Why do people want to immigrate to the U.S.?

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Why do people want to immigrate to the U.S.? This is not a rhetorical question nor am I being facetious.

It seems to be fairly common now that a growing number of U.S. citizens, academics, politicians, etc view the U.S. as inherently racist. I think Bernie Sanders recently called it racist to the core or something else to the effect that racism is pervasive and near universal.

I could understand why people from Central America, on the same continent might want to immigrate because of proximity, but why do people who don't already have family here and are from different continents want to come here if it's inhospitable to minorities and people of different races?

Especially people that are already living on the continents of Europe and Asia. Europe is widely regarded as being more tolerant to people of different races. If I felt the desire or the need to immigrate I would definitely want to immigrate to a country that was known to be more tolerant to me than one that was widely reported to be racist against me.

Not a bad question.

America is 1) not Communist, 2) economically sound, 3) quite diverse really, and 4) HUGE. We have states that are bigger than some countries. If you want to find something in the world America is the place to do it in.

Bernie Sanders is a radical. Europe is not tolerant to other races; they are in Poland & Hungary limiting immigration and there is a strong anti-immigration sentiment in England. (They do not want Islam changing their culture as they are already Christian or at least were at one time) Europe is full of wonderful achievements of Western civilization and they just don't want that ruined. Not saying immigrants are bad but small countries fill up faster than big ones.

And America is a big one.

I live on a street where in 2016 everyone on the block voted for Trump. In this town we're quite accepting & happy to see all kinds of races. The LGBT crowd is pretty small (but we have zero nightlife and no umbrella drinks so that might have something to do with it) but the Mexicans, Guatemalans, Argentinians, all come up and have good jobs. Some are self-made businessmen. Others are working tirelessly to beautify the town, planting & maintaining gardens. Still others are auto mechanics--we have a lot of older 1990s-2000s cars on the road that don't take specialists skill to maintain, and the immigrants are making good money rebuilding them.

As for the black community (this is the Deep South--South Carolina to be specific) they have historically lived in their own neighborhoods which seems pretty segregational at first. (At one time it was segregation.) Now, however, there are many, many black people, men and women, in public life. We have a black banker (in the heart of Trump country) black hoteliers, black teachers and professors, all kinds of jobs for all kinds of people. Lots of black people move to find opportunity when they get out of high school. And this white guy here is doing the same thing.

Oh, and I might add that the white man isn't so badly off either. The nice thing about America is that if you want to do something, you usually can. I know some old guys outside of town who like tractors. They've rebuilt & sold farm equipment for the last 30 years or so. Of course some of their tractors are the old kind that must be hand-cranked to start, but they can fix anything, and people flock to them to get small classic tractors for gardening & maintenance on their land. (We can buy land here! It's not super expensive.) White people can do just about whatever they like, too.

I might also add that women & men all see lots of opportunity.

And the weather's great and there isn't a lot of pollution.

Actually, you might enjoy dropping over and seeing the U.S.A. firsthand, if you travel. It would at least be better than reading about it from anti-American papers, or in my case pro-American ramblings. Our newspapers really are terrible, basically propaganda for whatever powers want to be in charge, so you have to get news very carefully.

Hey, I live here & I like it.

if you are wealthy you have a lot more freedom in the USA than in a lot of Asian countries.
Wealthy people have a lot more freedom in the USA than poor people.

The USA has a lot of land devoted to housing compared to a lot of countries.
You don't have to be rich to live in a single family home with a nice yard.
And not be in some remote village far from shopping and good health care.

@Borromeo Excellent response!

Interesting. To put this in a little context for Magna--South Carolina (where I live) is one of the 12 poorest states in the Union.

Still not lookin' too shabby! You don't really need all that money here. Rent isn't high as it is in big industrialized states; you don't need a big fancy car (because we don't have vehicle inspections so I can still drive my old rust-bucket) and the food is cheap here because we have a lot of farmers!

Because they're from a third world country where things are a lot worse. People from other developed countries, on the other hand...

People in "third world countries" tend to believe similar to what immigrants believed in the 19th centuries---that the United States, somehow, has streets paved in gold. When they actually get to the US, they are frequently disillusioned. They find many of the same problems here as there.

The difference, really, is the wages in the US, and the relatively low cost of living outside of major urban metropolitan areas.

People immigrate to the United States from Mexico for one simple reason: the wages are much higher in the US. And the Mexican in the US can send down money to the family in Mexico. This is actually probably true for most other "third world" countries.

Also: The United States is in close proximity, especially, to Mexico.

Most of the time, people immigrate for economic reasons. Many times, they are running away from living under drug cartels, too. Or running away from being forced to move constantly because of civil war.

Many people cannot imagine a situation where they can live in the same home they lived in 20 years ago.

Eastern Europeans are more racist than White Americans. More propsperous and more progressive Western Europeans are only about the same degree of tolerant as White Americans. Don't know where you get Europe as a whole being more tolerant than America. Irish Protestants and Catholics cant even tolerate each other, and Serbs and Croats cant tolerate each other, and Gypsies have been persecuted for centuries all over Europe, and are still the n****rs of Eastern Europe. Europeans invented antisemitism.

Like Lostonearth said most migrants are from the third world where there is bottomless overpopulation, and poverty, often accompanied by war.

Black Africans will walk across the Sahara to the coast of post-Khaddaffi Libya ,and then board rickety boats and drown by the hundreds in the Mediterranean to get to Europe. If you gave each an airline ticket to LaGuardia they would gladly go to the US instead.

Some parts of the third world are progressing and are becoming economically dynamic, like India. But even so, lets say only one percent of India's population still yearns to move elsewhere (instead of most them dreaming of that a couple of generations ago) that would still be one percent of over a billion people. So that would ten million folks yearing to knock on our door (enough folks to fill two new average sized US states).

Many of the better off immigrants to the USA studied at US colleges so they know exactly what it is like here.

Countries vary a lot in their tolerance of people that are "different." It is wise to move to someplace that will accept you.

People are starting to desire Canada more often than US.

A country can simultaneously be flawed, even deeply so, and still be a good place to live.

The US is the largest economy in the world; a world leader in many industries including a lot of high profile ones; culturally, geographically, economically, and ethnically diverse.

America is a relatively safe and peaceful country.

You have huge amounts of “soft power”. Hollywood is basically a giant advert for America. You have the best universities in the world. America is synonymous with opportunity and prosperity and people really believe in the American dream.

Reagan talked about the shining city on the hill- that genuinely is how a lot of people think about America. Less so these days than during the Obama administration, but I know a fair few dual nationals who want to go to the US to seek their fortune even despite the Trumpiness.

While America has its flaws and these are well known, people have positivity biases. So they might know that America routinely bankrupts citizens if they get sick, but just assume that getting sick is something that happens to other people. If they come from a peaceful country then they might know that America’s murder rate is higher than their country, but assume that murder is something that happens to other people.

As for Europe, yes there are some countries that are just as good as America in most ways and generally show more pro-immigrant attitudes than America, and a lot of people do choose those countries, but there are no magic countries where racism is not an issue. Britain and France both attract and repel immigrants due to their colonial pasts. Spain and Italy are not good places to be black. The Netherlands and Belgium are very small and not as well known. The Scandinavian countries are extremely racially homogenous. Germany is probably the only European country that is clearly preferable to non-English speaking migrants.

Australia is extremely hostile unless you’re rich. New Zealand is a hella long way from everywhere else. Canada is just little America.

So I’ve given a few different answers there, but ultimately the main thing is that different people will have different priorities and will make different choices.

Canada isn't Little America.

They don't have a right to bear arms. They have free health care. They have liberal laws.

People from Canada who live near the American border invariably buy their gas, and many other items, from the US side.

Canadians tend to have a very ambivalent view of the United States. They are presented to us, in a way, through the song "American Woman," by the Guess Who.

I can see why some people who live in poophole countries would want to come to the U.S.

But I've talked to people in the Netherlands and Europe, and most of them wouldn't touch the U.S. with a ten foot pole. Our screwed-up healthcare is enough to put many people off.