Border Enforcement Costs

Steve Antler, the Econopundit, considers the potential economic costs of immigration restriction policies advocated by nativist elements of both parties.

He writes:

Think for a moment. Strict border enforcement and criminalization of any business' employment of undocumented immigrants would create an immediate labor shortage in many businesses in many parts of the country. If under these circumstances the wage effects turned out to be not at the 10% range of the scale but rather way over in the "negligible" part, immigration reform will disrupt major portions of the US economy without generating anything good as a tradeoff. The outcome would be a major recession with rising prices.

Read the whole thing here.

Can you say "stagflation"?