[Age of Reason]

There is something fundamentally wrong with modern America if the most productive people on earth aren't bred and grown right here at home.

Made-in-America-People should be all the talent we'd ever need.

[ConsistentLibertarian]

"There is something fundamentally wrong with modern America if the most productive people on earth aren't bred and grown right here at home."

That's crazy. Absolutely crazy.

Only a small percentage of the world's population are American. One reason America has so many productive people is that we import them. Productivity is a measure of how much value someone can create over a given period of time. Computer programmers, scientists, engineers, artists, athletes, entertainers ... they all create value and we can measure their productivity. Some of the most productive people in the US are immigrants who left Iran, Kenya, the Czech Republic etc etc and made their way here (where we collect their taxes and don't let them vote).

It's been that way for a long time. At a time when anti-semitism was a more powerful force in American politics, the US imported amazingly productive Jewish scientists who wanted to escape Hitler's Germany. I'm sure glad no one was around to say "Hey, Buy American" in the labor market for nuclear scientists!

If you wanted to maximize the productivity of Americans you could deport the lowest quartile and replace them in a heartbeat with Chinese or Guatemalan or Icelandic substitutes or what have you.