[jtown,man]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

I agree that mobility is upward mobility harder and also still think that my statement was accurate.

First, the U.S.'s immigration system biases our legal immigrant populations to the most high paying jobs. Unless the immigrant is an asylum seeker, or someone with an illegal status, the person is virtually guaranteed to be earning a wage that is above the median income of the population as a whole, due to the requirements for obtaining a work permit. Second, related to the first point, they are also more likely than Americans as a whole to be working in tech or finance, which are the two industries that have produced the most millionaires over the past 20-30 years. There simply is no equivalent anywhere else in the world (except China) for the number of rich people that have been created through technology in the U.S. over the past three decades.

One point, the vast majority of legal immigrants aren't here because of their potential of high wages. They are here because they have family here.