If they were actually accepting all applications that meet the criteria, that would make first come first serve more fair, but there are quotas so they have to reject N-1 applications regardless of their application.

Lottery systems are generally considered fairer than first come first serve because they don't advantage people who apply early. Especially in an immigration-related process where circumstances are likely to dictate when you can apply, not everyone will have an opportunity to 'get in early'.

If you have a way to make the process simultaneously non-random, fair, and not have a cap (which I personally would probably be fine with eliminating but is presumably a non-starter for various political reasons), I'm sure some people would love to hear about it.

Sure, just make the process much more restrictive. The idea is to take in the best, not help the most vulnerable.

> The idea is to take in the best

Is that really the purpose of the family-reunification program?

That's a typo.

Sure. Attach a price tag to it.

Ah yes, because "the people with the most money get in" is the absolute definition of fair for sure.

Why is that wrong? How do you propose to select to pick who gets in and who doesn’t?

The other options are to let everybody in or to suppose you already know the right criteria for who'd be the "best" immigrants. Hint: you don't.

Genuinely random selection averts loads of really nasty problems in a system where you need to pick things even though humans tend to be sure some other approach would work better.

> The other options are to let everybody in or to suppose you already know the right criteria for who'd be the "best" immigrants. Hint: you don't.

On an individual basis of course not, but you don't think in the aggregate better candidates can be chosen?

No. If the information is not about the individual, then it isn't useful in evaluating the individual. I know that sounds tautological, but it seems that obvious.

I would imagine it's because there are a limited number of people that Canadians will allow to immigrate into their county?

Yep Canada has pretty tight immigration policy.

While it does seem wrong and silly, isn't a completely random lottery explicitly fair? No one involved is privileged by any metric (unless you believe in supernatural luck).

Unfair to whom? That is going to be relative.

to those who lose the lottery, duh!

Its still better than using the place of birth as a determining factor.

You can still use that in concomitance with the lottery.

"The Liberals introduced a lottery in 2017 in an effort to make the system fairer – previously, applications were accepted on a first-come, first-served basis. The program receives roughly 100,000 applications each year and selects 10,000"