Actually Joe, the entire point of the demographic shift that's occurring right now is that immigration is not just needed to fill the "lower paid" positions - though it's certainly needed for that too.
If you look at the shocking shortage of doctors, nurses and medical support staff (as one single example - there are other sectors in which this is relevant too) in the UK currently (especially London) and the fact that this shortage is only going to get worse as the population ages and more medical staff are needed, then i think you'll find that immigration is not bringing "useless mouths" (a horrible - and fundamentally inaccurate - phrase) to these shores. Rather it's bringing the people who will run things when the native population hits a personnel crisis due to ageing (as i say, this has only just begun in Europe; but it becomes more and more urgent with each passing year).
Also, on the subject of the bottom rung of the wage ladder. Two points to be made.
1. Yes, many immigrants upon first arriving will wind up in low-paid jobs (assuming prejudice allows them a job in the first place... though eventually necessity will overcome prejudice i believe). That's the nature of uprooting and starting completely again in a new land. However those low-paid jobs - while perhaps not representing massive tax revenue - are fundamental to the smooth running of the economy. *Someone* needs to do them.
2. Most of those people will have ambitions beyond their first crappy job, and many will move up the wage ladder. Certainly their children will have higher ambitions and with the benefit of a relatively decent education (one of the reasons a family moves here) will be qualified to achieve them.
As i said previously, i think someone whose entire province is now a lake (Mozambique), or whose town has been destroyed by warfare countless times in the past few years (Afghanistan, Kurdistan, the Balkans) and who has watched friends or family killed in the process, or who faces starvation thanks to ecological mismanagement (Southern Africa) has every right to hop a ship and join the final blow-out going on in the wealthy nations.
i mean, what the hell right to we have to stop them? Most of the resources we're squandering is coming from them anyways (the story of Nigerian oil, and the distribution of the wealth it generates is sickening to anyone with half a portion of human decency... and this is being done "by us to them").
That doesn't mean, however, to return to my original point, that this is a good thing for the planet. From a global perspective, we need *less* people living the western wasteful lifestyle (at whatever wage rung) not *more*.
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