Why It is Important to Talk About Open Borders

A Free Word Requires Free Migration.

We are only three weeks away from the fifth Open Borders Conference, which will be held online on October 29, 2022. We have two exciting keynote speakers - Guerline Jozef of the Haitian Bridge Alliance and Chandran Kukathas, author of Immigration and Freedom. Our speakers will focus on the problems with restricting immigration. Jozef will speak directly to the burden imposed by the immigration system on Black people. Kukathas will talk about how migration barriers violate our rights. Please take the time to register at the conference at this link: https://bit.ly/22obc_Register

While the conference excites us, we should always take a moment to appreciate the harm that migration restrictions impose on millions of people. First, and foremost, all those walls and border patrols prevent people from seeking jobs and being with their loved ones. If you prevent a person in a developing economy from moving to the United States, you are forcing someone back into  poverty. But we should also look at how migration restrictions harm non-migrants as well. The economist Michael Clemens wrote a widely discussed paper in 2011 estimating that the world would double its economic output if people could freely migrate. Restricting migration not only hurts people who wish to move, but it literally makes the world trillions of dollars poorer. This is a sobering thought.

Please join us for the 5th Open Borders Conference and register here: https://bit.ly/22obc_Register