so as someone without strong feelings and also who is unwilling to ever read noah why screen by country of origin instead of just determining (i) desired immigration level, and then (ii) executing an annual or w/e second-price auction for the immigration rights?
hmmmmmmmm I wonder about that. I can imagine it going the other direction too; seems like a muddy empirical question. My expectation is that US culture is (was?!!) powerful enough to dissolve most cultural compatibility issues, but we could penalize certain bids if needed.