Buttigieg's plan to repopulate depressed rural areas with immigrants reminds one of old Soviet schemes to ship people to Siberia to stimulate the economy there.
"Here's the problem. If you give government a job to do, even one that seems justified in the abstract, it will use its power to make a terrible mess in practice."
It's impossible to calculate the cost and benefit immigration without considering psychic profit and loss. And the government definitely is in no position to make any calculations at all.