Except you can't create Google in India. Google isn't minted by divine inspiration hitting a couple of smart guys in a garage.

It's created by an entire ecosystem that allows a project like that to be conceived and executed in such a way that has benefited the entire world, including the poor in India.

It's a big qualifier, but like I said, it's not zero-sum.

No economist will argue that limiting skilled labor immigration (or any immigration, really!) is an optimal policy for improving the lives of the poor elsewhere. It just doesn't work that way.

▲

rayiner 43 minutes ago | parent | next [-]

I doubt its better for India to have Indians making Google richer than to have them staying in India to make something even a fraction of the size of Google in India. How is India going to create that ecosystem if all the smart people leave?

	▲	airstrike 20 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		It's better to not frame this in terms of a specific country, lest it come across as if we're picking on India specifically. Developing countries have structural reasons for why they are underdeveloped. This is a very complicated topic, and one for which there is no shortage of academic interest. I suggest starting from William Easterly's "The Elusive Quest for Growth". I quote here from the book review MIT Press: > What is necessary for growth is that government incentives induce investment in collective goods like education, health, and the rule of law

▲

digitaltrees 37 minutes ago | parent | prev [-]

This is the correct answer. Concentration of talent creates cross pollination and collaborative learning. The innovation is then exported.