Mass Immigration to U.S. Is World’s ‘Largest Anti-Poverty Program’ at the Expense of Americans, by John Binder.

Decades of mass immigration to the United States, with more than 1.5 million legal immigrants entering the country every year, is the world’s “largest anti-poverty program” at the expense of blue-collar American workers and the middle class, says a Harvard University economist.

In an interview with Talking Points Memo, economist George Borjas detailed how more than five decades of mass immigration of low-wage foreign nationals to the U.S. have negatively impacted America’s poor, working class, and middle class in the labor force. …

When it comes to how much Americans have suffered because of mass immigration, Borjas says his “rule of thumb is that if immigration increases the number of workers by 10 percent, the wage of workers probably drops by about 3 percent.” …

Borjas said that Americans are not only negatively impacted by immigration in the workforce but also in how much they must pay in social services for new arrivals.

That extends to the rest of the West too.

hat-tip Scott of the Pacific, Stephen Neil