Immigration and unemployment in Ireland

By Alex Singleton | 29 January 2006

One of the claims about migration is that countries receiving immigrants are economically damaged. People argue for tougher limits of immigration in the name of protecting jobs. The empirical evidence, however, suggests that economies as a whole benefit from immigration. The Freedom Institute - Europe's feistiest think tank - reports new figures from Ireland's Central Statistics Office. In the third quarter of 2005:

approximately 25% of the 40,000 immigrants who joined the labour force found work in the construction industry. Interestingly, the same release reports a 30,000 increase in employment in that sector in the 12 months to the end of Q3. That means that an extra 20,000 Irish people found work in construction, despite the influx of 10,000 "displacing" immigrants into the industry.

So not only is construction employing more immigrants, it is also employing more Irish people too.