Socialists back regularization as Spain's PP stirs fear

The fight over undocumented immigration: drag or engine?

What weighs more, cultural identity or GDP? The debate over irregular immigration once again pits Spain's Socialists against conservatives, just as data suggest growth would suffer without it. While the PP stages a pre-campaign rally to a merengue beat under the slogan "Europa es Hispana", the Socialist Party defends regularizing undocumented migrants as a necessary measure for the labor market. And it is not just the left saying so: Spanish business leaders have come out in favor of regularization, calling it a "necessary measure" in remarks reported by El País. Behind it all, a headline in El Mundo sums it up: "Spain would not lead EU growth without immigrants".

The tension is obvious. On one side, an identity-based discourse appealing to Hispanic heritage and border control. On the other, the economic evidence of a country that needs labor in key sectors such as hospitality, agriculture and care work. The paradox is that while the parties clash, the economy has already voted: without the contribution of foreign workers, Spain's GDP simply would not reach the growth rates it boasts about.

The calculation is cold. Employers know that regularization is not an act of generosity but a logistical necessity. The underground economy generated by undocumented migrants is also of no use to anyone who wants to collect taxes. But politics runs on different clocks and different arguments. And in that gap, more than an ideological debate is at stake: the country's competitiveness is on the line.

So while politicians argue over whether Spain is more or less Hispanic, business leaders do the math. And the numbers, stubborn as ever, say that without irregular immigrants growth is left in the shadows. But of course, numbers don't vote.