Republicans and Democrats are largely united in horror at the Chinese Communist Party’s crackdown on freedom in Hong Kong, with the semi-autonomous state now facing increasing censorship from the mainland and rampant civil liberties violations.
We don’t have to just watch in despair. We should follow the United Kingdom’s lead and open our doors to immigrants and refugees from Hong Kong.
This could take several different forms. We could offer asylum status to any Hong Konger who makes it to our shores or simply create special visas for a set number of immigrants — say 500,000 to 1 million. This latter option is likely to appeal more to conservatives. Those admitted on visas could be mandated to move to underpopulated areas or parts of the country with stagnant populations if that would help skeptics get on board.
The immigration boost wouldn’t have to be an influx of unskilled laborers, a controversial prospect among some factions of the Right. We could make visas “merit-based” — a shift President Trump and other immigration hawks have supported in the past. Too, we could even restrict the program to skilled doctors, nurses, researchers, and scientists to help us combat COVID-19 and skilled programmers or technology experts to help us challenge the Chinese Communist Party’s growing influence over global technology. Suffice it to say we would be admitting people with the skills and resources to make contributions, not wards of the state or additions to the welfare rolls.
That’s not to say there would necessarily be anything wrong with a more sweeping program but simply to suggest a narrowly-tailored approach that could more realistically achieve broad support. Even conservatives and China hawks should get on board because accepting Hong Kongers is the best (and least costly) way to “punish” China.
“Hundreds of thousands of people fleeing Beijing’s rule would be an international embarrassment for China — and, more importantly, it would be a huge economic blow,” writes Reason’s Eric Boehm. “Instead of seizing one of the richest and most economically vibrant [cities] on the planet, China would be absorbing a shell of a once-great place.”
This would hardly be an act of charity, even though Hong Kongers would indeed benefit tremendously from escaping tyranny in coming to the land of the free. As far as the economy is concerned, accepting immigrants from Hong Kong is a win-win, even from the “America First” perspective. A survey of top economists showed a broad consensus that the average U.S. citizen would be better off if more highly educated foreign workers were allowed to immigrate each year.
This poll is why anti-immigration activists can’t get any serious economist to support their policies against work visas.https://t.co/pkcwNBhx20 pic.twitter.com/rl0cgtoZH4
— Daniel Di Martino ???? (@DanielDiMartino) July 9, 2020
This analysis is confirmed by many studies showing the positive economic impact of high-skilled immigration. And Hong Kong, at least before the Communist Party’s takeover, had one of the strongest and most innovative economies in the world. No doubt, high-skill immigrants from the region are the cream of the crop.
Given the high unemployment and disastrous economic decline facing the United States amid the coronavirus crisis, our economy is in desperate need of a boost. Welcoming freedom-lovers from Hong Kong would help solve two problems at once.
Brad Polumbo (@Brad_Polumbo) is a Washington Examiner contributor and fellow at the Foundation for Economic Education.
