Passel, J.S. Immigration and Immigrants - Setting the record straight. 1994-http://www.urban.org/pubs/immig/immig.html). In the UK also, it is debatable as to how many people who argue that immigrants are scroungers have tried living on the government's income support of 51.40 p/w. So whilst immigration appears to have a slightly positive impact on government spending, how does it affect the economy as a whole, in areas such as employment and GDP? The biggest and most beneficial economic impact of immigration on a receiving country is that it can solve labour shortage problems that a country may face. The best example of this is in post war Europe. Immediately after World war two, the British government brought in 90,000 workers from refugee camps and Italy (Castles and Miller, 1993, p68), through the European Voluntary worker scheme, however these were tied to designated to specific jobs and had few rights. This scheme was operated only up to 1951, as it was easier to utilise colonial workers. As well as the Voluntary worker scheme, a further 100,000 Europeans entered Britain on work permits and by 1961 there were approximately 541,000 workers from the commonwealth. Some had come as a result of direct recruitment by London transport, whilst most came spontaneously due to the demand. In Britain almost all migrants came in a 10 - 15 year period, the introduction of such acts as The 1971 Immigration act and the 1968 Commonwealth act has resulted in there being very little migration since the 70`s, except for the consolidation of immigrant communities and of skilled labour. Swi...
