Qualified immigrants should be paid for coming to the US?

Yes, that's what someone posting on ImmigrationVoice said. You think that's way over the top? Well, consider this article on BusinessWeek.

And let's not forget about immigrants. The workers who move to the U.S. each year bring with them a mother lode of education and skills -- human capital -- for free. One celebrated example is Jonathan Ive, the man who designed the iPod and iMac. Ive was born in England and educated at Newcastle Polytechnic University of Northumbria before joining Apple Computer Inc. in California in 1992.

Ive is not unique. Most of the workers who immigrate to the U.S. each year have at least a high school diploma, while about a third have a college education or better. Since it costs, on average, roughly $100,000 to provide 12 years of elementary and secondary education, and another $100,000 to pay for a college degree, immigrants are providing a subsidy of at least $50 billion annually to the U.S. economy in free human capital. Alternatively, valuing their contribution to the economy by the total wages they expect to earn during their lifetime would put the value of the human capital of new immigrants closer to $200 billion per year. Either the low or high estimate would make the current account deficit look smaller.

So flash back to when you were in your home country. You were in the top 5% in your high school. You get a scholarship for college (which is ultimately paid for by the tax payers). You graduate with excellent grades and get a job that 95% of the population wish they had. You made all the best decisions and are enjoying the results at a very young age. Then, in some unfortunate moment you take an uncharacteristically bad decision. You decide to migrate to the U.S. You give up your job and your life style and get on that plane, very anxious of your future but with the strong belief that U.S. is the place where your dreams will come true. Surely, they will appreciate someone of your calibre.

I bet there are lot of folks who have had the same emotions when they first landed here in the U.S. While you knew things may not be that easy, you believed atleast they will be reasonable. How wrong we all were....