The central assessment of the economic net impact of the arrivals is a positive boost to the UK economy of between £2.4bn and £2.9bn over five years with the majority of this in the form of additional tax collected by the exchequer.
As mentioned by
@plawolf, they want easy money. Especially with the Pandemic and Brexit economic issues.
Let's face it, there is no downside.
1. You get to look tough on China, standing up for HK without actually doing anything. You don't need to fight. Hot air is free.
2. If people come, then it is likely they have immigration means/money. The poor are too poor to move as the UK government is not providing any social support.
However, its all made up numbers anyway. Majority of the good earners in HK work in the financial industry. I'm going to assume they are going to stay in HK for the following reasons.
- They have the means already
- If they were so political, they wouldn't sully themselves with "China money", which is what the majority of the money in HK is.
- There is almost zero-upside. You would uproot your family and further negatively impact their quality of life by reducing earning potential.
The hope would be to get upper middle earners who are willing to take a cut in their earnings, but some of the tradeoffs (access to higher education, better English skills) for their family are worth it. In HK it is both difficult to get good secondary and post-secondary education without a lot of money. However, since there are no jobs for these people in UK right now, again they are unlikely to go.
Now referring to
@horse's post. These are the same push/pull factors working for the Canadians in HK. Although Canada has better pull than UK because the cost of living is lower overall and better overall environment (Fresh air factor). Anecdotally (and some limited statistics) are showing that many HK-Canadians from the handover period, came to Canada (had kids, or brought young kids), then went back or the kids went back (mainly for better earning potential thanks to the Chinese economy), then are coming back again (free healthcare or the family factors above).
Is racism a factor? It always will be. However, it is my honest opinion that it would not be the deciding factor for anyone.
That being said, pretending that you will get "a warm welcome" is laughable. We see with Covid the absolute garbage that is floating to the surface now. So many articles about "bat soup", "dirty Chinese markets" really tells you that the racism is still very mainstream. The latest science is showing that the Wuhan market did not play much of a role if at all in the spread of Covid. Yet the Australian government still pushed for an investigation specifically aimed at China. This is a geopolitical move first, but you don't need a PhD to know that Chinese-Australians (immigrants or born jus soli) are going to be collateral damage. This is the textbook definition of institutional racism.
