SDPtalk with Garett Jones

The Culture Transplant – is diversity really our strength?

In this episode of SDPtalk, William Clouston is joined by Garett Jones, professor of economics at George Mason University and author of three books known as the Singapore Trilogy.

In his latest book The Culture Transplant, Garett demonstrates that immigrants retain the socio-economic norms of their mother country across multiple generations. He claims that full assimilation within a generation or two is therefore impossible. Instead, the cultural attitudes of the immigrants shape the institutions and influence the economic productivity of their new country.

Garett and William discuss the implications of this for migration policy, particularly in the most innovative Western nations. They agree that moderate levels of migration bring many benefits, but mass migration from poor to rich countries could ultimately “wound the goose that lays the golden eggs of global innovation and worldwide prosperity.”