European Immigration Solutions

There is an interesting article in the New York Times today that discusses Europe's problems with immigration, multiculturalism, and Muslims who have failed to assimilate into mainstream society. The gist of the piece is that Europe (and by this they mean Western Europe) is in a seemingly unsolvable dilemma, because it needs immigrants more than ever due to declining natural population growth, and yet many immigrants have not and don't seem to be able to integrate into the rest of society, with disastrous results. The article offers no solutions and appears pessimistic that an answer will be found anytime soon.

Now I don't know why Europeans (and the piece's author) consider this to be an unsolvable problem, because there is indeed an easy solution: encourage immigration from countries other than the Muslim world. There are millions and millions of people from China, India, Eastern Europe, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Latin America who would love to live in First World Europe, and who would very likely become hardworking, productive members of society. Sure, many of these countries are farther away than the Muslim world (except for Eastern Europe, which to be fair, does contribute a decent number of immigrants to the West), but that never stopped tens of millions of these people from immigrating to America, which is farther off still.

Europe's immigration problems do not stem from letting in too many immigrants; they stem from letting in too many radical Muslim immigrants. If the immigrants come from elsewhere, the problem is solved before it even begins.

Of course, this is not the only potential solution; immigration would not be needed at all if Europeans decided to have more babies and create more productive economies. But given the Continent's quasi-socialist welfare states that depress economic growth and make it expensive to raise kids, this scenario is unlikely to occur anytime soon. And as such, non-Muslim immigration appears to be the best answer.