Undocumented Immigration Summary

According to a study released last year by the Pew Hispanic Center, as of 2008, 11.9 million illegal immigrants lived in the United States, more than triple the 3.5 million who lived in the country in 1990 (Izumi). Immigration throughout the years has become a major issue in the U.S because of too many immigrants entering the country year after year. The U.S has come to a point whether they should deport the immigrants back to their country. Believe it or not, these immigrants are a big contribution to the U.S. If it wasn’t for them, the U.S economy wouldn’t be where it stands now. In recent discussions of whether immigrants should be deported, there has been sides where immigration would be good for our country and others disagree. Some believe that immigrants should be allowed to stay in our country, because they believe our economy wouldn’t be good without them and many businesses rely on immigrants working for them. On the other hand, the other side believe that immigrants are overpopulating the U.S and don’t have the money to support all of these immigrants (education/jobs.) Immigrants should be allowed to remain in the country because many families would be separated, they are already accustomed to the American society, and they contribute to the economy.

Immigration reform has been a big issue for our country in recent years. Many U.S. citizens claim that immigration is harmful to the US economy. In just 20 years, we have seen the average number of immigrants per year jump a staggering 20%. This has lead to the biased opinions we see towards immigration today. Currently, our country is not receiving any benefit from immigration. The number of minimum wage jobs available have decreased but so have the number of professional jobs. This is due to the fact that immigrants usually do not have a middle class with average skills. They are either refugees escaping their country hoping for the U.S. government to help them out or they are highly skilled and trained professionals needed by the United States. This has led to an economic

For decades, immigration has been a problem for the United States. Due to the people traveling from their native lands to the United States seeking a better life for themselves, and more primarily for the family that has come with them. Immigration is the action of settling into a country of which one is not native. Despite the many legal immigrants not every immigrant enters the country with legal documents and most of these illegal immigrants are poor and uneducated. Some undocumented immigrants commit crimes such as drug smuggling, or terrorism. Our policies on illegal immigration can diminish the problem by enforcing immigration laws, revoking birthright autonomy, and demanding proof of citizenship when applying for social services. Immigration has become a major problem in this country and needs to be restricted.

In the period of thirty years between 1970 and 2000 immigration and immigrants in the United States has changed drastically. Their origin countries have changed, their are more in the US and dejectedly poverty rates have risen as well. Global events as well as new US immigration laws/amendments have impacted the fundamental changes in immigration. Although not all the shifts in immigration have been positive, undoubtedly in a period of thirty years there are noticeable differences.

Some of the things I hear a lot are how immigrants do not pay any taxes, or that they are taking away our health benefits. But the reality is that, just like the rest of us when they go somewhere to shop they too pay sales tax. It is not like immigrants have a special benefit that omits them from taxes. Also when an immigrant does happen to have a factory job of some sort they never receive any tax return. A lot of people also choose to overlook the huge economical boost these people give to our country. Illegal immigrants represent a gigantic part of our nations labor force according to “The Aspen Institute of economic opportunity program”, 16% of our nation’s work force was foreign born. This means that there are over 25 million undocumented employees in the U.S. today imagine what would happen to our economy if we got rid of

Undocumented immigrants live with fear of deportation every day of their lives. Those with control of state institutions who do not consider undocumented immigrants as worthy American residents in our society, take advantage of their power by instilling fear of deportation. The restrictive federal and state laws towards migration in the U.S. has become a way to keep undocumented immigrants and their families living in the shadows. Arrocha (2013) claims that the paradox of the U.S. migration seems be that our free democratic republicanism is viewed as the land of freedom, equality, and justice. Yet, these undocumented immigrants aren’t treated equally or given the freedom to live in our society without intimidation. In states like Arizona, the program SB 1070 allowed state officials to profile individuals who presumed to be residing in the state without legal documents. Needless to say, this was a tool used to regulate migration and also a way to differentiate legal residents from illegal residents, which resulted as an inhumane and degrading way to treat these individuals. For that reason, it has become unreachable for immigrants to assimilate into our American society because they are characterized as either aliens, criminals, or

Economy by Daniel Costa, David Cooper, and Heidi Shierholz states, “ Unauthorized immigrants generally cannot receive benefits from government programs, except in some cases, such as when illegal immigrants children receive public education, and in somes states that allow illegal immigrants to attend state colleges at in-state tuition rates”. Immigrants and their children contribute more in taxes than they receive in benefits (Johnson, 10). A significant portion of illegal immigrants file taxes using Individual Taxpayer Identification Numbers (ITINs); however, many unauthorized immigrants don’t file because they fear deportation (Costa). Although, there are a lot of illegal immigrants, they are not overpopulating our country. Recent estimates show that there are about 11.5 to 12 million illegal immigrants in the United States, that is about one-third of the foreign-born population. There are over 400 million citizen in the United States. In the PDF, The Economic Logic of Illegal Immigration by Gordon D. Hanson states, “ In 2005, there were thirty-five million immigrants living in the United States, of which 30 percent were in the country illegally and 3 percent were temporary legal residents” (6). The foreign-born now make up 12 percent of the U.S. population. In the website The Facts on Immigration Today: 2017 Edition by the CAP Immigration Team and Michael D. Nicholson states, “The number of foreign-born individuals in

Throughout history, millions of people have immigrated to The United States with high hopes of a better life. This not only helped them achieve their goal, but also helped build America as we know it today. While they can be hard workers, illegal immigration ultimately needs to be stopped, or slowed at the very least because it 's economically crippling to allow them to take advantage of government assistance, it’s expensive to ensure the education of their children, many put lives in danger by driving without a licence, and allowing them to stay encourages more to come.

or many years the United States has been considered by many people to be the land of opportunity where anyone can come to achieve a better life. Like anywhere in the world the immigration of people both legally and illegally has helped shape America’s population and economy. In the U.S. there are millions of illegal immigrants that struggle to find a way to live as well as legal immigrants who abide by American law and still struggle to get by. As a result of the large inflow of foreign-born people into the United States, in recent decades immigration has singularly increased the presence of foreign-born workers in America. There have been many heated debates surrounding the impact of these immigrants on the U.S. workforce and economy. Critics often point to the labor market to support their case against immigration. They argue that an increase in the supply of workers creates extra competition for jobs which cause American-born workers to suffer if immigrants are willing to accept lower wages.

Immigration’s principal effect on the American economy is it’s increase of the total national GDP by approximately 11% annually. This may seem to be wildly beneficial to the nation; however, George Borjas, an economist at the Harvard Kennedy School of Economics, states “This ‘contribution’ to the aggregate economy, however, does not measure the net benefit to the native-born population. Of the $1.6 trillion increase in GDP, 97.8 percent goes to the immigrants themselves in the form of wages and benefits” (Borjas). Borjas’ research clearly indicates that the net economic benefit of immigration for the native population of America is practically nonexistent. Furthermore, immigration not only does not benefit the native population but negatively affects it. By flooding the labor market with droves of new arrivals, primarily unskilled and uneducated laborers, the wages and employment opportunities for current citizens drastically decrease as “A 10 percent increase in the size of an education/age group due to the entry of immigrants (both legal and illegal) reduces the wage of native-born men in that group by 3.7 percent and the wage of all native-born workers by 2.5 percent ($1,396)” (Borjas). Additionally, the social welfare use of immigrant families of all education levels is 33% compared to 19% of native

Whether or not immigrants enter the United States legally or not is another issue, but generally speaking, the majority of immigrants who are here illegally are not criminals or a danger to society—critics just make them out to be. This is an example of fear mongering, a type of immigrant anti-sentiment that people develop to portray immigrants in a negative light. It is important to remember, just like their American counterparts, “they need access to schools and school services to enhance their lives, but they are often handicapped by their ‘unauthorized’ status” (Nelson,

From the moment Christopher Columbus set foot in the America’s, this hemisphere has been confronted with the battles and prosperities of immigration and its effects on individuals and society. In fact, most of our relatives undoubtedly came to this country from a foreign nation with the anticipation to make an enhanced life for themselves and future generations. The private struggles these individuals had to endure: the lengthy travel, personal expenditure, the notion of leaving their families behind, and yielding to screenings by government personnel, were the experiences which united into this melting pot of culture

Demographics in the United States have been undergoing very rapid changes over the last decades. Recent political turmoil in Asia, Africa and Latin America have encouraged people from those areas to immigrate into the United States, and years before that, it was mostly Southern and Eastern Europeans along with European Jews and Irish people who immigrated due to the political conflicts in their respective countries. With such a complex population make-up, a turbulent history of tension and conflict amongst the country’s diverse ethnic, religious, and socio economic groups can be expected. Not only is conflict over social justice issues an extensive part of American history, ever since the foundation of the United States there has been conflict over who, exactly, is to be considered an American.

According to pewresearch.org, illegal immigrants made up around 3.5% of the US population in the year of 2014, these illegals make up 5.1% of the US work force, and around 52% of them are Mexican. The primary reason illegal immigration is such a problem is that these citizens do not pay taxes and often send money back across the border to impoverished relatives. Immigrationforum.org calculates that we spend an average of 5.05 million USD per day on detaining illegal immigrants, with around 159 USD daily cost to taxpayers for every immigrant detained. In order to address our immigration issues, the US should make immigration easier, which will save millions of taxpayer dollars and allow these immigrants to bring their families across the border, this will allow them to become taxable members of the US work force as well as halting the departure of our currency across our borders. Ultimately however, all of this immigration reform will be utterly pointless if we do not have a solid domestic policy to support

Illegal aliens who come to America all want one thing: a higher standard of living and liberty. But the real question is; who pays the price of allowing illegal aliens to bathe in the freedom that is America? Americans do not mind sharing the American dream with different nationalities but the swarm of people has put a strain on the working class. The real problem is whether or not to deport illegal aliens who are fleeing their countries due to poverty or legalize them and risk a lower standard of living for Americans. Illegal immigrants pose a far greater negative impact on the American economy and punish taxpayers.