I just do not understand a government that does not want to enforce the law...good grief if your government wants to circumvent the law....where the hell does that leave the populace. They are illegal aliens .............geesh by definition they are illegal. Either enforce the damn laws or abolish the laws and make new ones........BUT do not friggin make it up as you go along.
Damn great way to fight the war on terroism let everyone one in the world know your borders are ripe for the taking ....hey come on in.
Damn great way to fight the war on terroism let everyone one in the world know your borders are ripe for the taking ....hey come on in.
Oh please. This is as dumb as the drug war, which I think a lot of you would agree is a complete waste of resources and effort. People are arrested and shipped out every day. People are caught. People do die in the desert trying to cross. Yet the economic incentive is far too strong to stop them. Would you prefer to REALLY eat up our resources and put them in jail? Would that get you off? That ought to be real cheap, instead of letting them do jobs that don't get filled, put them in jail and run up a nice bill. Admit it, just saying we sealed the border isn't exactly going to cut it. If we can't close the border to drugs, how can we close it to people coming in here to work where we give employers no reason to pause in hiring them?
You know what would really solve the problem? Raise the minimum wage to about $12/hour. That would make sure most of them got priced out of the market. Of course it would kill off a lot of American jobs, but those of you that have your "nationalist" cap on could at least celebrate that those that do hold down jobs probably will be almost all legal residents or citizens. Until you insist that $5.15/hour is a reasonable wage for whatever reason, keep expecting people to cross that border and take the jobs because Americans sure aren't going to take them.
You know what would really solve the problem? Raise the minimum wage to about $12/hour. That would make sure most of them got priced out of the market. Of course it would kill off a lot of American jobs, but those of you that have your "nationalist" cap on could at least celebrate that those that do hold down jobs probably will be almost all legal residents or citizens. Until you insist that $5.15/hour is a reasonable wage for whatever reason, keep expecting people to cross that border and take the jobs because Americans sure aren't going to take them.
Patriot said:
I was talking to you but about truthteller.
Are you sure illegals are going to your schools, getting healthcare and such? Are you absolutely sure about that? They'd have to have fake social insurance numbers (or whatever you call it) to accomplish that. I don't think they're just crossing the border and going to the doctor. I have a hard time imagining that.
There are a few that do it, but most people kid themselves if they think the health care they get in the US is so good that they have much incentive to go to the few holes there are and cross to do it. Most Mexicans are covered by a form of health insurance and can get covered. The illegals that do get care are there because they are working and happen to get hurt or sick. The last thing they do is go to get care though, that is thought to be a very high risk activity and puts you in danger of getting deported. Often the problem is they don't get enough health care, going only to the ER when a simple visit earlier when the problem could have been prevented from being a major issue would have saved a lot of grief and money. The main thing that peeves a lot of people I am sure is the people that come across to have children in the country. In most cases they are Mexicans of some means that do pay a fair cost for the service, but of course it really peeves a lot of people that their kids then are technically citizens.
Not that I'm endorsing his actions, but you've chosen the wrong example here, I think. Did Garcia shoot March because he was afraid of being arrested as an illegal immigrant, something that would not have been an issue under this new proposed legislation? Or are you suggesting that Mexico produces more murderers?
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I don't care what his motivations were for killing March. Are you trying to justify his actions because he thought he would be arrested as an illegal immigrant. I wish you would tell that to March's family. If my son or dad had died like that and you came spewing that left wing bullshit in my face I would have a hard time not slapping you.
If the laws were to be enforced, every illegal immigrant would be picked up and sent back home.
California still has the death penalty, doesn't it? It could be that. Canada refused to give you back a known Californian murderer (forget his name now) back in the early 90s for the same reason.
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Yes, it is exactly why they wouldn't extradite him back to the US. BTW, he does deserve the death penalty but I would give him life with hard labour. If Mexico wouldn't send back murderers then the US needs to do something more drastic like going the way of Pat Buchanan.
___________________________________________________________
Well, lookie here. The so-called 'Christian' engaged in a class war. Whatever happened to 'blessed are the meek' and all that? Seems to me Jesus was in the habit of offering empathy and assistance to the poor, not shutting them out to protect his own private property, which you might remember was given by god in the first place. Isn't greed one of the cardinal sins?
You call Garcia meek? America gives more of its fair share to help poverty in other countries. I guess by your reasoning then you should have an open door policy, right? Because trying to enforce the law of the land is against Jesus' teachings.
____________________________________________________________________
I don't care what his motivations were for killing March. Are you trying to justify his actions because he thought he would be arrested as an illegal immigrant. I wish you would tell that to March's family. If my son or dad had died like that and you came spewing that left wing bullshit in my face I would have a hard time not slapping you.
If the laws were to be enforced, every illegal immigrant would be picked up and sent back home.
California still has the death penalty, doesn't it? It could be that. Canada refused to give you back a known Californian murderer (forget his name now) back in the early 90s for the same reason.
__________________________________________________________________
Yes, it is exactly why they wouldn't extradite him back to the US. BTW, he does deserve the death penalty but I would give him life with hard labour. If Mexico wouldn't send back murderers then the US needs to do something more drastic like going the way of Pat Buchanan.
___________________________________________________________
Well, lookie here. The so-called 'Christian' engaged in a class war. Whatever happened to 'blessed are the meek' and all that? Seems to me Jesus was in the habit of offering empathy and assistance to the poor, not shutting them out to protect his own private property, which you might remember was given by god in the first place. Isn't greed one of the cardinal sins?
You call Garcia meek? America gives more of its fair share to help poverty in other countries. I guess by your reasoning then you should have an open door policy, right? Because trying to enforce the law of the land is against Jesus' teachings.
truthteller said:
No, which is why I preceded the whole thing with, "Not that I'm endorsing his actions ..." I was employed standard argument analysis, and your argument had a hole in it, is all.
Wow. For a Christian, you sure are an ásshole.
As they should be. Hence the term 'illegal.' Not once have I endorsed Bush's new agenda, remember. Not even a little bit. But your particular brand of hyper-nationalism gives me the creeps, and I felt that some of your comments were borderline racist, thus deserving a response.
Nope, I'm calling poor people meek. As a group, at least.
Truth be told, I think borders and nation-states are simply the result of men engaged in millenia of pissing contests. I think civil human beings can do better than that. So, yes, I think borders are fundamentally stupid. I realise that this won't change, so I don't concern myself with the issue much. But I am proud of Canada's immigration practices, yes.
If trying to 'enforce the law of the land' was your only concern, you would not have used the term 'Balkanising' which was clearly xenophobic. Also, you would not have popped your head on here Nov. 3rd proclaiming how your religious group hammered the election and were going to change things. Like abortion, for example. It is the law of the land, after all.
I found this on cis.org
I have no idea if the Center for Immigration Studies has a right wing bias or not. Their conclusion is that illegal aliens are an annual net drain to the Federal Government. If given amnesty, the cost would increase nearly 200%.
I know, the article is long.
The High Cost of Cheap Labor
Illegal Immigration and the Federal Budget
Executive Summary
This study is one of the first to estimate the total impact of illegal immigration on the federal budget. Most previous studies have focused on the state and local level and have examined only costs or tax payments, but not both. Based on Census Bureau data, this study finds that, when all taxes paid (direct and indirect) and all costs are considered, illegal households created a net fiscal deficit at the federal level of more than $10 billion in 2002. We also estimate that, if there was an amnesty for illegal aliens, the net fiscal deficit would grow to nearly $29 billion.
Among the findings:
• Households headed by illegal aliens imposed more than $26.3 billion in costs on the federal government in 2002 and paid only $16 billion in taxes, creating a net fiscal deficit of almost $10.4 billion, or $2,700 per illegal household.
• Among the largest costs are Medicaid ($2.5 billion); treatment for the uninsured ($2.2 billion); food assistance programs such as food stamps, WIC, and free school lunches ($1.9 billion); the federal prison and court systems ($1.6 billion); and federal aid to schools ($1.4 billion).
• With nearly two-thirds of illegal aliens lacking a high school degree, the primary reason they create a fiscal deficit is their low education levels and resulting low incomes and tax payments, not their legal status or heavy use of most social services.
• On average, the costs that illegal households impose on federal coffers are less than half that of other households, but their tax payments are only one-fourth that of other households.
• Many of the costs associated with illegals are due to their American-born children, who are awarded U.S. citizenship at birth. Thus, greater efforts at barring illegals from federal programs will not reduce costs because their citizen children can continue to access them.
• If illegal aliens were given amnesty and began to pay taxes and use services like households headed by legal immigrants with the same education levels, the estimated annual net fiscal deficit would increase from $2,700 per household to nearly $7,700, for a total net cost of $29 billion.
• Costs increase dramatically because unskilled immigrants with legal status — what most illegal aliens would become — can access government programs, but still tend to make very modest tax payments.
• Although legalization would increase average tax payments by 77 percent, average costs would rise by 118 percent.
• The fact that legal immigrants with few years of schooling are a large fiscal drain does not mean that legal immigrants overall are a net drain — many legal immigrants are highly skilled.
• The vast majority of illegals hold jobs. Thus the fiscal deficit they create for the federal government is not the result of an unwillingness to work.
• The results of this study are consistent with a 1997 study by the National Research Council, which also found that immigrants’ education level is a key determinant of their fiscal impact.
A Complex Fiscal Picture
Welfare use. Our findings show that many of the preconceived notions about the fiscal impact of illegal households turn out to be inaccurate. In terms of welfare use, receipt of cash assistance programs tends to be very low, while Medicaid use, though significant, is still less than for other households. Only use of food assistance programs is significantly higher than that of the rest of the population. Also, contrary to the perceptions that illegal aliens don’t pay payroll taxes, we estimate that more than half of illegals work “on the books.” On average, illegal households pay more than $4,200 a year in all forms of federal taxes. Unfortunately, they impose costs of $6,950 per household.
Social Security and Medicare. Although we find that the net effect of illegal households is negative at the federal level, the same is not true for Social Security and Medicare. We estimate that illegal households create a combined net benefit for these two programs in excess of $7 billion a year, accounting for about 4 percent of the total annual surplus in these two programs. However, they create a net deficit of $17.4 billion in the rest of the budget, for a total net loss of $10.4 billion. Nonetheless, their impact on Social Security and Medicare is unambiguously positive. Of course, if the Social Security totalization agreement with Mexico signed in June goes into effect, allowing illegals to collect Social Security, these calculations would change.
The Impact of Amnesty. Finally, our estimates show that amnesty would significantly increase tax revenue. Because both their income and tax compliance would rise, we estimate that under the most likely scenario the average illegal alien household would pay 77 percent ($3,200) more a year in federal taxes once legalized. While not enough to offset the 118 percent ($8,200) per household increase in costs that would come with legalization, amnesty would significantly increase both the average income and tax payments of illegal aliens.
What’s Different About Today’s Immigration. Many native-born Americans observe that their ancestors came to America and did not place great demands on government services. Perhaps this is true, but the size and scope of government were dramatically smaller during the last great wave of immigration. Not just means-tested programs, but expenditures on everything from public schools to roads were only a fraction of what they are today. Thus, the arrival of unskilled immigrants in the past did not have the negative fiscal implications that it does today. Moreover, the American economy has changed profoundly since the last great wave of immigration, with education now the key determinant of economic success. The costs that unskilled immigrants impose simply reflect the nature of the modern American economy and welfare state. It is doubtful that the fiscal costs can be avoided if our immigration policies remain unchanged.
Policy Implications
The negative impact on the federal budget need not be the only or even the primary consideration when deciding what to do about illegal immigration. But assuming that the fiscal status quo is unacceptable, there are three main changes in policy that might reduce or eliminate the fiscal costs of illegal immigration. One set of options is to allow illegal aliens to remain in the country, but attempt to reduce the costs they impose. A second set of options would be to grant them legal status as a way of increasing the taxes they pay. A third option would be to enforce the law and reduce the size of the illegal population and with it the costs of illegal immigration.
Reducing the Cost Side of the Equation. Reducing the costs illegals impose would probably be the most difficult of the three options because illegal households already impose only about 46 percent as much in costs on the federal government as other households. Thus, the amount of money that can be saved by curtailing their use of public services even further is probably quite limited. Moreover, the fact that benefits are often received on behalf of their U.S.-citizen children means that it is very difficult to prevent illegal households from accessing the programs they do. And many of the programs illegals use most extensively are likely to be politically very difficult to cut, such as the Women Infants and Children (WIC) nutrition program. Other costs, such as incarcerating illegals who have been convicted of crimes are unavoidable. It seems almost certain that if illegals are allowed to remain in the country, the fiscal deficit will persist.
Increasing Tax Revenue by Granting Amnesty. As discussed above, our research shows that granting illegal aliens amnesty would dramatically increase tax revenue. Unfortunately, we find that costs would increase even more. Costs would rise dramatically because illegals would be able to access many programs that are currently off limits to them. Moreover, even if legalized illegal aliens continued to be barred from using some means-tested programs, they would still be much more likely to sign their U.S.-citizen children up for them because they would lose whatever fear they had of the government. We know this because immigrants with legal status, who have the same education levels and resulting low incomes as illegal aliens, sign their U.S.-citizen children up for programs like Medicaid at higher rates than illegal aliens with U.S.-citizen children. In addition, direct costs for programs like the Earned Income Tax Credit would also grow dramatically with legalization. Right now, illegals need a Social Security number and have to file a tax return to get the credit. As a result, relatively few actually get it. We estimate that once legalized, payments to illegals under this program would grow more than ten-fold.
From a purely fiscal point of view, the main problem with legalization is that illegals would, for the most part, become unskilled legal immigrants. And unskilled legal immigrants create much larger fiscal costs than unskilled illegal aliens. Legalization will not change the low education levels of illegal aliens or the fact that the American labor market offers very limited opportunities to such workers, whatever their legal status. Nor will it change the basic fact that the United States, like all industrialized democracies, has a well-developed welfare state that provides assistance to low-income workers. Large fiscal costs are simply an unavoidable outcome of unskilled immigration given the economic and fiscal realities of America today.
Enforcing Immigration Laws. If we are serious about avoiding the fiscal costs of illegal immigration, the only real option is to enforce the law and reduce the number of illegal aliens in the country. First, this would entail much greater efforts to police the nation’s land and sea borders. At present, less than 2,000 agents are on duty at any one time on the Mexican and Canadian borders. Second, much greater effort must be made to ensure that those allowed into the country on a temporary basis, such as tourists and guest workers, are not likely to stay in the country permanently. Third, the centerpiece of any enforcement effort would be to enforce the ban on hiring illegal aliens. At present, the law is completely unenforced. Enforcement would require using existing databases to ensure that all new hires are authorized to work in the United States and levying heavy fines on businesses that knowingly employ illegal aliens. Finally, a clear message from policymakers, especially senior members of the administration, that enforcement of the law is valued and vitally important to the nation, would dramatically increase the extremely low morale of those who enforce immigration laws.
Policing the border, enforcing the ban on hiring illegal aliens, denying temporary visas to those likely to remain permanently, and all the other things necessary to reduce illegal immigration will take time and cost money. However, since the cost of illegal immigration to the federal government alone is estimated at over $10 billion a year, significant resources could be devoted to enforcement efforts and still leave taxpayers with significant net savings. Enforcement not only has the advantage of reducing the costs of illegal immigration, it also is very popular with the general public. Nonetheless, policymakers can expect strong opposition from special interest groups, especially ethnic advocacy groups and those elements of the business community that do not want to invest in labor-saving devices and techniques or pay better salaries, but instead want access to large numbers of cheap, unskilled workers. If we choose to continue to not enforce the law or to grant illegals amnesty, both the public and policymakers have to understand that there will be significant long-term costs for taxpayers.
Summary Methodology
Overall Approach. To estimate the impact of households headed by illegal aliens, we rely heavily on the National Research Council’s (NRC) 1997 study, “The New Americans.” Like that study, we use the March Current Population Survey (CPS) and the decennial Census, both collected by the Census Bureau. We use the March 2003 CPS, which asks questions about income, household structure, and use of public services in the calendar year prior to the survey. We control total federal expenditures and tax receipts by category to reflect actual expenditures and tax payments. Like the NRC, we assume that immigrants have no impact on defense-related expenditures and therefore assign those costs only to native-headed households. Like the NRC, we define a household as persons living together who are related. Individuals living alone or with persons to whom they are unrelated are treated as their own households. As the NRC study points out, a “household is the primary unit through which public services are consumed and taxes paid.” Following the NRC’s example of using households, many of which include U.S.-citizen children, as the unit of analysis makes sense because the presence of these children and the costs they create are a direct result of their parents having been allowed to enter and remain in country. Thus, counting services used by these children allows for a full accounting of the costs of illegal immigration.
Identifying Illegal Aliens in Census Bureau Data. While the CPS does not ask respondents if they are illegal aliens, the Urban Institute, the former Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), and the Census Bureau have used socio-demographic characteristics in the data to estimate the size and characteristics of the illegal population. To identify illegal aliens in the survey, we used citizenship status, year of arrival in the United States, age, country of birth, educational attainment, sex, receipt of welfare programs, receipt of Social Security, veteran status, and marital status. This method is based on some very well-established facts about the characteristics of the illegal population. In some cases, we assume that individuals have zero chance of being an illegal alien, such as naturalized citizens, veterans, and individuals who report that they personally receive Social Security benefits or cash assistance from a welfare program or those who are enrolled in Medicaid. However, other members of a household, mainly the U.S.-born children of illegal aliens, can and do receive these programs. We estimate that there were 8.7 million illegal aliens included in the March 2003 CPS. By design, our estimates for the size and characteristics of the illegal population are very similar to those prepared by the Census Bureau, the INS, and the Urban Institute.
Estimating the Impact of Amnesty. We assume that any amnesty that passes Congress will have Lawful Permanent Residence (LPR) as a component. Even though the President’s amnesty proposal in January seems to envision “temporary” worker status, every major legalization bill in Congress, including those sponsored by Republican legislators, provides illegal aliens with LPR status at some point in the process. Moreover, Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry has indicated his strong desire to give LPR status to illegal aliens.
To estimate the likely impact of legalization, we run two different simulations. In our first simulation, we assume that legalized illegal aliens would use services and pay taxes like all households headed by legal immigrants with the same characteristics. In this simulation, we control for the education level of the household head and whether the head is from Mexico. The first simulation shows that the net fiscal deficit grows from about $2,700 to more than $6,000 per household. In the second simulation, we again control for education and whether the household head is Mexican and also assume that illegals would become like post-1986 legal immigrants, excluding refugees. Because illegals are much more like recently arrived non-refugees than legal immigrants in general, the second simulation is the more plausible. The second simulation shows that the net fiscal deficit per household would climb to $7,700.
Results Similar to Other Studies. Our overall conclusion that education level is the primary determinant of tax payments made and services used is very similar to the conclusion of the 1997 National Research Council report, “The New Americans.” The results of our study also closely match the findings of a 1998 Urban Institute study, which examined tax payments by illegal aliens in New York State. In order to test our results we ran separate estimates for federal taxes and found that, when adjusted for inflation, our estimated federal taxes are almost identical to those of the Urban Institute. The results of this study are also buttressed by an analysis of illegal alien tax returns done by the Inspector General’s Office of the Department of Treasury in 2004, which found that about half of illegals had no federal income tax liability, very similar to our finding of 45 percent.
I have no idea if the Center for Immigration Studies has a right wing bias or not. Their conclusion is that illegal aliens are an annual net drain to the Federal Government. If given amnesty, the cost would increase nearly 200%.
I know, the article is long.
The High Cost of Cheap Labor
Illegal Immigration and the Federal Budget
Executive Summary
This study is one of the first to estimate the total impact of illegal immigration on the federal budget. Most previous studies have focused on the state and local level and have examined only costs or tax payments, but not both. Based on Census Bureau data, this study finds that, when all taxes paid (direct and indirect) and all costs are considered, illegal households created a net fiscal deficit at the federal level of more than $10 billion in 2002. We also estimate that, if there was an amnesty for illegal aliens, the net fiscal deficit would grow to nearly $29 billion.
Among the findings:
• Households headed by illegal aliens imposed more than $26.3 billion in costs on the federal government in 2002 and paid only $16 billion in taxes, creating a net fiscal deficit of almost $10.4 billion, or $2,700 per illegal household.
• Among the largest costs are Medicaid ($2.5 billion); treatment for the uninsured ($2.2 billion); food assistance programs such as food stamps, WIC, and free school lunches ($1.9 billion); the federal prison and court systems ($1.6 billion); and federal aid to schools ($1.4 billion).
• With nearly two-thirds of illegal aliens lacking a high school degree, the primary reason they create a fiscal deficit is their low education levels and resulting low incomes and tax payments, not their legal status or heavy use of most social services.
• On average, the costs that illegal households impose on federal coffers are less than half that of other households, but their tax payments are only one-fourth that of other households.
• Many of the costs associated with illegals are due to their American-born children, who are awarded U.S. citizenship at birth. Thus, greater efforts at barring illegals from federal programs will not reduce costs because their citizen children can continue to access them.
• If illegal aliens were given amnesty and began to pay taxes and use services like households headed by legal immigrants with the same education levels, the estimated annual net fiscal deficit would increase from $2,700 per household to nearly $7,700, for a total net cost of $29 billion.
• Costs increase dramatically because unskilled immigrants with legal status — what most illegal aliens would become — can access government programs, but still tend to make very modest tax payments.
• Although legalization would increase average tax payments by 77 percent, average costs would rise by 118 percent.
• The fact that legal immigrants with few years of schooling are a large fiscal drain does not mean that legal immigrants overall are a net drain — many legal immigrants are highly skilled.
• The vast majority of illegals hold jobs. Thus the fiscal deficit they create for the federal government is not the result of an unwillingness to work.
• The results of this study are consistent with a 1997 study by the National Research Council, which also found that immigrants’ education level is a key determinant of their fiscal impact.
A Complex Fiscal Picture
Welfare use. Our findings show that many of the preconceived notions about the fiscal impact of illegal households turn out to be inaccurate. In terms of welfare use, receipt of cash assistance programs tends to be very low, while Medicaid use, though significant, is still less than for other households. Only use of food assistance programs is significantly higher than that of the rest of the population. Also, contrary to the perceptions that illegal aliens don’t pay payroll taxes, we estimate that more than half of illegals work “on the books.” On average, illegal households pay more than $4,200 a year in all forms of federal taxes. Unfortunately, they impose costs of $6,950 per household.
Social Security and Medicare. Although we find that the net effect of illegal households is negative at the federal level, the same is not true for Social Security and Medicare. We estimate that illegal households create a combined net benefit for these two programs in excess of $7 billion a year, accounting for about 4 percent of the total annual surplus in these two programs. However, they create a net deficit of $17.4 billion in the rest of the budget, for a total net loss of $10.4 billion. Nonetheless, their impact on Social Security and Medicare is unambiguously positive. Of course, if the Social Security totalization agreement with Mexico signed in June goes into effect, allowing illegals to collect Social Security, these calculations would change.
The Impact of Amnesty. Finally, our estimates show that amnesty would significantly increase tax revenue. Because both their income and tax compliance would rise, we estimate that under the most likely scenario the average illegal alien household would pay 77 percent ($3,200) more a year in federal taxes once legalized. While not enough to offset the 118 percent ($8,200) per household increase in costs that would come with legalization, amnesty would significantly increase both the average income and tax payments of illegal aliens.
What’s Different About Today’s Immigration. Many native-born Americans observe that their ancestors came to America and did not place great demands on government services. Perhaps this is true, but the size and scope of government were dramatically smaller during the last great wave of immigration. Not just means-tested programs, but expenditures on everything from public schools to roads were only a fraction of what they are today. Thus, the arrival of unskilled immigrants in the past did not have the negative fiscal implications that it does today. Moreover, the American economy has changed profoundly since the last great wave of immigration, with education now the key determinant of economic success. The costs that unskilled immigrants impose simply reflect the nature of the modern American economy and welfare state. It is doubtful that the fiscal costs can be avoided if our immigration policies remain unchanged.
Policy Implications
The negative impact on the federal budget need not be the only or even the primary consideration when deciding what to do about illegal immigration. But assuming that the fiscal status quo is unacceptable, there are three main changes in policy that might reduce or eliminate the fiscal costs of illegal immigration. One set of options is to allow illegal aliens to remain in the country, but attempt to reduce the costs they impose. A second set of options would be to grant them legal status as a way of increasing the taxes they pay. A third option would be to enforce the law and reduce the size of the illegal population and with it the costs of illegal immigration.
Reducing the Cost Side of the Equation. Reducing the costs illegals impose would probably be the most difficult of the three options because illegal households already impose only about 46 percent as much in costs on the federal government as other households. Thus, the amount of money that can be saved by curtailing their use of public services even further is probably quite limited. Moreover, the fact that benefits are often received on behalf of their U.S.-citizen children means that it is very difficult to prevent illegal households from accessing the programs they do. And many of the programs illegals use most extensively are likely to be politically very difficult to cut, such as the Women Infants and Children (WIC) nutrition program. Other costs, such as incarcerating illegals who have been convicted of crimes are unavoidable. It seems almost certain that if illegals are allowed to remain in the country, the fiscal deficit will persist.
Increasing Tax Revenue by Granting Amnesty. As discussed above, our research shows that granting illegal aliens amnesty would dramatically increase tax revenue. Unfortunately, we find that costs would increase even more. Costs would rise dramatically because illegals would be able to access many programs that are currently off limits to them. Moreover, even if legalized illegal aliens continued to be barred from using some means-tested programs, they would still be much more likely to sign their U.S.-citizen children up for them because they would lose whatever fear they had of the government. We know this because immigrants with legal status, who have the same education levels and resulting low incomes as illegal aliens, sign their U.S.-citizen children up for programs like Medicaid at higher rates than illegal aliens with U.S.-citizen children. In addition, direct costs for programs like the Earned Income Tax Credit would also grow dramatically with legalization. Right now, illegals need a Social Security number and have to file a tax return to get the credit. As a result, relatively few actually get it. We estimate that once legalized, payments to illegals under this program would grow more than ten-fold.
From a purely fiscal point of view, the main problem with legalization is that illegals would, for the most part, become unskilled legal immigrants. And unskilled legal immigrants create much larger fiscal costs than unskilled illegal aliens. Legalization will not change the low education levels of illegal aliens or the fact that the American labor market offers very limited opportunities to such workers, whatever their legal status. Nor will it change the basic fact that the United States, like all industrialized democracies, has a well-developed welfare state that provides assistance to low-income workers. Large fiscal costs are simply an unavoidable outcome of unskilled immigration given the economic and fiscal realities of America today.
Enforcing Immigration Laws. If we are serious about avoiding the fiscal costs of illegal immigration, the only real option is to enforce the law and reduce the number of illegal aliens in the country. First, this would entail much greater efforts to police the nation’s land and sea borders. At present, less than 2,000 agents are on duty at any one time on the Mexican and Canadian borders. Second, much greater effort must be made to ensure that those allowed into the country on a temporary basis, such as tourists and guest workers, are not likely to stay in the country permanently. Third, the centerpiece of any enforcement effort would be to enforce the ban on hiring illegal aliens. At present, the law is completely unenforced. Enforcement would require using existing databases to ensure that all new hires are authorized to work in the United States and levying heavy fines on businesses that knowingly employ illegal aliens. Finally, a clear message from policymakers, especially senior members of the administration, that enforcement of the law is valued and vitally important to the nation, would dramatically increase the extremely low morale of those who enforce immigration laws.
Policing the border, enforcing the ban on hiring illegal aliens, denying temporary visas to those likely to remain permanently, and all the other things necessary to reduce illegal immigration will take time and cost money. However, since the cost of illegal immigration to the federal government alone is estimated at over $10 billion a year, significant resources could be devoted to enforcement efforts and still leave taxpayers with significant net savings. Enforcement not only has the advantage of reducing the costs of illegal immigration, it also is very popular with the general public. Nonetheless, policymakers can expect strong opposition from special interest groups, especially ethnic advocacy groups and those elements of the business community that do not want to invest in labor-saving devices and techniques or pay better salaries, but instead want access to large numbers of cheap, unskilled workers. If we choose to continue to not enforce the law or to grant illegals amnesty, both the public and policymakers have to understand that there will be significant long-term costs for taxpayers.
Summary Methodology
Overall Approach. To estimate the impact of households headed by illegal aliens, we rely heavily on the National Research Council’s (NRC) 1997 study, “The New Americans.” Like that study, we use the March Current Population Survey (CPS) and the decennial Census, both collected by the Census Bureau. We use the March 2003 CPS, which asks questions about income, household structure, and use of public services in the calendar year prior to the survey. We control total federal expenditures and tax receipts by category to reflect actual expenditures and tax payments. Like the NRC, we assume that immigrants have no impact on defense-related expenditures and therefore assign those costs only to native-headed households. Like the NRC, we define a household as persons living together who are related. Individuals living alone or with persons to whom they are unrelated are treated as their own households. As the NRC study points out, a “household is the primary unit through which public services are consumed and taxes paid.” Following the NRC’s example of using households, many of which include U.S.-citizen children, as the unit of analysis makes sense because the presence of these children and the costs they create are a direct result of their parents having been allowed to enter and remain in country. Thus, counting services used by these children allows for a full accounting of the costs of illegal immigration.
Identifying Illegal Aliens in Census Bureau Data. While the CPS does not ask respondents if they are illegal aliens, the Urban Institute, the former Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), and the Census Bureau have used socio-demographic characteristics in the data to estimate the size and characteristics of the illegal population. To identify illegal aliens in the survey, we used citizenship status, year of arrival in the United States, age, country of birth, educational attainment, sex, receipt of welfare programs, receipt of Social Security, veteran status, and marital status. This method is based on some very well-established facts about the characteristics of the illegal population. In some cases, we assume that individuals have zero chance of being an illegal alien, such as naturalized citizens, veterans, and individuals who report that they personally receive Social Security benefits or cash assistance from a welfare program or those who are enrolled in Medicaid. However, other members of a household, mainly the U.S.-born children of illegal aliens, can and do receive these programs. We estimate that there were 8.7 million illegal aliens included in the March 2003 CPS. By design, our estimates for the size and characteristics of the illegal population are very similar to those prepared by the Census Bureau, the INS, and the Urban Institute.
Estimating the Impact of Amnesty. We assume that any amnesty that passes Congress will have Lawful Permanent Residence (LPR) as a component. Even though the President’s amnesty proposal in January seems to envision “temporary” worker status, every major legalization bill in Congress, including those sponsored by Republican legislators, provides illegal aliens with LPR status at some point in the process. Moreover, Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry has indicated his strong desire to give LPR status to illegal aliens.
To estimate the likely impact of legalization, we run two different simulations. In our first simulation, we assume that legalized illegal aliens would use services and pay taxes like all households headed by legal immigrants with the same characteristics. In this simulation, we control for the education level of the household head and whether the head is from Mexico. The first simulation shows that the net fiscal deficit grows from about $2,700 to more than $6,000 per household. In the second simulation, we again control for education and whether the household head is Mexican and also assume that illegals would become like post-1986 legal immigrants, excluding refugees. Because illegals are much more like recently arrived non-refugees than legal immigrants in general, the second simulation is the more plausible. The second simulation shows that the net fiscal deficit per household would climb to $7,700.
Results Similar to Other Studies. Our overall conclusion that education level is the primary determinant of tax payments made and services used is very similar to the conclusion of the 1997 National Research Council report, “The New Americans.” The results of our study also closely match the findings of a 1998 Urban Institute study, which examined tax payments by illegal aliens in New York State. In order to test our results we ran separate estimates for federal taxes and found that, when adjusted for inflation, our estimated federal taxes are almost identical to those of the Urban Institute. The results of this study are also buttressed by an analysis of illegal alien tax returns done by the Inspector General’s Office of the Department of Treasury in 2004, which found that about half of illegals had no federal income tax liability, very similar to our finding of 45 percent.
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No, which is why I preceded the whole thing with, "Not that I'm endorsing his actions ..." I was employed standard argument analysis, and your argument had a hole in it, is all.
Nice way of covering up on how you really feel with "Not that I'm endorsing his actions ..."
Wow. For a Christian, you sure are an ásshole.
I rather be an ásshole than an atheist. At least I have some common sense to see this world couldn't come by chance. Atheists can never answer what happened before the big hoax. I mean the big bang
Truth be told, I think borders and nation-states are simply the result of men engaged in millenia of pissing contests. I think civil human beings can do better than that. So, yes, I think borders are fundamentally stupid. I realise that this won't change, so I don't concern myself with the issue much. But I am proud of Canada's immigration practices, yes.
At least you are honest enough to admit you are open to an open border policy.
If trying to 'enforce the law of the land' was your only concern, you would not have used the term 'Balkanising' which was clearly xenophobic. Also, you would not have popped your head on here Nov. 3rd proclaiming how your religious group hammered the election and were going to change things. Like abortion, for example. It is the law of the land, after all
How can you compare abortion to illegal immigration? Most Americans don't favour people coming to the US illegally. You don't reward people for illegal behaviour.
On abortion, the nation is divided 50/50 according to a CNN poll.
Nice way of covering up on how you really feel with "Not that I'm endorsing his actions ..."
Wow. For a Christian, you sure are an ásshole.
I rather be an ásshole than an atheist. At least I have some common sense to see this world couldn't come by chance. Atheists can never answer what happened before the big hoax. I mean the big bang
Truth be told, I think borders and nation-states are simply the result of men engaged in millenia of pissing contests. I think civil human beings can do better than that. So, yes, I think borders are fundamentally stupid. I realise that this won't change, so I don't concern myself with the issue much. But I am proud of Canada's immigration practices, yes.
At least you are honest enough to admit you are open to an open border policy.
If trying to 'enforce the law of the land' was your only concern, you would not have used the term 'Balkanising' which was clearly xenophobic. Also, you would not have popped your head on here Nov. 3rd proclaiming how your religious group hammered the election and were going to change things. Like abortion, for example. It is the law of the land, after all
How can you compare abortion to illegal immigration? Most Americans don't favour people coming to the US illegally. You don't reward people for illegal behaviour.
On abortion, the nation is divided 50/50 according to a CNN poll.
Wow...
A book written by man in a time when the earth was flat, there was only one continent known by man, the sun revolved around the earth, gravity was known as falling, and mixing natural threads was cause for a good ole' fashion ass woopin is how you explain the creation of the earth...
Thank you God for giving stupid people a crutch and a reason to believe they have a cup with string stretched to heaven.
A book written by man in a time when the earth was flat, there was only one continent known by man, the sun revolved around the earth, gravity was known as falling, and mixing natural threads was cause for a good ole' fashion ass woopin is how you explain the creation of the earth...
Thank you God for giving stupid people a crutch and a reason to believe they have a cup with string stretched to heaven.
"I'd rather be an a$$hole than an atheist. At least I have some common sense to see that the world couldn't come by chance. Atheists can never answer what happened before the big hoax. I mean the big bang."
Religious people can never answer as to how God came about or who created God, because using your reasoning, God couldn't have happened by chance.
I always found religious people to be cocksure moral snobs....thier own religion is absolutely undisputable.....other religions or sects are OBVIOUSLY wrong in thier viewpoints.....everyone who doesn't believe in the vague teachings and unproven promises is going to burn in some fiery place according to thier scriptures.....all for not believing in a doctrine that gives little evidence to believe in....WOW!.....rather extreme....
I'll stick with being an agnostic.....maybe there is a god, maybe there isn't......I'll try to live a good life, and if something dire happens to me for nonbelief then I will consider the whole process to be a farce.
The only thing that makes us different from each other is our actions and our intent. Judge me on that if you want to be fair.
Religious people can never answer as to how God came about or who created God, because using your reasoning, God couldn't have happened by chance.
I always found religious people to be cocksure moral snobs....thier own religion is absolutely undisputable.....other religions or sects are OBVIOUSLY wrong in thier viewpoints.....everyone who doesn't believe in the vague teachings and unproven promises is going to burn in some fiery place according to thier scriptures.....all for not believing in a doctrine that gives little evidence to believe in....WOW!.....rather extreme....
I'll stick with being an agnostic.....maybe there is a god, maybe there isn't......I'll try to live a good life, and if something dire happens to me for nonbelief then I will consider the whole process to be a farce.
The only thing that makes us different from each other is our actions and our intent. Judge me on that if you want to be fair.
The Big Bang theory does not eliminate or explain away the existence of a god. It is entirely possible that a god existed who set events in motion that precipitated the Big Bang. The same is true for the theory of evolution.truthteller said:
My atheism stems entirely from my propensity for reason. I have no evidence that a god exists but plenty of evidence that organised religion does more harm than good. My movement away from Christianity was a very personal one that began with my rejecting the Catholic Church at a fairly young age and then eventually becoming disinterested in the idea of any form of god. I could well be wrong, and could well be punished in eternity as a result. In the meantime, I try to live my life without being an àsshole and hope that if a god does exist and my actions on earth determine my fate, that I will judged accordingly.
Your assault on me due to my atheism is well, not very nice. I don't laugh at you for believing in god, do I?
I'm not protectionist, that's all. I would actually welcome the day when the lives of citizens in the underdeveloped world are more on par with our own (at least in terms of opportunity and options) and understand that my standard of living will probably have to drop to facilitate this. Again, I'm not protectionist.
I'm not comparing abortion to illegal immigration. I am pointing out that you are against making illegals legal because they are lawbreakers. Yet I have read your hopes that the new four-year term will lead to a reversal of current laws in existence. In other words, it's not direct respect for the laws of the land that you are defending, but, rather, respect for the laws that are consistent with your views.
I just laugh when I see this comment:
How can you compare abortion to illegal immigration? Most Americans don't favour people coming to the US illegally. You don't reward people for illegal behaviour.
Gee you call it a reward to do the lowest jobs and get paid the minimum wage, if you are lucky? How about the chance to live with 8 other people in a one bedroom apartment, thousands of miles from your spouse, your children, your parents. It really gets good when you get a paycheck and after paying taxes for social security you never will benefit from, you get to take what little is left and send almost all of it to that family back home, leaving yourself enough to pay the rent and eat. What an insult to call this "rewarding".
The long study mentioned was so heinously lacking I can't believe they published it. I used to work on a research committee where we studied economic issues, with illegal receipients of health care and their cost to San Diego County a regular discussion piece. Now being a border county which used to have by far the worst impacts of illegal immigration you would think the board would be up in arms. Actually those that chose to be open minded saw that all the studies we read and all the arguments given came up short for one simple reason. People living in an area create economic activity! They pay taxes directly, but completely overlooked in these surveys is the indirect taxes they create. If enough of them patronize a store, that creates the need for more workers who pay taxes. If the store does well enough, that is a small business owner that makes money and pays taxes. The distributors of the products in the chain all make a profit and employ workers. These benefits are completely ignored in just about every survey of this situation out there. In San Diego County the benefit from "foreigners" is unmistakably huge, it creates almost 10% of the areas economic activity if judged fairly. This comes from both the activities of legal and illegal foreigners present in the area, some of which are merely day trippers from Mexico or tourists from around the world.
You never will hear San Diego's politicians complaining about these issues because all of them recognize that all is not doom and gloom. Few places have more foreign nationals using the area's medical resources. Few areas have to deal crimes committed as San Diego does. Half the stolen cars are raced across the border. Despite what crime and costs do occur, informed politicians realize that unless you are really greedy, you can't complain only about what it costs you without accepting there is plenty of good that can come from it.
How can you compare abortion to illegal immigration? Most Americans don't favour people coming to the US illegally. You don't reward people for illegal behaviour.
Gee you call it a reward to do the lowest jobs and get paid the minimum wage, if you are lucky? How about the chance to live with 8 other people in a one bedroom apartment, thousands of miles from your spouse, your children, your parents. It really gets good when you get a paycheck and after paying taxes for social security you never will benefit from, you get to take what little is left and send almost all of it to that family back home, leaving yourself enough to pay the rent and eat. What an insult to call this "rewarding".
The long study mentioned was so heinously lacking I can't believe they published it. I used to work on a research committee where we studied economic issues, with illegal receipients of health care and their cost to San Diego County a regular discussion piece. Now being a border county which used to have by far the worst impacts of illegal immigration you would think the board would be up in arms. Actually those that chose to be open minded saw that all the studies we read and all the arguments given came up short for one simple reason. People living in an area create economic activity! They pay taxes directly, but completely overlooked in these surveys is the indirect taxes they create. If enough of them patronize a store, that creates the need for more workers who pay taxes. If the store does well enough, that is a small business owner that makes money and pays taxes. The distributors of the products in the chain all make a profit and employ workers. These benefits are completely ignored in just about every survey of this situation out there. In San Diego County the benefit from "foreigners" is unmistakably huge, it creates almost 10% of the areas economic activity if judged fairly. This comes from both the activities of legal and illegal foreigners present in the area, some of which are merely day trippers from Mexico or tourists from around the world.
You never will hear San Diego's politicians complaining about these issues because all of them recognize that all is not doom and gloom. Few places have more foreign nationals using the area's medical resources. Few areas have to deal crimes committed as San Diego does. Half the stolen cars are raced across the border. Despite what crime and costs do occur, informed politicians realize that unless you are really greedy, you can't complain only about what it costs you without accepting there is plenty of good that can come from it.
