Itâs easy to say letâs kick them all out, but let’s talk about what that would really mean. $970 billion in goods and services would stop being produced, $7 billion dollars in social security and $1.5 billion in Medicare contributions and untold billions in sales and other taxes would be lost.
So those that are proposing to enforce the law and kick out all illegal immigrants are also proposing a massive shortage in food supplies and construction resources, taking billions out of social security, Medicare and state sales tax and likely reducing the GDP.
Yes, there will be some benefit. Most compellingly $26 billion in services paid to illegal immigrants and their children will fall off the books. Some Americans will take over their jobs, but not nearly enough (unemployment is 4.7%). Wages will rise, but disproportionately because of a labor shortage. And of course we will be able to say we properly enforced the law after ignoring it for years.
The reason these laws are not being enforced and the reason why even President Bush doesn’t favor deporting all illegal immigrants is because it makes no economic sense.
The economy will adapt.
If business stop hiring illegals then they will have to raise wages for working Americans! As democrats we claim to be the party for working people yet we are making it harder for them by supporting lawbreakers. We need to enforce the laws we have on the books now.
Let’s say you could round up 1% of the illegal workers every single day — that’d be 100,000 in the first day alone, so it’s an awfully optimistic estimate. Rounding up a percentage of the remaining is a nice model, since it gets harder and harder to find more illegals since only those who are “good at hiding” will be left as the easier-to-find are rounded up first.
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After 100 days, there’d still be 36% of the illegals (due to compound interest.
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Ao, in more than three months, nearly 2/3rds would have been removed. Some of those jobs would go unfilled. Some are below minimum wage workers whose jobs aren’t efficient at minimum wage or higher, and those jobs would evaporate. But then there’s another whole category — the jobs which would now pay Americans (a higher wage than the illegal), but would get done. Homes would still be getting built, only for a higher price.
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You hit on this in the third paragraph, but I think that people are just assuming that ==bam==! they’re shipped out instantly.
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The economy will adjust. Some prices will go up, some services will disapear, some agriculture may more South of the Border. But, more Americans will be gainfully employed, more taxes will be paid into the treasurary*, and less will come out of the treasury in the form of social services.
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Things simply won’t grind to a halt.
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* Admittedly, this may or may not be true. If an illegal is paying taxes anyway and his job is eliminated, than that’s a loss. But if an illegal’s under-the-table job goes above the table, or if “whitey” does the job for $1 or $2 more an hour, then tax revenue has gone up.
I’m not sure what the “answer” is, but there are some other issues here:
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1. The US does not have a national identity card or identity system. “Rounding up” illegal aliens won’t be easy. Many illegals have state drivers licenses. Fake birth certificates are easy to get or create.
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2. As is well known, the INS cannot police the borders. There are not nearly enough INS agents to arrest 100,000 people in a single day. One percent per day is fantastically optimistic. Being an illegal alien is not a felony under federal law or any kind of violation of state law, so don’t expect the local police to help.
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3. A sustained effort of this type will require unprecedented law enforcement activity in some communities. Can you imagine identity screeners on farms and at construction sites? Do you think the businesses involved with simply grin and bear it? Do you think that US citizens will put up with waiting in line as an INS agent says “papers, please”?
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4. If right now, you had to prove you were legally in this country, what document would you produce? What if you don’t have a passport (the law does not require you to have one, you know)?
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was chosen intentionally, and then emphasized. My point was that this so-called “kick ’em out” campaign couldn’t work very quickly — and more would flow in to take the jobs that those who were kicked out made available.
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But, if instead, we saw the INS et al actually reduce the number of jobs available to illegal aliens through cracking down on employers, then we’d see (1) some economic production disapear, and (2) some economic production cost more — but very slowly over time. As a result, there wouldn’t be a giant monkey wrench thrown into the complex machine we call the economy. It would happen slowly — a few more cents for tomatos, another $3 to stay at a hotel, etc. The economy would survive just fine, methinks.
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To answer (4), I have a passport. I also have a birth certificate — as should the hospital in which I was born. There are also witnesses (both parents, my mothers OBGYN, my pediatrician), and the paper trail of bills and insurance from the hospital. So, if push came to shove, it wouldn’t be that hard to demonstrate that I was born in tUSA, and therefore a citizen.
here is the real story of several farms and a small construction company – all examples listed below I have witnessed.
American citizens they have hired think the work is too hard or boring, but have no skills, use drugs and alcohol to excess, even using the work site as a place to deal, leave with no notice, trash the equipment, steal tools, do not work regular hours or come in on time.
Immigrants work steadily, do not mind the hours ( often very early or late for milking cows and harvesting, or long hours during good weather in construction), and stick around long enough to learn new skills, live frugally so they can send money home, and have replacements ready to come when they do need to go home, either for vacation or for good.
Better pay is not the answer.
the construction and agriculture areas would start getting employees who are now working in other blue collar areas. Furthermore, with better pay, the difference between having that job and getting relegated back to McDonalds is higher — making the implicit penalty for goofing off higher.
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The higher the wages, the more the person is going to want to keep the job — that’s true for all people and all jobs.
unfortunately I do not think from what I have observed that it is a matter of pay. Rather it is the physically hard work in uncomfortable conditions that unemployed Americans do not seem to tbe able to handle.
I’ve been all over this country from the south through the midwest and believe me Americans are working hard, but we as country are undercutting their efforts. How are unskilled Americans ever going to get ahead when businesses are allowed to pay illegals sub-standard wages under the table. If we crack down on businesses to only hire legal workers they will have to raise wages and living standards for the most vunerable Americans the working class. As democrats we have to be careful not to make an enemy out of working people who used to be our lifeblood.
I was not talking about wage scale. I was talking about the real work that I see unemployed legal citizens unwilling to do. The farm workers I know of are legal, although I am sure others are not. I was trying to explain the difference in work ethic that I see in recent immigrants.
I can also tell you that I know the people whom the corporations hire at $7.50/hr. but only for 32 hrs – not enough for health care to kick in. Their ‘assistant managers’ get paid $8.50/hr. with no hope for advancement – they won’t get raises, even though they have responsibility. I know someone who manages a store weekends, year round, for more than 5 yrs, does seasonal ordering for them too, feels good to get $11./hr.
I don’t think our pre-occupation with immigration touches the problem of paying fair wages for work done.