9 ms·

Switzerland to restrict EU immigration

38 points by youngerdryas 13y ago

corin_ 13y ago
> EU officials have always told Switzerland it cannot cherry pick only those parts of European policy it likes best. Surely that's the exact reason they are not a member of the European Union, and exactly what they can do.
- bradleyjg 13y ago
  Certainly they can. But then the EU can quit treating Switzerland like a quasi-member, and instead treat them like a they do e.g. Turkey.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
  - Kudzu_Bob 13y ago
    Why? Because they're not as multicultural as the rest of Europe? Because they dare to live in a way that suits themselves? The promoters of diversity ueber alles certainly are in touch with their inner totalitarian these days.
    - bradleyjg 13y ago
      Because it isn't worth the effort to bilaterally negotiate every little detail with tiny Switzerland. The EU has accommodated Switzerland's extreme go-it-alone ethos by offering membership in all but name. They did so out of a sense of shared history, affection, and mutual benefit. If the Switzerland is no longer interested they can truly go it alone. As for totalitarian, it's pretty rich to argue against free movement and in favor of rank nationalism and accuse your interlocutors of totalitarian tendencies.
      - Kudzu_Bob 13y ago
        Aristotle contended that justice consists of treating equals equally, and unequals unequally. You, on the other hand, want to treat Switzerland just like Turkey, even though the two countries are strikingly unequal.
        anigbrowl 13y ago
        Analogies do not work that way! /Morbo You're using a very selective definition of 'equal.' Switzerland is certainly different from Turkey in various ways, but in this context they should be assessed on their degree of legal ties to the EU - treaties signed and complied with, for example. Arguably, Switzerland is getting far more benefits from the EU than Turkey despite neither of them being actual members.
        Kudzu_Bob 13y ago
        And they are making far better use of those benefits than Turkey ever could. For instance (since so many people here are fond of economic arguments), tiny Switzerland (population under eight million) has a GDP a bit over six hundred and thirty-five billion dollars. But even though Turkey has a population nine times greater, that country's GDP is only a hundred billion and change bigger than Switzerland's. If the Turks were as productive, their economy would be the equal of China's, with only a fraction of China's population. The Swiss literally get more done before their morning coffee break than the Turks do all day, maybe because they somehow manage to spend their time at useful tasks rather than blowing up Kurds, staging military coups, listening to crazy preachers, banning political parties, and so on. I'm glad the EU is helping them out, because they deserve it.
        anigbrowl 13y ago
        In other words, I'm right so you change the subject to how lazy the Turks are. Well, Let's put Switzerland where Turkey is and vice-versa and see how well the Swiss do, shall we? Sorry, but your post comes off as pretty thinly-veiled racism, thanks to your highly selective use of statistics, dismissal of geography, and conflation of multiple historical events into the present.
    - Gormo 13y ago
      Isn't Switzerland, on any meaningful account, far more "multicultural" than the rest of Europe? We're talking about what's arguably the most decentralized country in the world here; the one in which four different languages are dominant in different regions. And, aside from all that, artificially-enforced uniformity seems no less totalitarian than artificially-enforced diversity. Wouldn't you regard any legislative policy that attempts to direct the composition of civil society - toward any goal - to be inherently totalitarian? Certainly it at least creates a sort of circular reference in the mechanism of democracy: how can the state be held accountable to society if it has the power to manipulate society?
      - Kudzu_Bob 13y ago
        Switzerland is far more multicultural than the rest of Europe. Switzerland must embrace multiculturalism the way the rest of Europe has. Switzerland is the most decentralized country in the world. Switzerland is inherently totalitarian. Legislative policy that attempts to direct the composition of civil society is bad when citizens vote for it. Legislative policy that attempts to direct the composition of civil society is good when it is imposed on an unwilling citizenry by a foreign bureaucracy. Got it. Everything is much clearer now.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- nickik 13y ago
  In theory that is true, and it is very nice. The problem just is that the EU is all around Switzerland, they have a huge stick they can use. If there where more countrys like Switzerland it would be closer to theory.
RivieraKid 13y ago
Totally understandable decesion, don't see anything wrong about it.
- a_c_s 13y ago
  You mean except for the part where they previously agreed not to do so?
  - zimbatm 13y ago
    You mean before they started getting 80k immigrants a year ? EDIT: 80k / year represents ~1% of the actual population
  - RivieraKid 13y ago
    If it was more than an informal agreement, then yes, except for that I don't see a problem.
  - jvm 13y ago
    When they made the agreement, they included a "safeguard clause" indicating that the deal would be off if immigration exceeded a particular amount. It has. I'm completely against the policy, but it's not a violation of the agreement.
    - paradoja 13y ago
      > I'm completely against the policy, but it's not a violation of the agreement. That is not clear. EU officials say that it is indeed a violation of the agreement: “The measures adopted today by the Swiss government are contrary to the agreement on the Free Movement of Persons, since they differentiate between groups of member states.” http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9f70bc54-ad0c-11e2-9454-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2RQRJECSf http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9f70bc54-ad0c-11e2-9454-00144feabd...
      - Kudzu_Bob 13y ago
        If it is not clear whether it's a violation of the agreement, then it is dishonest to accuse them of being in violation of the agreement.
shell0x 13y ago
Switzerland seems to be the only country in Europe which gets it right. They also have a 'real' democracy(grassroots democracy), which is a huge advantage, because people can vote for nearly everything.
- oellegaard 13y ago
  How is that an advantage? Sure, they get to vote on roundabouts in the city, but having that many votes have also led to one of the lowest participation rates, when they vote, in Europe.
  - nickik 13y ago
    Most people dont care about most of the things and so they dont vote most of the time. Some people vote only on the lower levels, some only on the highest. I myself do normally not vote on village level (5000 people) because the matters are quite trival, while I vote on the level that involve things like immigration. I know other people that do to opposit because truth is that the village level things probeblly still have a bigger impact on your live then the country wide things. If there is a vote on something really importent that a lot of people feel is importent participation rates shoots up quite a bit.
  - Kudzu_Bob 13y ago
    You seem to think that participation is an end in itself. By that metric, Belgium is doing splendidly, whereas Switzerland is a failure. Meanwhile, on Planet Earth, Switzerland is a marvelous country, while Belgium is on the verge of splitting up.
oellegaard 13y ago
I used to live in Switzerland for two years. Switzerland depends on foreigners for high-skilled jobs - they simply have a higher demand for high-skilled people than they currently produce. It seems like a super stupid idea to limit that.
alanbyrne 13y ago
I wonder what this means for us Swiss citizens working in other EU member countries. Will they reciprocally boot us out?
alanbyrne 13y ago
I wonder what this means for us Swiss citizens working in other EU member countries. Will they reciprocally boot us out?
jcfrei 13y ago
I feel more and more ashamed as a swiss citizen - seeing xenophobia on the rise across the country. it is disheartening to see the growing populism among our politicians, mindlessly fueling the fears in the swiss population and focusing the political deliberations on topics such as immigration, asylum-seekers and highway taxes instead of the real issues in this country. the swiss citizen need to wake up and realize which century they are in. in the 21st century few swiss people understand the implications of globalization and that immigration for better or worse is inevitable. as a matter of fact the economy of this country would not stand as strong without the constant influx of immigrants. it is time we acknowledge this fact and leave our resentments towards europe behind. for those who are interested, you'll find more extensive remarks in my blog: http://jcfrei.com http://jcfrei.com
- schoper 13y ago
  Even if it were true that "the economy of this country would not stand as strong without the constant influx of immigrants" -- and it's not true, it's foolish -- you would still want to consider before selling your birthright for the bowl of red.
  - Kudzu_Bob 13y ago
    Some people seem to think that whatever is good for the stock market is good for the country, because the country IS the stock market.
  - phaet0n 13y ago
    What exactly is jcfrei's birthright? Or yours, or mine for that matter? I'm going to get out my raclette and chillout for a bit...
    - Kudzu_Bob 13y ago
      If you do not know what your birthright is, then it is unlikely that you will manage to keep it for very long.
- hugh4life 13y ago
agilebyte 13y ago
So is the problem essentially the rising cost of real estate? See I was under the impression that IF you structure your economy correctly and you have net surplus (of money) and IF you draw immigrants from all social strata, surely these people will just continue in the trend? Some will be workers, some employers, some have nots? The only problem would be a country getting cramped so it costs more to build the same type of buildings, roads etc.
- mjn 13y ago
  From what I've read of it, a lot of it is cultural as well. Outside a few liberal, cosmopolitan parts of society (whether left-liberal or right-liberal), many Swiss just don't want more than a handful of immigrants, and like maintaining a closed, stable Nation of people whose great-great-grandfathers were Swiss. This even (perhaps especially) extends to negative sentiment directed at German immigrants by Swiss-Germans. One paper I ran across (via Wikipedia) suggested that negative sentiment directed at Germans might be due to their similarity: if the objective cultural difference between two groups is not huge, then an influx of immigration is particularly threatening, because it might erase the fragile boundary: http://img2.tapuz.co.il/CommunaFiles/44893554.pdf http://img2.tapuz.co.il/CommunaFiles/44893554.pdf
return0 13y ago
I wonder if they will extend this to the immigration of capital.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
wsc981 13y ago
I think this policy makes perfect sense. In the Netherlands we've put the borders wide open since the early 90s and perhaps even earlier due to EU legislation. Overall the results have been terrible. These are some of the issues we deal with nowadays: - many immigrants are on welfare, this puts a huge economic pressure on our country. - many immigrants of Middle-Eastern descent put a huge pressure on our healthcare (e.g. very many visits to our general practitioners). - the culture of many Middle-Eastern immigrants doesn't merge very well with our Western culture. E.g. in Marrocan culture boys are generally higher regarded as girls. Additionally these boys are one of our biggest problem groups (very high criminality). Mothers don't have the means to correct these boys. - I should note Marrocan girls seem to do pretty well in the Netherlands, low criminality and generally hard working students at school with good grades. It's interesting when browsing fora of Dutch-Marrocan people (for example http.maroc.nl) you often see posts of Marrocan girls looking for converted (to Islam) Dutch guys to wed. These girls often prefer converted Dutch partner because the girls themselves would have more freedom in such a relation. Many of these immigrants live close to each other. Since many woman don't work and are not allowed to leave home by themselves except for shopping / visiting the doctor, they often don't learn the Dutch language which results in them being socially excluded from the Dutch society. In my opinion our own government failed big time on this. We should have had limited immigration from the start (early 70s or 80s perhaps?) and when people would come we should have made sure immigrants would be spread around cities, not living close to each other in "ghettos". This would have forced many immigrants to integrate better in our society. Either way, I think unlimited immigration puts huge strains on society and eventually destabilises society as a whole because of culture clashes.
- anigbrowl 13y ago
  It takes a few generations for these things to work themselves out. I imagine the former Dutch colonies would have preferred a more limited subjugation as well, but you can't always have what you want.
- kintamanimatt 13y ago
  This is really quite xenophobic. The majority of migration is going to be from the EU [1], and despite Europe's integration by way of treaties, I'm under the impression that someone fresh off the boat (metaphorically speaking) can't just suddenly claim all the welfare there is. Immigrants from non-EU countries have to be able to show their ability to support themselves before they're granted a visa, so I highly doubt they're a huge burden on society too. Only something like 2.16% of population is from Morocco [2] and I really doubt they're the result of society's ills. While I can't find statistics, I highly doubt these people are draining the country's coffers through welfare payments. Also, why do you think they're constantly seeking health care? Even if they are, you seem to be saying they're unnecessarily visiting the doctor and are hypochondriacs; again, I struggle to understand why this would be the case just because they're from the middle east. Do you have any statistics available that demonstrate middle-eastern immigrants visit their GP more than born and bred Dutch, and are feigning illness? (I'm not saying it's untrue, I just can't find anything to support or refute your claim.) The thing with the freedom of movement provisions is it works both ways: the Dutch are just as able to leave and move to another EU nation as other EU nationals are able to move to the Netherlands. Quite a good number of Dutch emigrate both to within and outside the EU, which is fair and fine. Immigration, at least in the US, can be argued to have quite a positive effect on society. [3] I see no reason for this not to apply to the Netherlands. What your argument really seems to boil down to is that there are people from a different tribe that are living among your tribe and, by way of confirmation bias, you notice all the things they do wrong. No society is perfect and not all immigrants are going to integrate into society or be a net benefit, but many more will be. Relatively speaking, the Netherlands has its shit together and I fail to see any evidence that supports your claim that the Dutch standard of living is being significantly eroded because of brown people. [1] http://www.cbs.nl/en-GB/menu/themas/bevolking/publicaties/artikelen/archief/2012/2012-011-pb.htm http://www.cbs.nl/en-GB/menu/themas/bevolking/publicaties/ar... [2] http://statline.cbs.nl/StatWeb/Download/Population__origin_250413021841.html http://statline.cbs.nl/StatWeb/Download/Population__origin_2... [3] http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/20/opinion/the-beneficial-impact-of-immigrants.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/20/opinion/the-beneficial-imp...

38 points by youngerdryas 13y ago

> EU officials have always told Switzerland it cannot cherry pick only those parts of European policy it likes best. Surely that's the exact reason they are not a member of the European Union, and exactly what they can do.

bradleyjg 13y ago
Certainly they can. But then the EU can quit treating Switzerland like a quasi-member, and instead treat them like a they do e.g. Turkey.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- Kudzu_Bob 13y ago
  Why? Because they're not as multicultural as the rest of Europe? Because they dare to live in a way that suits themselves? The promoters of diversity ueber alles certainly are in touch with their inner totalitarian these days.
  - bradleyjg 13y ago
    Because it isn't worth the effort to bilaterally negotiate every little detail with tiny Switzerland. The EU has accommodated Switzerland's extreme go-it-alone ethos by offering membership in all but name. They did so out of a sense of shared history, affection, and mutual benefit. If the Switzerland is no longer interested they can truly go it alone. As for totalitarian, it's pretty rich to argue against free movement and in favor of rank nationalism and accuse your interlocutors of totalitarian tendencies.
    - Kudzu_Bob 13y ago
      Aristotle contended that justice consists of treating equals equally, and unequals unequally. You, on the other hand, want to treat Switzerland just like Turkey, even though the two countries are strikingly unequal.
      - anigbrowl 13y ago
        Analogies do not work that way! /Morbo You're using a very selective definition of 'equal.' Switzerland is certainly different from Turkey in various ways, but in this context they should be assessed on their degree of legal ties to the EU - treaties signed and complied with, for example. Arguably, Switzerland is getting far more benefits from the EU than Turkey despite neither of them being actual members.
        Kudzu_Bob 13y ago
        And they are making far better use of those benefits than Turkey ever could. For instance (since so many people here are fond of economic arguments), tiny Switzerland (population under eight million) has a GDP a bit over six hundred and thirty-five billion dollars. But even though Turkey has a population nine times greater, that country's GDP is only a hundred billion and change bigger than Switzerland's. If the Turks were as productive, their economy would be the equal of China's, with only a fraction of China's population. The Swiss literally get more done before their morning coffee break than the Turks do all day, maybe because they somehow manage to spend their time at useful tasks rather than blowing up Kurds, staging military coups, listening to crazy preachers, banning political parties, and so on. I'm glad the EU is helping them out, because they deserve it.
        anigbrowl 13y ago
        In other words, I'm right so you change the subject to how lazy the Turks are. Well, Let's put Switzerland where Turkey is and vice-versa and see how well the Swiss do, shall we? Sorry, but your post comes off as pretty thinly-veiled racism, thanks to your highly selective use of statistics, dismissal of geography, and conflation of multiple historical events into the present.
  - Gormo 13y ago
    Isn't Switzerland, on any meaningful account, far more "multicultural" than the rest of Europe? We're talking about what's arguably the most decentralized country in the world here; the one in which four different languages are dominant in different regions. And, aside from all that, artificially-enforced uniformity seems no less totalitarian than artificially-enforced diversity. Wouldn't you regard any legislative policy that attempts to direct the composition of civil society - toward any goal - to be inherently totalitarian? Certainly it at least creates a sort of circular reference in the mechanism of democracy: how can the state be held accountable to society if it has the power to manipulate society?
    - Kudzu_Bob 13y ago
      Switzerland is far more multicultural than the rest of Europe. Switzerland must embrace multiculturalism the way the rest of Europe has. Switzerland is the most decentralized country in the world. Switzerland is inherently totalitarian. Legislative policy that attempts to direct the composition of civil society is bad when citizens vote for it. Legislative policy that attempts to direct the composition of civil society is good when it is imposed on an unwilling citizenry by a foreign bureaucracy. Got it. Everything is much clearer now.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
nickik 13y ago
In theory that is true, and it is very nice. The problem just is that the EU is all around Switzerland, they have a huge stick they can use. If there where more countrys like Switzerland it would be closer to theory.

RivieraKid 13y ago

Totally understandable decesion, don't see anything wrong about it.

a_c_s 13y ago
You mean except for the part where they previously agreed not to do so?
- zimbatm 13y ago
  You mean before they started getting 80k immigrants a year ? EDIT: 80k / year represents ~1% of the actual population
- RivieraKid 13y ago
  If it was more than an informal agreement, then yes, except for that I don't see a problem.
- jvm 13y ago
  When they made the agreement, they included a "safeguard clause" indicating that the deal would be off if immigration exceeded a particular amount. It has. I'm completely against the policy, but it's not a violation of the agreement.
  - paradoja 13y ago
    > I'm completely against the policy, but it's not a violation of the agreement. That is not clear. EU officials say that it is indeed a violation of the agreement: “The measures adopted today by the Swiss government are contrary to the agreement on the Free Movement of Persons, since they differentiate between groups of member states.” http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9f70bc54-ad0c-11e2-9454-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2RQRJECSf http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9f70bc54-ad0c-11e2-9454-00144feabd...
    - Kudzu_Bob 13y ago
      If it is not clear whether it's a violation of the agreement, then it is dishonest to accuse them of being in violation of the agreement.

shell0x 13y ago

Switzerland seems to be the only country in Europe which gets it right. They also have a 'real' democracy(grassroots democracy), which is a huge advantage, because people can vote for nearly everything.

oellegaard 13y ago
How is that an advantage? Sure, they get to vote on roundabouts in the city, but having that many votes have also led to one of the lowest participation rates, when they vote, in Europe.
- nickik 13y ago
  Most people dont care about most of the things and so they dont vote most of the time. Some people vote only on the lower levels, some only on the highest. I myself do normally not vote on village level (5000 people) because the matters are quite trival, while I vote on the level that involve things like immigration. I know other people that do to opposit because truth is that the village level things probeblly still have a bigger impact on your live then the country wide things. If there is a vote on something really importent that a lot of people feel is importent participation rates shoots up quite a bit.
- Kudzu_Bob 13y ago
  You seem to think that participation is an end in itself. By that metric, Belgium is doing splendidly, whereas Switzerland is a failure. Meanwhile, on Planet Earth, Switzerland is a marvelous country, while Belgium is on the verge of splitting up.

oellegaard 13y ago

I used to live in Switzerland for two years. Switzerland depends on foreigners for high-skilled jobs - they simply have a higher demand for high-skilled people than they currently produce. It seems like a super stupid idea to limit that.

alanbyrne 13y ago

I wonder what this means for us Swiss citizens working in other EU member countries. Will they reciprocally boot us out?

alanbyrne 13y ago

I wonder what this means for us Swiss citizens working in other EU member countries. Will they reciprocally boot us out?

jcfrei 13y ago

I feel more and more ashamed as a swiss citizen - seeing xenophobia on the rise across the country. it is disheartening to see the growing populism among our politicians, mindlessly fueling the fears in the swiss population and focusing the political deliberations on topics such as immigration, asylum-seekers and highway taxes instead of the real issues in this country. the swiss citizen need to wake up and realize which century they are in. in the 21st century few swiss people understand the implications of globalization and that immigration for better or worse is inevitable. as a matter of fact the economy of this country would not stand as strong without the constant influx of immigrants. it is time we acknowledge this fact and leave our resentments towards europe behind. for those who are interested, you'll find more extensive remarks in my blog: http://jcfrei.com http://jcfrei.com

schoper 13y ago
Even if it were true that "the economy of this country would not stand as strong without the constant influx of immigrants" -- and it's not true, it's foolish -- you would still want to consider before selling your birthright for the bowl of red.
- Kudzu_Bob 13y ago
  Some people seem to think that whatever is good for the stock market is good for the country, because the country IS the stock market.
- phaet0n 13y ago
  What exactly is jcfrei's birthright? Or yours, or mine for that matter? I'm going to get out my raclette and chillout for a bit...
  - Kudzu_Bob 13y ago
    If you do not know what your birthright is, then it is unlikely that you will manage to keep it for very long.
hugh4life 13y ago

agilebyte 13y ago

So is the problem essentially the rising cost of real estate? See I was under the impression that IF you structure your economy correctly and you have net surplus (of money) and IF you draw immigrants from all social strata, surely these people will just continue in the trend? Some will be workers, some employers, some have nots? The only problem would be a country getting cramped so it costs more to build the same type of buildings, roads etc.

mjn 13y ago
From what I've read of it, a lot of it is cultural as well. Outside a few liberal, cosmopolitan parts of society (whether left-liberal or right-liberal), many Swiss just don't want more than a handful of immigrants, and like maintaining a closed, stable Nation of people whose great-great-grandfathers were Swiss. This even (perhaps especially) extends to negative sentiment directed at German immigrants by Swiss-Germans. One paper I ran across (via Wikipedia) suggested that negative sentiment directed at Germans might be due to their similarity: if the objective cultural difference between two groups is not huge, then an influx of immigration is particularly threatening, because it might erase the fragile boundary: http://img2.tapuz.co.il/CommunaFiles/44893554.pdf http://img2.tapuz.co.il/CommunaFiles/44893554.pdf

return0 13y ago

I wonder if they will extend this to the immigration of capital.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

wsc981 13y ago

I think this policy makes perfect sense. In the Netherlands we've put the borders wide open since the early 90s and perhaps even earlier due to EU legislation. Overall the results have been terrible. These are some of the issues we deal with nowadays: - many immigrants are on welfare, this puts a huge economic pressure on our country. - many immigrants of Middle-Eastern descent put a huge pressure on our healthcare (e.g. very many visits to our general practitioners). - the culture of many Middle-Eastern immigrants doesn't merge very well with our Western culture. E.g. in Marrocan culture boys are generally higher regarded as girls. Additionally these boys are one of our biggest problem groups (very high criminality). Mothers don't have the means to correct these boys. - I should note Marrocan girls seem to do pretty well in the Netherlands, low criminality and generally hard working students at school with good grades. It's interesting when browsing fora of Dutch-Marrocan people (for example http.maroc.nl) you often see posts of Marrocan girls looking for converted (to Islam) Dutch guys to wed. These girls often prefer converted Dutch partner because the girls themselves would have more freedom in such a relation. Many of these immigrants live close to each other. Since many woman don't work and are not allowed to leave home by themselves except for shopping / visiting the doctor, they often don't learn the Dutch language which results in them being socially excluded from the Dutch society. In my opinion our own government failed big time on this. We should have had limited immigration from the start (early 70s or 80s perhaps?) and when people would come we should have made sure immigrants would be spread around cities, not living close to each other in "ghettos". This would have forced many immigrants to integrate better in our society. Either way, I think unlimited immigration puts huge strains on society and eventually destabilises society as a whole because of culture clashes.

anigbrowl 13y ago
It takes a few generations for these things to work themselves out. I imagine the former Dutch colonies would have preferred a more limited subjugation as well, but you can't always have what you want.
kintamanimatt 13y ago
This is really quite xenophobic. The majority of migration is going to be from the EU [1], and despite Europe's integration by way of treaties, I'm under the impression that someone fresh off the boat (metaphorically speaking) can't just suddenly claim all the welfare there is. Immigrants from non-EU countries have to be able to show their ability to support themselves before they're granted a visa, so I highly doubt they're a huge burden on society too. Only something like 2.16% of population is from Morocco [2] and I really doubt they're the result of society's ills. While I can't find statistics, I highly doubt these people are draining the country's coffers through welfare payments. Also, why do you think they're constantly seeking health care? Even if they are, you seem to be saying they're unnecessarily visiting the doctor and are hypochondriacs; again, I struggle to understand why this would be the case just because they're from the middle east. Do you have any statistics available that demonstrate middle-eastern immigrants visit their GP more than born and bred Dutch, and are feigning illness? (I'm not saying it's untrue, I just can't find anything to support or refute your claim.) The thing with the freedom of movement provisions is it works both ways: the Dutch are just as able to leave and move to another EU nation as other EU nationals are able to move to the Netherlands. Quite a good number of Dutch emigrate both to within and outside the EU, which is fair and fine. Immigration, at least in the US, can be argued to have quite a positive effect on society. [3] I see no reason for this not to apply to the Netherlands. What your argument really seems to boil down to is that there are people from a different tribe that are living among your tribe and, by way of confirmation bias, you notice all the things they do wrong. No society is perfect and not all immigrants are going to integrate into society or be a net benefit, but many more will be. Relatively speaking, the Netherlands has its shit together and I fail to see any evidence that supports your claim that the Dutch standard of living is being significantly eroded because of brown people. [1] http://www.cbs.nl/en-GB/menu/themas/bevolking/publicaties/artikelen/archief/2012/2012-011-pb.htm http://www.cbs.nl/en-GB/menu/themas/bevolking/publicaties/ar... [2] http://statline.cbs.nl/StatWeb/Download/Population__origin_250413021841.html http://statline.cbs.nl/StatWeb/Download/Population__origin_2... [3] http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/20/opinion/the-beneficial-impact-of-immigrants.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/20/opinion/the-beneficial-imp...