Thesis on "International Economy"

Thesis 12 pages (5149 words) Sources: 4 Style: Chicago

[EXCERPT] . . . .

International Economy

Does immigration and migration from a country really affect the economy of the country? Britain is not new to both. For over two centuries Britain was the centre of an empire where the sun never set. In the periods of industrialization in the 17th century to the end of the Second World War, Britons have emigrated to most part of the Empire, and many groups of people of different ethnicity have immigrated into Britain. During the days of the empire both these served as the basis for the economic development of Britain and were the mainstay of the strength to over come two great world wars. However the situation is reversed today.

There are immigrants and emigrants in the modern times and these create ripples in the economy like never before. Britain does not have her colonies any more, and the economy is in isolation, and a part of the European Union. Immigration has been restricted to the members of the union and there are moves to keep others especially Asiatic out. Thus the country welcomes Europeans and consequently will find people of English origins emigrate to Europe and even the Middle East. This paper analyses the problems of the mass movement of people to and from Britain and the impact it may have on the economy of UK in future. That the changes in population will undermine the status of the nation is never in doubt.

What does immigration and migration mean?

Immigration and migration are to be seen in two contexts. The first is the immigration into Britain of alien population and emigration of Britons to other countries. These population changes bring a lot of progress and also problems with it for the economy as a whole. On the other hand immigration into cities in Britain also occurs on account of population shifts within the UK from Ireland for example. Emigration from cities to remote places within the UK also occurs. Are we right in calling these changes as immigration and emigration? Although in the true definition of the term, we ought to include exits and inputs to and from the state, we also have to consider the effects of migration from hinterlands to cities both by Britons and others. This causes a lot of change in the society. For example if there are more immigrants and Britons flow out of the country with the aggregate being more immigrants, then it follows that politics will change with the change in population. Thus political views, social views and the basic culture of the British will be eventually replaced by a mixture of foreign cultures based on the individual communities wants. Thus Britain will have to accommodate Islam and the shariat in the laws, on account of migrant Pakistani workers, and have to accommodate other languages other than English. This will have reflections on the literature, faith and culture of future Britain.

What are the impacts of migration and immigration on the Great Britain's economy in long and short run?

The major problem both for the short run and the long run will be the increase in the population in UK which enhanced by 281,200 by the year 2004. Migration had a big impact on the population increase with one million two hundred and thirty thousand of the population out of one million five hundred thousand or eighty one percent and of these 430,000 illegal migrants in the UK. The net emigration of British born people (see appendix for statistics) shows that less than ten percent are women between the ages of fifteen to forty-four. The statistics of the Office of National Statistics -- ONS appended show that UK's total head count was greater than fifty million in the year 2004. There have been more births to immigrants in UK than the native women who had emigrated from the country. Further the statistics appended show that in 7 years the population growth was more than the earlier population of cities like Birmingham of about 977,000 and Nottingham of about 267,000 combined. There is no data on the illegal immigrants which is estimated to add two million every ten years. (Migration Watch UK 2005)

The second problem is that Britons are abandoning Britain and as a result the English will become a minority in the country. This is likely to have devastating effects. One reason for this is the unabated emigration of Britons to other shores. Nicholson-Lord (2004) says that UK citizens are moving out of UK at a fast pace. They have second homes, in far off places like Canada, West Indies and have invested in Middle East. It has become the fad of the British middle class. Already natives own one hundred and fifty one thousand second homes in Wales and other places in England. This is very tardy as compared to the value of property that Britons have invested overseas. For example it is estimated that over seven hundred and fifty thousand homes in Spain are owned British subjects, and about the same figure in France, and many places in U.S., Portugal, and Eastern Europe. That means that about 1.5 million people, that is about six percent of the British population want to move out of Britain giving up their domicile and move to another country. This does not merely apply to the affluent but even those people who are not so well off. Given an opportunity they would move out. (Nicholson-Lord 2004)

Nicholson also points out that in polls conducted separately by ICM and YouGov shows that over half of the respondents had expressed a need for leaving Britain. Thus fifty five percent of the respondents wanted to seriously examine the possibility of settling down in any other part of the world by leaving UK. Nicholson also comments on a similar survey done by the 'Offshore Bank Alliance & Leicester International' as well as the 'Centre for Future 2020' -- which was wider and the report predicts that in the coming decade over 6,000,000 Britons would have migrated abroad. This aspect has been overlooked while there is a great concentration on immigration, the emigration issue does not find examination by the concerned authorities. The net result of the count is that more immigrants are seen than emigrants.

Why do people want to leave Britain? Nicholson-Lord (2004) commenting on this quotes the 'Emigrate Magazine' which published the fact that emigrants from Britain have a very poor opinion of the quality of life in Britain, which according to them is getting worse. Problems ranged from traffic snarls to crime, and taxes, lack of space and other ills. According to the majority, Britain is headed towards a stand still. Better quality of life was one of the reasons for moving abroad along with living costs, and the general pessimism about Britain and the average Briton's detachment to homeland. As per Nicholson-Lord (2004) an important aspect is that the problem with investment in the UK property was that what was a great investment decade ago has now become a bad bargain. On the other hand the other countries have less tax and better property laws. For example the French property law and taxation are much better than what is prevalent in UK.

Research by Champion (1999) showed that migration has an important influence on the growth of UK cities in the 1990s and later. London seems to have absorbed most of the migration balance, including the international population and asylum seekers. Some cities like Merseyside showed a ten percent reduction with regard to its populace. West Yorkshire will have seventy one thousand more people by the year 2021.

It is also showed that London will expand in population to extra 662,000 by 2021. There is thus for cities, domestic migration and overseas migration. The domestic migration and the international migration have great effect on city populations. There will be vital changes in the character of the labor force and this will be positive, considering that that those who move in with technical or professional skills will help growth in most economic areas. (Champion 1999) Thus immigrants abroad, and the migrants from within the country, that is from the other areas of UK are the reasons that London has greater need for managerial and professional staff, in spite of the fact that there are vacancies in factories for skilled workers like machine operatives, sales and many labor- based occupations. Unfortunately research is lacking in these areas.

What has Great Britain government changed or do to face the problems that came from migration and immigration?

Though there is great respect in Britain for the individual and human rights, and is a part of the culture, the attitude to the UK immigration policy is simply to control opportunities for aliens in entering Britain, and every attempt is made to avoid the migrants from permanently settling in UK. Thus the British citizenship policy after 1971 is discriminatory. (Messina 1995) UK is one among the countries that have least problems with the policies regarding… READ MORE

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