Severe restrictions on immigration could trigger a demographic time bomb for the U.S. economy. Here's the chain reaction: fewer incoming workers means a shrinking labor force, which directly undermines the tax base funding Social Security and Medicare. These programs already face sustainability challenges with an aging population—cutting off the flow of working-age contributors only accelerates the crisis.

The math is straightforward but brutal. Social Security depends on current workers paying into the system to support retirees. Reduce the worker-to-retiree ratio, and you're either looking at benefit cuts, tax hikes, or both. Medicare faces the same squeeze. Immigration has historically been one of the few mechanisms offsetting demographic decline in developed economies.

What makes this particularly concerning is the timing. Boomers are retiring en masse, and birth rates remain below replacement levels. Immigration isn't just filling jobs—it's propping up the entire fiscal architecture of entitlement programs. Drastically limiting it without a backup plan is essentially choosing fiscal strain over pragmatic policy.

The irony? The same voices calling for stricter borders often oppose benefit cuts or tax increases. But you can't have it both ways. Demographics don't negotiate.