Quote:
Originally Posted by someone123
The fact that there was historically immigration to Canada isn't by itself a good reason for continuing or increasing immigration today.
The Canada of the past was thinly populated and mostly rural. Today, a large number of Canadians are crowded into a couple of cities that have become hugely unaffordable and don't have enough infrastructure to support their current populations. We also have fairly significant unemployment and largely stagnant wages. Nowhere in Canada is really economically crying out for settlers to come and harvest low-hanging fruit that will otherwise go to waste.
It might make sense to admit some immigrants because they are likely to be particularly successful and help others, or on humanitarian grounds. Those may be compelling reasons based somewhat concretely on helping to improve live here and abroad. "We're a country of immigrants" on the other hand is not a coherent line of reasoning.
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The split between rural and urban has only increased by 5 percent since 1971 (76% urban then vs 81% in 2011). Canada's unemployment rate is the lowest it's been since 2009 (give or take a tenth or two), and it was much higher through most of the 1980s and 1990s. Average wages have gone up by about 60% since 1995. We've been admitting immigrants to our country during this time and it hasn't made any difference economically.
And by saying "nowhere in Canada is really economically crying out for settlers to come and harvest low-hanging fruit that will otherwise go to waste" you seem to be implying that immigrants will be of lower socio-economic status. Why? Immigrants are also doctors, teachers, professors, engineers, and other highly sought-after professions. They're largely not here to dig ditches or serve at Tim Hortons. I can tell you that BC could really use a bunch of doctors to start up family practices, and if those doctors are immigrants, then that's alright by a lot of people.