a technologist who will work cheap.
"Silicon Valley, the poster child of economic contributions of talented immigrants, represents this idea perfectly. Global technology brands often speak of an immigrant co-founder. Google was co-founded by Sergey Brin, a Russian; Sun Microsystems by Vinod Khosla, an Indian and now a leading venture capitalist. eBay was founded by Pierre Omidyar, a French-Iranian. Elon Musk, born in South Africa, co-founded four companies: PayPal, Tesla Motors, SpaceX and SolarCity. YouTube's co-founder, Steve Chen, and Yahoo!'s co-founder, Jerry Yang, are both Chinese immigrants. Andy Grove, a Hungarian, co-founded Intel."
Except for Sun and Intel these companies don't build anything! Tesla, and SpaceX are so far just producing curiosity products and SolarCity has yet to have a significant impact on the housing market as a whole. The rest are all internet systems. Yes, the internet is a marvel, but what about the real success stories of the computer revolution - Apple, HP, Dell - oh yes - they were founded by Americans. This seems like too much of an exercise in focusing on only the data that proves a point while ignoring the rest. After all, the analysis data this author cites from only looked at businesses that were founded without the aid of venture capital firms, which is a very small portion business start-ups.
The wealth of nations is not determined by watching videos on line or how well you do in the great on line garage sale called eBay. It is measured by what you build in the physical world. Jobs such as these are only created as an adjunct to jobs that build things. Otherwise, you are just trading hats.
What you also fail to comprehend is that each of these businesses has or had competitors. So these businesses have not cornered the market. And these success stories have a lot to do with the people working for the company. Who is to say that if these companies did not start up, that some other company with a slightly different and maybe better concept would have hired the same people and produced a better product? To assume that only these select people could have done what they did and no one else could have subsequently come up with the same idea is an act of monumental conceit.
2. Most immigrant technologists are recruited over a native born technologists because they will work for less money. A Silicon Valley manager can complete a project under budget, so for the micro-economist, this is good, but for the macro-economist, this means one more underemployed American. (2)
3. Objective studies find that the real contribution to the economy by immigrant technologists is often greatly overstated. There is a very active advocacy group in place in the U.S. that is biased strongly in favor of immigrants. This distorts the debate. (3)
References:
1. http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/immigration-and-guest-worker-policies-undermining-us-tech-workers-finds-new-report-from-fair-133835948.html
2. http://hereandnow.wbur.org/2011/10/11/high-tech-workers
3. http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/6765.html)