lost" (Fix and Passel, 1994, www.urban.org). So whilst immigration is not the only solution for labour shortages, it can benefit the economy of a receiving country in many other ways. So what is the economic impact of immigration on a receiving country? It can be both positive and negative. Permanent settler migration can have a lot of benefits to an economy, whilst it is not necessary for solving labour shortages and whilst it can slow down the development of less labour intensive means of production. Immigrant labour can help national productivity, immigrant businesses provide employment, immigrant labour can help solve skilled labour shortages such as in the medical sector, immigrants pay taxes and the longer a immigrant community is established the more it contributes to an economy. When immigration happens en mass in times of conflict or disturbance such as in Kosovo it can have a serious negative economic impact on the receiving country, however the levels of immigration which the west has seen appears to have had a positive impact on the economy. ...
