Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Open societies have unequal outcomes, societies that pursue equal outcomes sacrifice openness

From The Paradox of the New Elite by Alexander Stille one might conclude that inclusive societies (ease of immigrant absorption) tend to yield unequal market outcomes (growing income disparity). This describes the US. Conversely, the data suggests that societies that pursue an equalization of outcomes are more likely to reject non-members. This describes OECD Europe.

This set of observations seems to relate to the observation by Milton Friedman IIRC, that you can have a generous welfare system or an open immigration policy but you can't have both.

This is an interesting insight by Stille.

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