This article on The BBC reports on a statement by the deputy head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Gita Gopinath, that immigration can help drive down UK inflation.

This makes complete sense, and one has to ask oneself why it even needed to be pointed out. The answer, of course, is that governments around the world are trying very hard to limit immigration.

Voters in richer nations are generally against immigration, mainly due to prejudice (just search the Internet for old news stories about "Polish plumbers", who were accused of stealing jobs from Brits - immigrants are typically accused of stealing jobs from locals, and simultaneously accused of living off of government benefits, which is contradictory).

Governments in countries such as the UK, USA, Germany, etc. would like to encourage immigration, but don't dare to, because they will face a backlash from voters.

Immigration solves a number of important and otherwise intractable problems:

• They do jobs that locals just do not want to do (bus drivers, garbage collectors, builders, etc.);
• They will accept pay that locals would not (hence the reduction of inflation);
• They help solve the huge shortage of highly skilled workers (doctors, nurses, engineers, programmers, etc.) faced by most western nations, and come ready trained/educated at zero cost the the nation to which they migrate;
• They are actually willing to work, and work hard, unlike some of the younger generation (described by many employers as lazy, entitled and unmanageable);
• They help to solve the problems that all developed countries have with funding their pension schemes, by changing the ratio of working pension contributors to pensioners.

Sadly, governments have yet to pluck up the courage to face this issue, and to educate their voters about the importance of immigration; instead, they make their countries poorer and less competitive by trying to get by. It is past time for these governments to grow a backbone.