So, where is all this coming from? I have to be honest, being a white man from an all white family with zero Latino relatives and very few Latino friends (not by choice, but simply from lack of intersecting life paths), I didn't understand the nuances of this issue until I started digging deeper to write this piece. I understood enough to know Donald Trump's plan was ridiculous, but that really requires very little information to understand (despite a huge conservative following who thinks he's on the money with these proposals). I found no shortage of resources out there about the issue of immigration reform. I'll link to some of these throughout, but what I really want to talk about is the motivation behind this debate. Is it about money? Is it about racism and xenophobia? Or, is it about wanting to find an easier road to legit citizenship for people who simply can't create the life they want in their home country?
First, let's address the financial question. It's honestly the first thing that came to my mind on the topic. How is this sustainable? How can we allow 11.3 million people to live here using public resources that they are not paying into? But upon exploring this concern, I found the numbers, as blurry as they may be, assuaged my concerns on the money front. Illegal immigrants actually pay $12 billion (with a "b") in payroll taxes every year, using fake or expired social security numbers or what's called an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number or ITIN. That's $12 billion going into our social security fund every year that these people will not be able to draw upon when they reach retirement age.
"Well, good," you say. "Consider it the fee for living here illegally." To which I'd say, "Maybe." I say maybe because this $12 billion is not their only contribution. Not by a long-shot. Should all 11.3 million illegal immigrants be rounded up and deported, as Trump suggests--a feat that would cost $50.3 billion dollars, an average cost of $10,070 per person being deported--the workforce would drop by 6.4%, and the U.S. GDP would drop by $80 billion a year. This would be a significant hit to our economy. Also, there is more to the story.
The law as it stands (i.e. how it stands prior to President Obama's DREAMers Executive Order, which can later be removed by a future president) if it were strictly enforced, would cost the U.S. between $300-400 billion over the next twenty years (the amount of time it will take to remove all current illegal immigrants and put systems in place to prevent future illegal immigrants from entering the country--if this is even possible). This is money I think we can all agree would be better spent in other areas of government, or better returned to the tax payer (depending on your political leanings). Basically, the current law is a law we simply can't afford to enforce, which means we're only partially enforcing it, which means it's costing a lot of money and doing nothing to solve the problems of illegal immigration. Thus, the absurdness of some people's attachment to this failed law simply because it's the law and the dire need to replace this law as soon as possible.
Which brings me to these real problems of illegal immigration. What are these problems, if not financial? According to Trump, and many other republicans, crime is a major issue. Trump says Mexico is sending all their rapists and murderers to the U.S. Pretty scary, if it were true. But, it isn't. Out of the 11.3 million illegal immigrants living here, about 90,000 are in state or federal prisons. That's one-eighth of one percent (.oo8) of the illegal immigrant population who are in prison, and there are no good stats on how many of those are in prison due to being in the country illegally having committed no other harmful crimes. Non-citizens make up about 5% of our prison population. So, crime is not a major issue in this debate, despite the fear-mongering being presented.
And if crime isn't the problem and the financial costs of enforcing the current law far outweigh the financial benefits of having these people living and working here, what are we left with? Some would argue that illegal immigrants are taking American jobs. This, I feel, is a legitimate debate. Progressives argue these are jobs no American wants--low-paying, physically demanding, no benefits, time-consuming, etc. Maybe that's true, but there's no real way to know so long as businesses are hiring non-citizens. Thus, making this a valid concern, especially following The Great Recession where people may be willing to take what they can get. Another concern is the cost of amnesty--the opposite extreme to mass deportation. What will 11.3 million new citizens suddenly gaining full access to public resources do to our entitlements programs? These programs are already expensive, though necessary and grossly underfunded. Some of this expense has been addressed above. These workers are already contributing $12 billion a year in tax revenue and as citizens will likely contribute much more, but how much more, and will it be enough as to not raise taxes on current citizens? Also, what will it do to the economy if the businesses hiring these 11.3 million people suddenly have to pay them a fair wage and provide benefits and pay higher taxes on their employees' behalf? These are things worth debating.
However, these are not the debates we're having. The reason Donald Trump hasn't been shouted off the world stage as a kooky narcissist unabashedly spewing racism toward a vital population of people and their friends and family is because he's saying what many Americans are thinking. It's hate toward Mexicans that is driving the immigration debate. And the hate comes from fear and the fear comes from lack of or misinformation and the misinformation is coming from people like Trump trying to achieve political and/ or financial gain by tapping into the emotions of an uninformed population of the American public.
This is the saddest part of this issue. These are real people. They have spouses and kids and parents and grandparents. They feel physical, emotional, psychological, and financial pain just like the rest of us, and as a country--a country that loves to go on-and-on about how Christian we are--rather than trying to understand their motivations for coming to the U.S. and find a compassionate and empathetic way to help them, we're talking about ways to split-up their families, to send them back to places they risked their lives to flee. We're talking about expensive walls and deportation methods instead of spending far less money integrating them into our society and benefiting from their being here. Can we take every person wanting to leave their home country? No. That's impossible. So, let's debate about that. Let's debate about who we let in and how many we can let in. Let's debate about the vetting process to become a citizen. Let's debate about why we really care who lives here if they're following our laws and paying taxes and doing everything else we as citizens do in the U.S. Let's debate what is an affordable, sustainable way of protecting our borders. We have to be smart about it. There are people in the world who want to do us harm, but historically and statistically speaking, those people are not coming from our neighboring countries. Thus, building a wall does nothing to keep us safer.
In the end, our borders are just lines on a map that we carved out through war, treaties, and diplomacy. Our constitution deems anyone born inside these lines to be an American. Yet, socially, that's not all we require to be considered American, is it? Some of us have decided we're more important than other people living here and have become very entitled to our place in the majority. Is that what we're afraid of? Having to learn another language? Having to integrate other traditions into our current traditions? Haven't we been doing that since the beginning? And, frankly, hasn't it only enhanced our lives to do so?
The people outside our lines are still people. They did nothing to deserve a lesser life. They didn't ask to be born where they were born, in the same way that people born into challenging circumstances in the U.S. didn't ask to be born with their situation. So, let's debate about how to safely and smartly help people live better lives, shall we? Let's ignore those trying to infuse hate and fear and misinformation into this very important debate and let the motivation be not just a more perfect union, but a more perfect humanity. That seems like a more inspiring place to start this conversation. As is stands, we're only talking about this because one crazy billionaire hates Mexicans and doesn't mind telling us about it. Can we ignore him? Can we turn away from his tabloid-esk antics and focus on the positive? That would be impressive America. Let's get real about this. People's lives (and our economy) depend on it.
However, these are not the debates we're having. The reason Donald Trump hasn't been shouted off the world stage as a kooky narcissist unabashedly spewing racism toward a vital population of people and their friends and family is because he's saying what many Americans are thinking. It's hate toward Mexicans that is driving the immigration debate. And the hate comes from fear and the fear comes from lack of or misinformation and the misinformation is coming from people like Trump trying to achieve political and/ or financial gain by tapping into the emotions of an uninformed population of the American public.
This is the saddest part of this issue. These are real people. They have spouses and kids and parents and grandparents. They feel physical, emotional, psychological, and financial pain just like the rest of us, and as a country--a country that loves to go on-and-on about how Christian we are--rather than trying to understand their motivations for coming to the U.S. and find a compassionate and empathetic way to help them, we're talking about ways to split-up their families, to send them back to places they risked their lives to flee. We're talking about expensive walls and deportation methods instead of spending far less money integrating them into our society and benefiting from their being here. Can we take every person wanting to leave their home country? No. That's impossible. So, let's debate about that. Let's debate about who we let in and how many we can let in. Let's debate about the vetting process to become a citizen. Let's debate about why we really care who lives here if they're following our laws and paying taxes and doing everything else we as citizens do in the U.S. Let's debate what is an affordable, sustainable way of protecting our borders. We have to be smart about it. There are people in the world who want to do us harm, but historically and statistically speaking, those people are not coming from our neighboring countries. Thus, building a wall does nothing to keep us safer.
In the end, our borders are just lines on a map that we carved out through war, treaties, and diplomacy. Our constitution deems anyone born inside these lines to be an American. Yet, socially, that's not all we require to be considered American, is it? Some of us have decided we're more important than other people living here and have become very entitled to our place in the majority. Is that what we're afraid of? Having to learn another language? Having to integrate other traditions into our current traditions? Haven't we been doing that since the beginning? And, frankly, hasn't it only enhanced our lives to do so?
The people outside our lines are still people. They did nothing to deserve a lesser life. They didn't ask to be born where they were born, in the same way that people born into challenging circumstances in the U.S. didn't ask to be born with their situation. So, let's debate about how to safely and smartly help people live better lives, shall we? Let's ignore those trying to infuse hate and fear and misinformation into this very important debate and let the motivation be not just a more perfect union, but a more perfect humanity. That seems like a more inspiring place to start this conversation. As is stands, we're only talking about this because one crazy billionaire hates Mexicans and doesn't mind telling us about it. Can we ignore him? Can we turn away from his tabloid-esk antics and focus on the positive? That would be impressive America. Let's get real about this. People's lives (and our economy) depend on it.
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