Pritchett's idea has drawn criticism from the left and right. Critics question the effects on family, as Pritchett's guest-worker proposal would prohibit workers from bringing children. Nationalists in rich countries are concerned about giving jobs to foreigners and whether those workers would go home once their job is over.

But wealthy nations such as Japan and Italy are suffering from a population decline and have no choice but to recruit labor from abroad, Pritchett said. Skilled laborers would probably be more likely to stay permanently and become citizens, while unskilled laborers would come in cycles.

Poor countries have too many unskilled laborers. If groups of unskilled laborers were plucked each year from poor countries, then workers remaining at home would be able to find jobs easier, Pritchett said. Wages at home would be higher.

Pritchett uses history as an example.

In Ireland during the late 1840s, the nation reeled from the economic shock of the potato famine as people died or left the country. The population fell by 53 percent. But the gross domestic product of Ireland never fell, and wages actually increased.

During economic troubles that began in Bolivia in the 1970s, people did not leave, because no other country would take them. Their population increased and "real wages have collapsed to less than half the level relative to the U.S.," Pritchett said.

"If you look at countries in the current closed-border era, when a country's in shock, real wages collapse," he said. "Really the world was a lot more globalized 100 years ago. You could pick up and move anywhere you wanted to. Now everybody is trapped. All of a sudden, geography is your destiny."

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E-mail: lhancock@desnews.com