From: Wim Nusselder (wim.nusselder@antenna.nl)
Date: Fri Dec 17 2004 - 09:55:26 GMT
Dear Platt,
You wrote 16 Dec 2004 10:53:06 -0500:
'that in 2004 some 110,000 people decided to leave the country does raise
questions.'
I don't think mobility in itself should be much of a problem. On 17 million
people an emigration suplus of 18.000 people is not that much. Can you find
comparable figures for movements between different US states or between
Canada and USA?
You can only get a 'social-fiscal number' in the Netherlands when you have a
legal status permitting you to work here. Immigrants into the Netherlands
are usually of working age. The exception is when they already have
relatives in the Netherlands who are able to support them. I don't think it
is the immigrants that put a strain on the Dutch social security system, but
rather the slow integration of second and third generation descendants. I
don't think the Netherlands is doing particularly bad regarding that
integration. There are no real ghetto's or no-go areas if you are from the
wrong ethnic origin in the Netherlands. Our economy (on average), like the
economy of any rich country, doesn't permit sealing the labour market off
from all immigrants. Sizable parts of the economy wouldn't work as well as
they do now without relatively low-cost labour from immigrants and their
descendants. Slow integration is both a risk involved and the condition for
that.
I don't think this is really different in the USA, is it?
I didn't comment on the remarks by Ellen Bles in your Telegraph quote that
"There are so many rules that nobody sticks to them" and the escalation of
bombings of churches and mosques "because the police and the state aren't
doing anything about it" because they are gross exaggerations. The number of
violent incidents and threats between Muslims and non-Muslims (mostly
adolescents) in the Netherlands in the month after the assassination of Theo
van Gogh was comparable with that after 11 Septemeber 2001 (in the
Netherlands!). It will subside in due course if nothing comparable happens.
'Escalation' is not the right word. As for the effect on the Dutch psyche of
that murder... we'll see. It cannot be much more profound than that of
street murders in countries where they are much more frequent.
With friendly greetings,
Wim
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