The rich world revolts against sky-high immigration

Migrants are increasingly unwelcome. Over half of Americans favour “deporting all immigrants living in the US illegally back to their home country", up from a third in 2016. Just 10% of Australians want more immigration, a sharp fall from a few years ago. Sir Keir Starmer, Britain’s new centre-left prime minister, wants his country to be “less reliant on migration by training more UK workers". Anthony Albanese, Australia’s slightly longer-serving centre-left prime minister, recently said his country’s migration system “wasn’t working properly" and wants to cut net migration in half. And that is before you get to Donald Trump, who pledges mass deportations if he wins America’s presidential election—an example populist parties across Europe may wish to follow.

It is not just words. Australia, Britain and Canada are cracking down on “degree mill" universities offering courses that allow in people whose true intention is to work. This year Canada hopes to cut the number of study permits by a third. Other countries are making it harder for migrants to bring family with them. President Joe Biden has announced measures to bar those who unlawfully cross America’s southern border from receiving asylum. In France President Emmanuel Macron wants to speed up deportations; Germany is enacting similar plans. And worse could be on its way. Mr Trump’s plans imply the removal of perhaps 7.5m people. What will all this mean for rich-world economies?

The change of approach follows a period of sky-high immigration. In the past three years 15m people have moved to rich countries, the biggest surge in modern history. Last year more than 3m people migrated to America on net, 1.3m went to Canada and about 700,000 turned up in Britain. The