About " The Past and future of immigration to Canada" by David Verbeeten

the objective of this post is to identify the main idea of the reading "The past and future of immigration to Canada" by David Verbeeten; and then number three of the arguments the author used.

Following the order of this statement, the main idea of the text is to indicate how the immigrants have been an important factor in the economy of Canada; and how the migratory policies of that country have changed through years in order to allow the entrance of the propotypes that are in accordance to what they need at that time. But not only the immigration influeces the economy; also the emmigration, because Canada has suffer from a big loss of professionals who left to other countries, such as United States. Finally, it leaves the doubt of the future of migration in Canada, which is unpredictably at the moment.

To feed this idea, the author states that "Over the course of four decades—decades
which were otherwise politically formative for the Dominion—the population of
Canada actually expanded at a rate below that of natural increase. Immigration only
began to contribute significantly to population growth after 1901. For much, if not
most, of its formative history, Canada was not a country of immigrants, but rather a
country of emigrants or transients". This means that Canadians at the begginings were looking for better opportunities elsewhere, and the migration rates where low; leaving Canada as a country merely agricultural, and only developing in one or two cities.

Then, after the Economic Boom in the XX century, the rates of immigration increased and now the government was forced to change the policies, to make them moer selective and restrictive, so these preferred the entrance of protestants and white people. But in the interwar period they were accused of discrimation, so they based their policies on a system of points and more objective.

This change affected the economy in a way that immigrants were more prepared but they were not willing to stay for a long time in the country, meanwhile the nationals professionals of the country were leaving mostly to the Unied States in the search for lower taxes and better salaries. However, there was work-force enough to continue growing.

finally the author states that the immigration rates beagan to get affected by the brain drain of professionals, leaving a country full of age people and low birth rates; and also, immigrants stoped looking at CAnada as a destination to migrate. All of this carries a series of social problems. The author says: "In the context of worldwide
aging and decline, Canada may find itself in a strengthened or weakened position. In
the event that developing societies are destabilized by severe imbalances in their
demographic distributions, Canada may once again become a destination of choice
for the skilled and educated workers of these societies as they seek to relocate"

In my opinion, Canada is a country with a lot of potential to be a destiny for migration, but the only main issue that stops this to happen is the lack of openness to immigrants, in a way that offers them more social securities and more facilities to stay there, have a family and improve the economy of the cuntry.