Attracting American Dreamers to Supercharge American Global Leadership
Author: Brian Slamkowski, Stanford Masters in International Policy ‘23
Albert Einstein, Madeleine Albright, Henry Kissinger, and Sundar Pichai shaped the world after immigrating to the United States. Global business juggernauts such as Google, Tesla, McDonald’s, and Pfizer were all founded by immigrants or offspring of immigrants. The impact of these companies on United States GDP, tax revenues, shareholder wealth, and the world’s economy are enormous. These four companies contribute over 500,000 American jobs with a total market cap of over $2.4 trillion. According to Forbes, more than 40% of all Nobel prizes were awarded to immigrant Americans since 2000.
Caroline and Taimur are brilliant classmates of mine at Stanford University, from Germany and Pakistan, respectively. Both are worried they cannot remain in the US to work after graduation in June. Luis is a DACA Dreamer, a Berkeley graduate with an impressive resume of work for multiple US Presidential Administrations. He still has no path to citizenship even though he’s contributed far more than American native citizens to the country’s prosperity. These highly skilled and intellectual powerhouses are who America needs to innovate and win in a time of unprecedented uncertainty.
When talented international classmates are concerned about their ability to remain in the US on visas or a viable path to citizenship, the red flag cannot be raised any higher. The immediate and long-term impacts of responsible and legal immigration through targeted highly skilled visa programs and innovative unskilled immigration pathways are solutions to America’s global great power competition, fiscal deficit, and future prosperity as a global leader.
According to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), immigration “increases the labor force and improves its demographics resulting in an expansion in total economic output.” The Minneapolis Federal Reserve Bank adds, “when immigrants are assigned the marginal cost of public goods, their fiscal impact is significantly less negative than that of natives. Immigrants’ tax contributions cover 93 percent of their publicly provided benefits, while natives’ contributions cover only 77 percent of theirs.” Immigrants are filling the voids of baby boomer retirements and labor shortages and paying taxes needed to close the astronomical US fiscal deficit. The US budget deficit is in dire need of the increased revenues and payroll taxes these immigrants or visa holders would contribute.
According to CBO, “The population is also projected to become older, on average, as growth in the number of people aged 65 or older outpaces that of younger age groups.” Immigration grows the labor force and provides better demographic makeup within the country. Expanding the labor force produces more on net, increases capital investment, makes workers more productive, and ultimately grows economic output. This effect pathway coincides with skilled and unskilled labor. Demographically, immigrants are usually of prime working age leading to more tax revenues for the government from the increase in the working-age population.
The policy fixes are attainable. They start with clearing the backlog of H-1B visas and immigration asylum seeker court decisions that total more than 2 million as of August 2022 by expanding decision-making authority to more qualified federal employees. Next, we must increase the cap on annual H1-B’s allowed, a law set by Congress, and expand the visa offerings beyond the H-1B because demand for them is outstripping the current limited supply. It’s been a catch-all visa for skilled workers but is insufficiently addressing the needs of America in the 21st Century. The O-1 visa for extraordinary talents in the sciences and arts can be leveraged but is woefully narrow to draw in the talented masses. We need to add visa options for entrepreneurs, graduates of US schools, researchers, and other STEM professionals. The US risks falling behind even our allies like the UK, who recently supercharged their skilled worker visa program under then chancellor, and now Prime Minister Stanford GSB’s own Rishi Sunak.
Critics will point to the so-called dissolving of “American values,” a loss of jobs, a drain on social safety net programs, or increased crime by segments of the immigrant population. The overwhelming reason for immigration remains economic hardship abroad. Immigrants are coming to the US to work. In many cases, to do back-breaking work. That is the American Dream, and these immigrants are living it. The labor shortages prevalent recently prove that more employees are needed. Finally, numerous studies have shown that immigrants do not have a higher crime rate than native citizens despite vitriolic rhetoric from some partisans.
In a country founded by sons and daughters of immigrants and built into a superpower by immigrants, the time to re-embrace our immigrant greatness is now to maintain the talent, skills, and hard-working American Dream. The viability of the American Dream depends on it.
Brian Slamkowski is a Major in the U.S. Army and is currently a GEN Wayne Downing Scholar at Stanford University’s Freeman Spogli Institute of International Studies. The views are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of the U.S. Department of the Army or the U.S. Department of Defense.
