The myth of the lazy, white Briton

By: Like the Roman

Over the last ten years there has been a surge in the number of immigrants coming to our shores, resulting in the rapid and unparalleled transformation of many of our towns and cities. The Office of National Statistics' figures indicate that in 1992, 164,000 migrants from outside the EU came to Britain; by 2006, this had almost trebled to 468,000! Those figures do not include British citizens or those from EU countries.

As the floodgates have opened and Britain has been submerged under a tidal wave of immigrants, our politicians have remained silent. Prior to the 1997 general election, senior representatives of the three main parties signed a pledge not to make 'race' an election issue, and in 2001 The Commission for Racial Equality requested a similar pledge was signed by individual MPs, effectively stifling debate on the issue.

Of course, discussion of immigration has been taboo since the 1960s, when Enoch Powell was hectored and pilloried by its left-wing exponents, the media and even his colleagues. Actually, that's not entirely true, discussion of the negative aspects of immigration and multiculturalism are taboo, we are forever being told about the benefits they bring.

Amongst the many spurious reasons cited for the need for mass-immigration, is that immigrants do "the jobs nobody else wants". We are frequently told that there are lots of lazy, indigenous Britons languishing on state benefits, rather than getting a job. The media perpetuate this myth by stereotyping benefit claimants as white, working class and uneducated - known in popular culture as 'chavs'. In contrast, ethnic minorities are usually portrayed as hard working and often entrepreneurial.

The government's own statistics, however, paint a different picture. As you can see from the graph below, Muslims, per capita, are far more likely to be unemployed than Christians, who after Jews, are the least likely to be out of work.



Even if the stereotypical hedonistic, feckless chav has turned his back on God, the above graph shows that per capita, a person of 'No religion' is more or less as likely to be unemployed as their Sikh or Hindu counterpart.

In addition to being lazy, the white underclass are also portrayed as having large broods, too. However again this is contrary to the statistics, which show that the highest birthrate in the UK is among Pakistani-born women, who have an average of 4.7 children compared to 1.6 for British-born women.

If indeed there are jobs that people don't want to do, basic economics suggests that this can be remedied quite simply - by increasing the wage. In fields that are more specialised, the higher wage will motivate people to get the skills required. By merely importing people with the necessary qualifications, we are suppressing wages and depriving other (usually poorer) countries of their skilled work force.

It is obvious to anybody that an immigrant from say, Poland, who is sharing a house (and thus the rent and bills) with several of his compatriots is likely to be willing to work for less than a Briton with a family to feed and clothe. When one also takes into account the fact that if he is sending money home, or saving it up with the intention of spending it in Poland, his income is in real terms much higher due to the cost of living being much cheaper there.

The truth is there is most definitely an underclass in the UK that is dependent upon benefits, though it is by no means exclusively white. More importantly, it is more the result of mass-immigration than its cause.

Tags: Like the Roman, Lazy white briton