Immigration: myths, misconceptions, and toxic rhetoric

Anti-immigrant sentiment is growing across Europe and North America. Here in Canada, right-wing politicians in the media have been scapegoating migrants at an alarming rate for the crisis in affordability, housing, jobs, and public services—diverting much needed attention from the corporate profiteering and government cutbacks on social services that in fact underlie those issues.

 

As public opinion on immigration has been pushed rightward and the federal Conservatives have taken a steady and sizable lead in the polls, the Liberal government has shelved a promised and historic plan—hard fought for by the immigrant justice movement – to offer Permanent Resident status to hundreds of thousands of undocumented people. These are the most vulnerable, underpaid, and exploited workers in the country.

 

We have just witnessed in England where the stoking of xenophobia can take us—with racist riots unfolding in several cities in early August. Far-right mobs tried to set fire to hotels housing asylum seekers, targeted mosques, and assaulted racialized people.

 

Canada's Temporary Foreign Workers Programme (TFWP) is currently being panned from all quarters. On one hand, there are criticisms from the right and centre about how the program has expanded its low wage stream, bringing in more farm workers, more cooks, and more fast food workers. At the same time, a UN report released late last year called it “a breeding ground for modern slavery”.

 

As is evident from the current political and cultural discourse on immigration, the issue is a very emotional one, highly volatile, and very personal for many. Fear, scapegoating, false narratives, victimizing, playing the blame game, and racism only add to the misconstruing and misunderstanding of a highly nuanced subject—"immigration policy".

 

Making matters more complicated, there are many different stakeholders impacted by Canada's various immigration policies – each with their own agendas, objectives, needs, and perspectives, sometimes in conflict with one another, at other times in harmony with each other.

 

The government favours immigration and immigrants as a way of boosting the GDP of a country and bridging the skills-labour gaps in the economy. Governments also need to maintain a certain level of population growth in order to support an aging population and the social services needed to support them—making the taxes that immigrants contribute (and their life-long spending and entrepreneurial endeavours) important factors to consider.

 

The capitalists favour immigrants as a source of low-cost labour, providing them with an opportunity to attain higher profits.

 

Families favour immigration to maintain close family and cultural ties and relationships.

 

Higher educational institutions favour immigration – through international student enrolments – as a way to fund their operations. Post-secondary institutions have sought to make up lost provincial funding through gouging international students, who pay almost five times more on average in tuition than Canadian students.

 

The construction industry and developers favour immigrants to supply much needed labour for building desperately needed housing, and also increasing demand for housing.

 

Further confounding the "immigration narrative" are the different categories of immigrants—each contributing in their own ways. There are international students, temporary foreign workers and agricultural labourers, low-skilled and high-skilled trades people and professionals, refugees and asylum seekers escaping from hostile environments and life situations, and family members yearning to reunite with their loved ones.

 

All these factors make parsing through all the information and thinking critically an arduous and time-consuming task. Hence, we find ourselves in a situation where people tend to gravitate towards easily understandable narratives and explanations of the impact of various immigration policies.

 

The growth of right-wing politics and polarizing new leaders at the federal and provincial levels has popularized various myths around immigration, migrants, and their impact on Canadian society, culture, and economy. Separating fact from fiction and myth from reality is critical to challenging the right’s attempts to scapegoat immigrants for the problems created by capitalism. Here we unpack some of those myths, and provide facts to debunk them.

 

MYTH #1: Immigrants are causing a housing and inflation (cost-of-living) crisis.

 

Everywhere we turn, we are told that an unchecked rise in immigration is causing skyrocketing home and rent prices. Researchers have consistently shown that the two drivers of high housing prices are population growth and inelastic housing markets—supply and demand. Connecting the arrival of newcomers to rising housing prices is an intuitive analysis; there are more immigrants, they are buying and renting more, causing prices to go up, and the solution is to slash the number of newcomers. Far-right politicians and their newspaper-owning billionaire backers have also been pushing this narrative.

 

The trouble is, this common-sense analysis is faulty. The truth is that we need more affordable, social and public housing, freezes on rental profits and increases in the supply of rental housing. The massive increase in housing and rental prices is not proportional to the increase in demand, nor to the increase in immigration. In fact, investors and developers are able to set any price that they want—and they are doing so unchecked. Simply building new homes won't relieve this pressure on rising prices.

 

Here are some facts:

(1) Most newcomers are migrant workers, students, and refugee claimants. They are not typically the ones buying homes. Many of these workers—those in agriculture, fisheries, care work and more—live in employer-controlled and incredibly inhumane housing. In agriculture in particular, migrants are warehoused without their families, potable water or privacy. Many of these workers are not competing for rental housing—let alone purchasing homes. Others, like international students, tend to rent – but often in precarious, exploitative conditions. Many immigrants are also poor and like temporary migrants, they are not the ones increasing the demand for housing. They are the people facing a housing crisis.

 

(2) Housing prices are rising far more quickly than population growth. Even if all new population growth is caused by immigration, the argument that immigration is causing housing prices to rise still doesn't make sense. The population increase (from all sources) in the last two years was approximately 4%, but rental prices shot up an astronomical 20+%. The benchmark price to purchase a home has also increased more sharply than the population has, shooting up about 7% in the last 2 years alone. Moreover, Canada has a declining birthrate. Population replacement requires 2.1 children per woman, while Canada’s fertility rate dropped to a record low of 1.33 in 2022.

 

These facts amount to one thing—financialization of housing. The investor class is holding our homes ransom. They are extorting vast sums from renters and pressing those who cannot pay into homelessness. This is not a population crisis; this is a commodity bubble created by investor greed.

 

This process has occasionally been recognized as a problem by the government and even half-heartedly addressed – but in a way designed to scapegoat “foreigners” for the lack of affordable housing. A few years ago, the right-wing bugaboo was foreign investors purchasing Canadian housing stock. The federal government passed laws to curb foreign home-ownership. But less than 6% of homeowners in Ontario and British Columbia are non-Canadian residents, while prices have jumped by 20% in 2022.

 

There is also a need to reform our immigration system to prevent the exploitation of migrants. We do need a well-funded, well-regulated, public university system that doesn't rely on extortionate tuition costs paid by international students. We need more, better, and denser housing. Additionally, we need long-term solutions that could guarantee affordability for decades to come – rent control, social housing, robust tenant protections, and a public pension that Canadians can actually live on, to name just a few examples. But none of these solutions will resolve the housing crisis. This is because the immediate, causal factor of skyrocketing housing costs is the increasing share of the housing market owned by individuals and corporations whose primary concern is their quarterly profits. The only solution is to take our housing supply back from speculators, large and small. It's time to remind ourselves that our homes are for living our lives, not for generating value for shareholders.

 

MYTH #2: Immigrants take jobs away from Canadians and lower wages.

 

There are those who say immigration hurts workers born in Canada by driving down wages and taking away jobs that they would otherwise have if there was little immigration into the country. Again, the facts do not bear this out.

 

While low-skilled immigrants may compete in the short-term with Canadian-born workers (example: high-school and college-level students) in certain sectors and regions of the country, this effect is small and not statistically significant across the country over the long term.

 

Economic migrants (the largest category of immigrants) are looking for economic opportunities, means of self-sustenance, and meaningful jobs – and so tend to prefer locations where employment opportunities and job availability are higher (larger Metropolitan areas). Whether they are high- or low-skilled, migrants rarely substitute for Canadian-born workers. Instead, migrants often complement these workers or accept jobs that non-immigrant workers don't want or can't do. The mere presence of immigrants increases demand in the economy and can spur new businesses to open – creating more jobs for both immigrant and native-born populations. So where does this anxiety about migrant workers come from?

 

The traditional labour market model, with employers on the demand side and employees on the supply side, defines the equilibrium wage and employment at the intersection of demand and supply. Employers hire all the workers they need at this wage, and all employees who want to work at this wage can find a job. Immigration increases labour supply. In the short term, holding all else constant (such as the demand for labour and international trade), the increase in labour supply lowers the equilibrium wage and raises the equilibrium level of employment, but it is not clear who gains from the increase in employment. It is possible that some Canadian-born workers lose their jobs or drop out of the market, and that some immigrants find jobs while others remain unemployed. The outcome hinges on stringent assumptions such as full employment, no labour market segmentation, identical skills for immigrants and non-immigrant workers, and immediate access by immigrants to all jobs held by non-immigrant workers. In this short-term model, immigrants are considered perfect substitutes for non-immigrant workers, and they affect the labour supply curve as if non-immigrant workers have replicated themselves. This simple labour market model of demand and supply assumes that migrants are exactly the same workers as native-born workers, with the same skills, education, and talents, and thus, their arrival increases the supply of labour. The irrefutable prediction of this model is that the wages of all workers go down and unemployment increases for all, as the market for labour becomes saturated in the short-run.

 

The reality is somewhat different. When considering the pragmatic labour market model and job creation mechanisms, native-born and migrant workers differ in their country-specific “human capital” (skills, experience or formal education) – such as language fluency, professional networks, and social and cultural knowledge. Initial skill differences make new immigrants imperfect substitutes for non-immigrant labour. The economics of migration tell us that a country such as Canada needs immigrants because its labour force is not large enough to meet the demand, or specialized enough to handle technological changes. Vacancies exist even under high unemployment because workers and jobs do not always match, or because unemployed workers might not want or be qualified for the jobs available. These workers may shun low-skill, repetitive jobs. Employers may then try to fill jobs by bringing in low-skilled immigrants—or by outsourcing. While the skills required for the job might be below immigrants' capabilities, immigrants are willing to accept the jobs in order to move to a country offering higher wages than their home country.

 

At higher skill-level jobs, vacancies can also exist in the short-run because the existing labour force might not be qualified—as could be the case, for example, of opportunities arising from rapid technological advances. Here, hiring qualified immigrant workers can fill the gap. Immigrants as consumers also increase the demand for goods and services. This higher demand in turn affects the labour market by boosting the demand for labour, leading to an increase in equilibrium employment.

 

Another reason why immigrants do not simply displace native-born workers is that as new arrivals, they do not have access to the same jobs as those workers. In segmented labour markets, immigrants may be placed for a long time into lower tier jobs as supplements to the existing workforce. Although this benefits native-born workers, it can trap immigrants at low socio-economic levels. In addition, immigrants who are self-employed may directly create jobs, for themselves and for any workers they might hire.

 

MYTH #3: Immigrants are a burden on social services, healthcare, and the Canadian economy.

 

Are refugees (and many immigrants) a liability to Canada, bringing physical and mental health issues? The research does not bear this out.

 

The cost of healthcare for refugees actually amounts to only 10% of that for other Canadians. Newcomers need encouragement and assistance in accessing health services. As refugees and immigrants are carefully screened, they in fact may be in better health than many Canadians.

 

Are immigrants and refugees "free-loaders", who don't pay taxes? A widespread myth has been circulating that refugees receive significantly more financial assistance than Canadians on pension. Non-status immigrants still pay Harmonized Sales Tax (HST), property taxes, contribute to the Canadian Pension Plan (CPP), and may have social insurance. Temporary Foreign Workers (TFWs), refugee claimants, and permanent residents all pay taxes but are not permitted to access many services. The amount of financial support Government-Assisted Refugees (GARs) receive (through the Refugee Assistance Program) is based on provincial social assistance rates—the minimum required to meet sustenance and accommodation costs – but this is often inadequate and limited to one year. GARs must prove they have no or insufficient income of their own (adjusted for family size variations). Privately sponsored refugees receive minimum funding guaranteed by the sponsor for up to one year after arrival, and they may be placed in temporary rent control accommodation. Refugees also typically have a significant debt burden for transportation, medical costs, etc.

 

Are immigrants and refugees a strain on the Canadian economy and a drain on our resources? Do refugees cost Canadians too much money? Again, the research does not bear this out. Refugees work hard to find employment and to integrate into a new country despite the disadvantages they face—learning a new language and culture, dealing with loss and trauma, difficulties finding a job, family separation etc.  As often happens, the low level of recognition of refugees’ qualifications (15%) means that well-qualified refugees are often working at low paid jobs and thus paying lower taxes. On the other hand, many refugees start small businesses, thus creating jobs.

 

MYTH #4: Immigrants are more prone to crime and pose potential security challenges.

 

Many people who oppose immigration say that it increases crime. But does immigration really affect crime? Studying Canada—a country whose proportion of migrants has increased considerably in the last 10 years, researchers find immigration significantly impacts people's perceptions of crime but has no effect on actual crime.

 

Immigrants and refugees seek security, safety, protection from persecution, and peaceful living conditions (it is far more difficult to enter Canada as an immigrant or refugee than as a visitor). Immigrants and refugees undergo stringent security checks (unlike Canadians). Those regarded as "security concerns" are in fact statistically insignificant. Inadmissibility factors include political security, serious criminality, human rights violations, and falsification of entry documents. Once someone claims asylum in Canada or before they are sponsored for re-settlement in Canada, they undergo rigorous security screening by RCMP, the Canadian Border Services, and the Canadian Security Intelligence Services. They are highly likely to be excluded from the refugee process or from re-settlement processes in the event of their presenting a national security threat or because of serious criminality, organized crime, or human rights violations.

 

Refugees are not statistically more dangerous than those born in Canada. In fact, a recent study found that newcomers are under-represented in prison populations, and that over the long-term, property crime tends to diminish in their vicinity. Refugees and immigrants commit fewer crimes than Canadian-born citizens, although when they do, their crimes receive a disproportionate amount of media coverage.

 

A major proportion of Canada's GDP growth is based on immigration. As anti-immigrant rhetoric increases, pro-immigration policies are being set aside. As immigration levels decrease (due to recent decisions and changes to immigration policies), there is a real possibility that people may face greater economic crises as the consequences of such decisions percolate and permeate throughout the Canadian economy. As this happens, it is likely that this effect will be partially blamed on inflation.

 

Conditions on the ground for migrants, immigrants, and workers are getting worse. There seems to be a distraction from the core issues, a misdirection, a magician's sleight of hand. As often happens during times of higher unemployment and rising inflation, one sees the anti-immigrant and racism train pull into the station. Instead of holding the people truly accountable for the immiseration of the working class and the woes of our present times (the capitalists, billionaires, speculators, bankers), it is immigrants and migrant workers that are being blamed, scapegoated, and exploited. People are being convinced that the problem is migrants and immigration, the border and illegal immigration, temporary foreign workers and refugees.

 

Every social movement organizing in this country must come together and put resources towards stopping the rise of anti-immigrant sentiment and racism. Repressive immigration policies don't stop newcomers from entering Canada—it just means that those who do come have even fewer rights. Real solutions—like freezing rental increases and ramping up production of public housing, would benefit everyone struggling with astronomical housing costs. They would also allow immigrants and migrants who do vital work – building and cleaning homes; growing, packing and delivering foods; and taking care of children, the sick and elderly – the security to stay in the country with dignity.