Migrant workers are among the most vulnerable in any nation. There's been a lot of worry during this financial crisis that growing unemployment in the U.S., Europe and elsewhere would result in a wave of migrant job losses, forcing immigrants to return to their home countries (and back to even more precarious situations). That has a knock on economic effect, because in many poor countries, remittances, or money sent home from migrant workers, represents a major source of national income -- in Mexico, for example, remittances are the biggest contributor to the economy after oil revenues. And indeed, they are already falling -- Dilip Ratha, the lead economist at the World Bank, recently noted on his blog that remittances around the world will likely fall by 5 to 8 percent in 2009.

But a close read of Ratha's post indicates that the situation isn't as bleak as it might appear. For starters, net migration flows around the world are still up, ironically in part because migrants are scared to go home due to a rise in anti-immigration sentiment. As Hania Zlotnik, the director of the United Nation's Population Division told me last month, "They are afraid now that once they leave, they'll never be able to come back in." Since overall remittance payments depend on the absolute number of immigrants abroad, rather than just how many are entering new countries in a given year, there's a good chance that remittances will pick up in 2010, as the financial crisis (hopefully) eases.

What's more worrisome is the tightening of border controls in both the U.S and Europe, tougher entry requirements and the threat of labor protectionism implicit in both. This isn't just political, its very much an economic issue. As my colleague and fellow blogger Barrett Sheridan wrote in a Newsweek International piece recently, freer migration has the potential to contribute more to the global economy than freer trade. While completing the onerous Doha Round (stick with me here, we're almost done...) of trade negotiations would increase global GDP growth by only 0.04 percent, some economists believe that freer migration could add over one full percentage point to global growth. By allowing workers to go where they need to go to find jobs, we are actually helping create more work for everyone. Tell that to anybody who worries about migrants taking their jobs.

Floyd Norris blogged the Goldman Sachs conference call this morning. For those that don't know, Goldman is in the news this week for making a reported $1.8 billion profit in the first quarter of 2009. This has been interpreted as a sign that the ailing financial sector might be ready to leap from its sickbed. But some suspicious smells still hover over the patient. For one, Goldman switched its reporting schedule from a fiscal year ending Nov. 30 to a calendar year ending Dec. 31. The first quarter of the reporting year, which normally would have been Dec.-Feb., became Jan.-Mar., in other words. That left December as an "orphan month," and it was a terrible month indeed -- Goldman suffered a $0.8 billion loss in December. Some suspected foul play, surmising that Goldman squeezed its writedowns and losses into December, making January, February and March look better than they actually were.

In addition, Goldman was the beneficiary of $12.9 billion of government money funneled through AIG, which the insurer used to pay off banks (such as Goldman) with which it had derivatives contracts. Analysts wondered: Was Q1 so healthy-seeming because of these one-time cash injections?

The answer was a cautious no. "Most of the impact was in December," according to Norris. "For the first quarter, the total A.I.G. effect on earnings was, in round numbers, zero."

And what effect did the calendar change have? Little to none, says the company. They wrote down the value of some toxic assets in December, and they did further writedowns in Q1. Which leads us to a good question. In Norris's words:

So how did they make money? One answer is that this is a great time to be in the banking business — if you ignore what we politely call legacy assets. Customers are desperate for cash, and will pay for it. Fees are up. If underwriting volumes continue to rise, this could be a great, great year. Assuming, of course, that the write-offs are over.

From a year of cataclysm to a year of plenty in just a month? This is one reason I don't believe the talk that the financial sector is going to shrink tremendously, at least not absent significant government reform. 

Want a 22,000% Rate of Return on Your Investment?: Hire a lobbyist.

Down and Out in Germany: Some in the German government are thinking about setting up state-funded companies in which other firms can "park" their "redundant" workers while they ride out the recession. Read it along with this NYT analysis of the decline of Germany's automobile manufacturing industry.

Dumb Wars: The FT's Clive Crook dissects the US war on drugs and concludes it is "criminally stupid." Considering that decriminalization could bring in an extra $100 billion each year, he says, it's high time someone at the White House took a serious look at overhaul.

IMF Loosens Up: In an effort to remove the borrowing "stigma" that soured relations with many emerging markets, the IMF is doing away with its strict structural reform requirements. Countries in need of funds will now be able to continuing borrowing from the IMF even if they have not yet implemented all agreed-upon policy reforms.

The Greatest Depression: What and when was the deepest economic collapse in any non-communist, non-wartime, fully industrialized country since the 1930s? Tyler Cowen at Marginal Revolution knows. Do you?