New Zealand gives an interesting case in immigration. The country imports a large number of people from India and China, and those immigrants are almost invariably excellent people. Cultural differences between immigrants and NZ-borns are superficial, and immigrants from Asia are law-abiding and industrious.
New Zealand's Asians are gracious and unintimidating. To be simple, no one ever feels that the Asian guy could pull a knife on them. The complaints that people do have about Asian immigrants in New Zealand, tend to be more childish than substantial.
The reason for this is clear. New Zealand operates a strong filter. Asians don't come to New Zealand without a solid background check. Hence, New Zealand only sees the best of what Asia has to offer, and to its great benefit. There are immigrants who do come to New Zealand without the filter, due to some unusual immigration privileges, and contrasting this is where the country sees its biggest (real) social problems.
You can see the point. If a country or region wants to grow rapidly with people, and it's small, then it can operate a strong filter and cream the best of what the world has to offer. It can rapidly develop an unusually high concentration of intelligent and respectable people.
Of course, if you want to live in a place that feels good, then the people factor is overwhelming. No one's happy when they have to deal with gangsters and junkies, etc, begging in the street.
So this is the point. With the online world potentially supporting at least 50% of existing jobs, we have the practical foundation for mass-migration on a revolutionary scale. It's now a live-anywhere economy. So, I predict that we could see massive demographic shifts, in choice growth hotspots. To explain:
Small or highly independent districts, in nice locations with good weather, can choose to grow rapidly simply by importing young online workers with clean backgrounds. The more of those people you have - the more attractive your country becomes.
Not only would your location become richer with the higher concentration of industrious people, but the greater concentration of good people will make the country more attractive on social grounds alone...
This will drive snowball growth. The dependant and somewhat depressing parts of society will proportionally shrink, making the country ever more attractive. Ask, why should people tolerate massive social problems, and risk being voted into socialism (like Venezuela), when they can just walk away from those countries?
Conversely, bad countries will get worse, with the effect being a snowball to the bottom as they lose all their good people.
My prediction is that in time, soon enough, we will see the development of paradises on earth, or much closer to it. If you want to be part of these paradises, then I suggest taking care with your reputation. Don't do anything concerningly criminal or abusive - and keep the tattoos off your face, hands and neck. Otherwise the gatekeepers might not open the gate.
-Andrew Atkin
