Generic Software Engineer, Yes; John Lennon, No.

Interesting story in the Washington Post. The proposed new point system, it turns out, counts the trees, but misses the forest:

Would America open its doors for the next Albert Einstein? Under the new immigration bill, the answer is maybe, but maybe not.

For years, foreign-born Nobel Prize winners, corporate officers, and top talents in sports, arts and sciences have had a fast track to permanent residency, and eventually citizenship, in the United States. In the name of attracting the world's greatest and brightest, authorities have granted these luminaries priority access to green cards under a little-known provision offered to "aliens of extraordinary abilities."

It has provided a way for a host of notable foreigners -- among them John Lennon and Yoko Ono and Venezuelan-born New York Yankee Bobby Abreu -- to make America their home.

But the bill now being debated in Congress would do away with the special "EB-1" preferred-status category, effectively forcing foreign VIPs to take a number and get in line with everyone else. They would be subject to a complex point system to determine their eligibility -- assessing education levels, English abilities, experience in the United States and other factors -- just as any engineer from India or farmworker from Mexico.

Comments

[Steve Sailer]

My view on the ideal immigration system:

John Lennon, Yes; Yoko Ono, No.

[Corvid]

What's the rationale behind this seemingly idiotic new wrinkle in immigration? Wouldn't it be fascinating to hear someone try to explain it?
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By the way, I'd like to thank Professor Borjas for setting up this blog. It's very much needed and is one that I have been reading and will continue to check daily.

[Lafayette]

Whilst taking a course in Management Psychology at IBM (a long, long time ago), the professor (also a first generation offspring of an immigrant) made a compelling statement.

He mentioned the fact that uprooting oneself from a country not as a migrant, but as an immigrant, was an act of tremendous courage. One cuts the links permanently with home and family as well as friends. One strikes out for an unknown land, an unknown language and an unknown culture. The challenge is not for the faint of heart.

My point: Immigration is a "natural selection" of a very particular person who manifests great personal will and dedication to an objective. Not bad as a profile, I must say.

And, to understand the hardship inherent in that challenge, M. Borjas, if you have not yet seen the film "Golden Door", then I suggest you not miss it. No one who came through Ellis Island was a faint of heart.

[keypusher]

"He mentioned the fact that uprooting oneself from a country not as a migrant, but as an immigrant, was an act of tremendous courage. One cuts the links permanently with home and family as well as friends. One strikes out for an unknown land, an unknown language and an unknown culture. The challenge is not for the faint of heart.

My point: Immigration is a "natural selection" of a very particular person who manifests great personal will and dedication to an objective. Not bad as a profile, I must say."

I need only think of my grandfather, who came to this country alone & not knowing English in 1922 and became a doctor in 1932 to see the truth in your professor's observation. But his observation is simply not relevant to modern mass migration across the Mexican border.

[Lafayette]

kp: "But his observation is simply not relevant to modern mass migration across the Mexican border."

I beg to differ.

Perhaps you might understand better the personal courage necessary were you to try immigrating to Mexico?

[Former FM-2 Visa holder]

"Perhaps you might understand better the personal courage necessary were you to try immigrating to Mexico?"

The Mexicans would kick you out. And don't go around demanding your "rights" as an immigrant in Mexico (even if you have and FM2 visa). That would only get you a beating before being deported.

[Online Pharmacy no Prescription]

A free world for free people please. Boundaries should not exist under any circumstance.