Paul Graham has written a pro-immigration essay titled “Let the Other 95% of Great Programmers In”.

The anti-immigration people have to invent some explanation to account for all the effort technology companies have expended trying to make immigration easier. So they claim it’s because they want to drive down salaries. But if you talk to startups, you find practically every one over a certain size has gone through legal contortions to get programmers into the US, where they then paid them the same as they’d have paid an American. Why would they go to extra trouble to get programmers for the same price? The only explanation is that they’re telling the truth: there are just not enough great programmers to go around.

I asked the CEO of a startup with about 70 programmers how many more he’d hire if he could get all the great programmers he wanted. He said “We’d hire 30 tomorrow morning.”

I’m pretty sure that this is an illustration of my hedge fund manager friend’s mantra: “When the market gives you an answer you don’t like, declare market failure.” Presumably Graham’s pal could hire 30 great programmers tomorrow if he offered compensation significantly in excess of what Google, Apple, and Microsoft are paying and/or simply called up great programmers to ask “How much would I have to pay you to quit your job?” and then agreed to whatever price was quoted.

This is also an example of our philosophy around imprisoning drug dealers to end drug dealing. People are born with an innate calling to drug dealing, rather than having chosen the field due to the economic incentives presented by the market. Thus if we put all current drug dealers in prison there will be no more drug dealers. The analysis of the situation that Graham describes is similar. Just as there is no way to turn a retail clerk into a drug dealer (since he or she lacks the genetic disposition toward drug dealing) there is no way that if companies nationwide paid programmers more than the BLS’s median pay of $74,280 per year (source), additional Americans would be attracted to this field.

[Note that in my home state of Massachusetts, $74,280 pre-tax is $52,192 per year after tax (ADP Paycheck Calculator), i.e., comparable to what a person could get in annual tax-free child support following a one-night encounter with a $300,000/year earner. A person who wanted to have two children could collect more than $52,192 per year by having sex with two different Massachusetts residents, each earning $135,200 per year or more (see worksheet).]