Eduardo Porter

How did the United States—the most prosperous country on earth, which created the world’s largest middle class—allow itself to become prey to social dysfunction unseen in other wealthy nations? The United States has the highest teen pregnancy rate among rich countries, the steepest infant mortality, the deepest poverty, the most yawning inequality, and the highest imprisonment rate. Eduardo Porter unpacks why the American government appears uninterested in alleviating these social ills, cutting support for the marginalized while so many Americans are falling through the cracks.

You wouldn’t know this from the nature of current debates, but there is no more powerful tool to reduce global poverty and raise living standards than immigration. Contrary to popular belief, immigration does no harm to domestic workers, and has actually been found to create higher paid jobs for locals: the strawberry picker in California creates jobs upstream in strawberry processing. Most critically, it drastically raises both the income of immigrants themselves and the overall GDP: 26 million foreigners in the American labor market added some $2 trillion to the American economy in 2019, according to the National Academies report. As they remit money home, immigrants raise living standards in their countries of origin too. Porter understands the ambivalence about immigrants in affluent societies—large flows of immigrants change societies in drastic, unpredictable ways. But, he argues that we should not ignore the enormous economic opportunity that immigration offers the world.

The United States is Browning. Non-Hispanic whites will be in the minority by the early 2040s—they already are in younger demographics. This swing is reshaping America’s politics—pushing whites into a defensive crouch against the change coming down the pike—and pushing political polarization along racial lines. Minorities will, in the end, determine America’s political future, but this ethnic shift is going to produce a lot of conflict between now and then. Porter explains how demographic changes are likely to play out on the political field, and how today’s lawmakers and politicians are scrambling to ensure control of tomorrow’s institutions.

The United States has no choice. If it is to succeed as a polity, as a functioning society, it must come to an inclusive understanding of what “American” means, breaking across the ethnic boundaries that have stood in the way of solidarity across the nation’s history. There are some signs that it might: interracial marriage has increased substantially, and cities are far more integrated than they've been since 1910. Still, hostility across ethnic and racial borders remains front and center in American politics. Porter argues that our society’s goals cannot be achieving racial justice by forcing whites to compensate nonwhites for decades of oppression. Instead, we must build a country that acknowledges our different strains and invites them all into the tent.

Immigration remains the most popular escape route for people trapped in impoverished countries. As climate change and automation further restrict developing nations’ paths out of poverty, migration to the rich world is likely to exert an even more powerful draw. Rich countries will try to hold the line at their borders. But this will open a political chasm, pitting liberal democrats on the defensive against populist parties driven by xenophobia, and willing to resort to anything to keep foreigners out. Porter explains that wealthy nations are doing themselves no favors by battening down the hatches. Instead, their ideal strategy should be to think about how best to incorporate the new arrivals within their social and economic structures. Rich nations are doing themselves no favors by battening down the hatches. Their ideal strategy should be to think about how best to incorporate the new arrivals within their social and economic structures.