Illegal Immigration

[mishalak]

So much heat and so little light. I think both sides have a serious case of plank their own eye while pointing out splinters in everyone else's eyes.

The Democrats loudly proclaiming in favor of the status quo, that it shouldn't be harder to illegally immigrate to the US, thus supporting the gray market for low skill workers and the businesses that thrive upon them. Along with the President I might add, who is striving mightily to satisfy both his business interests and his suburban angry white male voters.

The Republicans loudly proclaiming they want to get control of the boarder while not really going after the root causes of the situation, businesses not wanting to check the legal status of their workers or even knowingly violate the law because it makes them big profits. Let us not discount that there is a nice dose of closet racism among a significant subset of them, but don't tar all of them with that brush. That's no way to have a dialogue.

Could the United State absorb more immigrants, obviously we could, but should we? Eventually, yes, they will probably become American just as all those Italians who lived in separate neighborhoods with crime, ethnic food, and newspapers in their own language did. But if we allowed easy legal immigration what would it do? I suspect it would widen the gap between rich and poor because there would be a constant supply of labor to drive down wages on the lower end of the scale. I suspect it would produce more crime because the greater the gap between have and have not does that. I also suspect that much like the Wal*Mart effect it would overall increase prosperity because people at the top end would tend to get richer faster than the poor got poorer and everyone with the money to afford it would have lower priced goods and services.

I think immigration of low or no skill workers is like having an extra person who does not work around a house. Ways will be found to use him and this will have some good, but I don't know that it outweighs the bad.

I also think trying to cut down immigration to the official levels is probably stupid because there is so darn much demand to get into the US.

What I think should happen, but will not, is to better fence and patrol the boarder, phase in serious punishments for employers who employ illegal aliens (with perhaps an amnesty for past bad acts in exchange for admitting and ending them), institute an easy system to check on legal status, examine the cases of illegals already in the country and give those who are finding employment and improving their lot (like learning English, have learned a skill, etc) giving them legal status, sending back the problem cases (drug dealers, gang members, etc.), giving time to improve for questionable cases giving them three or four year green cards, make the process for legal immigration more transparent and simple (though not lax), and raise the legal immigration quota by 50%. Of course all this would take money that the Feds don't have. I don't know what I would cut, maybe business and sugar subsidies.

Comments

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

institute an easy system to check on legal status,

Any ideas? Do you favor everyone being required to carry a national identity card to provide ID to law enforcement when asked? or maybe just to immigration officers?

[mishalak.livejournal.com]

Not required to carry, just required to present and be checked at time of employment. Basically the same as now the I-9 form gets filled out, but instead of just keeping it on file it is transmitted to the INS to be checked out and/or the employer calls in to check and see if this is A) A valid driver's license and B) the name presented is the same on the social security account as on the little card. Though a national ID rather than having the kludgy system used now where driver's licenses are national ID in all but name wouldn't be bad either.

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

Not required to carry, just required to present and be checked at time of employment.

But this would apply to everyone, right? Not just to, say, people with accents or limited English skills?

[mishalak.livejournal.com]

Of course, it applies to everyone currently and I think this would be a good way to catch up with other sorts of fraud that don't involve being here illegally.

It relies on the same economics that drive the breaking of the law currently. If there is no work once an illegal is here they're going to stop coming.

[mishalak.livejournal.com]

And, periodic/random rechecking and correlation of "Hey how many jobs is this person working, we should check to see if he identity has been stolen." Not to mention if the person is using the identity of a person too young to be working legally in that state, the id of a person claimed as a dependent, someone on social security disability, listed as missing, etc, etc... This would also help with problems of people owing child support or taxes using false names to obtain employment.

It might be good to follow this up with legislation strengthening penalties for identity theft to make it less of an attractive crime.

[mjlayman.livejournal.com]

You know, when I get more infirm, I'm going to need a low-paid worker! Seriously, we've had rants against immigrants all through our history -- Germans, Japanese, Swedes -- and I think this one is like the rest, just political puffery.

[mishalak.livejournal.com]

Oh I'm sure I agree, there isn't any downside to illegal imigration. No reason at all to try and fix it, the market will solve the problem or something.

[mjlayman.livejournal.com]

Hey did I say I was Libertarian? So tell me, what's the downside to illegal immigration?

[mishalak.livejournal.com]

The Downsides of Illegal Immigration
One of the weaker arguments against illegal immigration is the corrosive effect upon unions. Just as in the past new immigrants who are much hungrier for work than those who have been here for a while make it easier to break nascent union movements and to bust unions already in place.

Environmental damage cannot be discounted either, both at the boarder and as a consequence of the unregulated building of slums and breaking of environmental laws.

Racism and homophobia are increased by illegal immigration, because they are on average just as prejudiced against blacks and gays as are the more stereotypical poor white person.

More seriously illegal immigration increases health costs for everyone in the same way that Wal*Mart paying its workers insufficiently and not giving them health insurance does. They depend upon emergency and urgent care and cannot pay for it.

Similarly they increase insurance rates for all licensed motorists. (Aside: Twice uninsured illegal immigrants have hit my car, once doing serious damage.)

Increased costs in general, for example housing, as more people flood in.

Crime rates are increased by illegal immigration not because of race or culture, but because of their condition. They are poor and the gap between them and the wealthy continues to grow partially as a consequence of illegal immigration itself. Having a big labor supply holds the line or reduces the pay for the poorest workers while benifiting the rich who employ them with greater profits.

The Upsides of Illegal Immigration:
Better ethnic dinning.

Lower costs of food especially produce.

[mjlayman.livejournal.com]

Excellent work! I think some of those elements are things we, the USA, should work on, like letting people in without killing the environment, setting up national health insurance, and better pay.

I don't read much about illegal immigrants running into more cars than other people, so I don't know about that.

Racism and homophobia is going to be a problem for a long time. I hope they'll learn from the bigotism against them, but Ghu knows the blacks haven't.

The hardest part is the union. In general, I think unions are a good thing. They keep the employer from damaging the employees. However, some unions have become so powerful that they're making unreasonable demands. I do shop at a union grocery store, though.

[mishalak.livejournal.com]

Not that they run into other cars more often, but that they don't have insurance when they do.

And I'll reiterate that I think that the solution is to crack down on illegal immigration while allowing more legal immigration. Legal immigrants are part of the system and thus have more incentive to follow the rules of our society and greater opportunity to rise.