<p>The ‘free social security’ pay-in seems to keep popping up as if it’s a justification to have illegals here and to keep them here. Using that logic we should just go ahead and remove any border controls we have in place so we could allow millions and millions more to come here illegally to boost the coffers even more. These same posters don’t seem to consider the strain on social systems such as schools (not paying appropriate property taxes when living many families in a dwelling planned for one), sewer systems (again - multiple families per SF dwelling), hospitals who treat many who’ll never pay, and many other social services. </p>
<p>I don’t buy it - I’d rather have legal workers who will pay and receive their appropriate share. If that means an increase in the SS tax for the legal workers then so be it.</p>
<p>The US has enjoyed relatively low unemployment rates by financial engineering and that financial engineering is in the process of unraveling. We are seeing higher unemployment as a result. Americans may change their minds as to what they will and won’t do.</p>
<p>I think that I computed an annual SS contribution of about $1,500 per year. But one child in a public school system costs $10,000.</p>
<br>
Attrition has started to be very successful.</p>
<p>What I don’t get is why you don’t understand that many of the people who immigrated illegally do not want to be here. That families, communities and cultures are being destroyed. What you advocate is the easy way out, the selfish way out. Human beings on both side of the border deserve better than that.</p>
<p>to ucsd…dad: not a social security justification…just an inconvenient truth for those who get overly self righteous about how" they" are taking from “us”. By all means, make them legal. “They” don’t plan on stiffing us and would much prefer to pay tax in order to avoid the extreme dislocations of illegal immigration in exchange for having work. Most of those I translate for are trying desperately to become legal, knowing they will incur tax and other obligations. The responsibility for the economic dislocations is our xenophobia, not their avariciousness.</p>
<p>BC eagle: but have you calculated what happens in 10-15 years when the rate of new employees enters the system decreases (absent “illegal” immigrant) but the population retiring surges?</p>
<p>Most of those whom I tutor couldn’t care less about their status. They get exactly what they need and don’t have the responsibilities. Granted, my tutorees are either women with small kids or men without families of their own here, but your experience isn’t representative of the whole picture.</p>
<p>zoosermom: actually, as I do counseling, I have a number of unemployed american clients who DO say they don’t want the jobs that the illegals do…indeed, they tend to say some nasty things about the values of the illegals in reference to their willingness to take such jobs. Xenophobia at some of its ugliest</p>
<p>The problems are orthogonal. With illegal immigrant families, the costs outweigh the benefits. They may benefit the social security system but it’s just pushing the costs elsewhere.</p>
<p>Your experience is not universal. I live in middle class NYC and I can tell you that the young black men in my neighborhood and in my church would do those jobs when given a chance. They aren’t often given that chance. Illegal immigrants absolutely victimize those at the bottom of the employment ladder. It makes me sad that so many Americans consider themselves good and moral people when supporting the victimization here in America and there in places like Mexico and Guatemala. I often wonder if these people don’t think at all. I’d also like to know how many of those righteous (self righteous?) Americans have illegal landscapers, childcare providers or cleaning people.</p>
<p>“I have a number of unemployed american clients who DO say they don’t want the jobs that the illegals do”</p>
<p>That is one of the problem. The NO is being rebuilt not by natives but by Hispanics. And they are plenty of Jobs in LA even McDonald is offering signing bonuses. In Houston, you will be hard pressed to find any other race crew (except Hispanics) for Landscaping, residential home construction, roofing or any other work that are low pay and back breaking.</p>
I don’t know what part of the country you’re in but there is in fact a lot of ‘taking from us’ and it’s very evident in this area. It has nothing to do with self righteousness - it’s the law that they’re here illegally - not a debate.</p>
<p>Even if the net from unrewarded SS taxes was greater than the impact on social services, which I doubt, it’s still not right to attempt to justify the illegals being here due to it. And if all of the illegals were given legal status, which a lot of the SS justifiers seem to advocate, then they ‘would’ collect the SS rewards and there goes the argument. </p>
<p>I agree that a lot of these illegals would prefer to have legal status although many would not want to become citizens. Our country already has a course for them to come to the country legally an over a million people per year do and I think the greatest numbers do come from Mexico - legally, and I think that’s fine. However, I don’t feel the USA can just open the floodgates and allow anyone to come here with some sort of legal status. If we did that we’d see many many millions of people from Latin America, China, Eastern Europe, and most other points on the globe flocking here and I think it would be detrimental. </p>
<p>This isn’t all about Mexicans or any kind of xenophobia as some try to state. It’s about sovereignty and management. It really doesn’t matter where the illegals come from or their ethnicity - it’s about whether they broke our laws to come here or not. </p>
<p>I don’t agree with the sentiment that ‘oh well, they came here illegally and got away with it so far, maybe due to ineffective border controls, so we should just let them stay’. The people who came here (which includes those who ‘stayed here’) illegally knew what they were doing at the time and chose to do it anyway. It’s unfortunate they were willing to risk the effects on themselves as well as their families but that was their choice. And when they themselves have illegal status and have kids born here who are legal citizens or bring very young children in, it places everyone in a very tough situation.</p>
<p>“one child in a public school system costs $10,000.”</p>
<p>““They” don’t plan on stiffing us.”</p>
<p>No, they don’t plan on it. However, monopolizing the public school classrooms in regions, cities where this is happening, and where poor blacks & poor southeast Asian legal immigrants have become voiceless minorities – that’s an unintentional but effective way of stiffing the U.S. public. Descriibing the result as inevitable & the children of immigrants as helpless & ‘deserving of an education’ does not lessen the damage to those citizens already economically compromised & with no schooling options except publics where classes are conducted in Spanish. And please don’t tell me it doesn’t happen, or rarely happens, or it’s occasional. It’s massive, in States & locales with high Hispanic immigrant populations. I know because I continue to work within the school system, despite not being officially employed by it right now. (My employment is private.)</p>
<p>Post 80:
“what i’m concerned about is this intense antipathy toward the undocumented workers already here”
I myself don’t have “intense antipathy.” But I do have intense antipathy toward (a) do-nothing governments on both sides of the border; (b) lack of courage & creativity to contribute to a problem-solving effort, supporting the dignity of peoples to take control of their own economic futures in their own countries; (c) complacency on the part of well-off citizens & business people whose children have the option to attend private schools. I definitely don’t see intense antipathy recently on P Cafe, but maybe I missed something.</p>
<p>Just to build off of something I said in Post 92:</p>
<p>Here’s some direct economic impact for you: When a low-income black student attends a school where the classes are conducted in Spanish, often the only alternative for the parents of that student, if actual education is a goal, is to remove the child from the class and do Guess What with him or her? Homeschool. Doesn’t matter if the homeschooling is being done with public funds (as it sometimes is). Homeschooling even in the best-staffed homeschool system REQUIRES at least one parent to be home, delivering that schooling. The effect of that desperate option is to remove that worker from the labor force, reduce the standard of living of the black family & obviously their available cash. (And tell me why, again, it’s perfectly fine to support illegal immigrants’ “rights” on the backs of poor black children? Somehow I don’t see a moral equivalency there.) I can cite you 3 recent examples of families who have had to make this decision; I taught the children myself, & in 2 of 3 of those families they were living in grinding poverty. Eventually the nonworking parent had no choice but return to work, abandon the homeschool effort, & consign their children to underperforming in a foreign-language school.</p>
<p>This is but one of the many ways that proponents of no-holds-barred illegal entry & “rights” have not taken into account the complex consequences of such laissez faire ‘policies’ on the survival & welfare & RIGHTS of legal residents.</p>
<p>Because it’s all about the self esteem of the righteous. It’s not as glamorous or enlightened or sophisticated or worldly or inclusive (pick your buzz word), to say “I care about poor Americans and want to see them raised out of poverty.” Much better in their social networks to say “I’m a citizen of the world and I put the well-being of the world’s citizens ahead of Americans.” Peer pressure and self-esteem. Never underestimate the pull of those things in certain groups of perpetual adolescents.</p>
<p>Re your Spanish class example…aren’t you conflating problems? Isn’t insistance on Spanish classes misguided in light of research on the effectiveness of English immersion, often opposed by Hispanics who do not want their children consigned to what is perceived as a remedial track, and supported by teacher’s unions anxious to employ more teachers (including bilinguals, ESL’s etc)? Isn’t that issue more about deciding what the language obligations of a school are (including children of All backgrounds, including recent Asian, African, Mideast etc immigrants) rather than an issue of illegal immigration?</p>
<p>“Isn’t that issue more about deciding what the language obligations of a school are (including children of All backgrounds, including recent Asian, African, Mideast etc immigrants) rather than an issue of illegal immigration?”</p>
<p>No, it isn’t. And I’m not confusing or conflating anything. Clearly you don’t work in such schools, nor have children in such schools. The arguments of several people on this thread reflect rather the ivory towers of their existences & their comfortable philosophies. What happens in the schools is not a result of “the light of research” or “the language obligations of a school.” We’re talking coping here, and the de facto results of a non-immersed school population in anything but Spanish – uninterested in learning academics in the language of English, nor of speaking it as immediately as possible in the marketplace. No, this is about Mexico North.</p>
<p>Illegal immigration is not an academic exercise, but an economic & practical reality, with real, daily effects on the lives of the least powerful among our own residents, the ones with the least voice & leverage. The spanish dominating the 98+% of such schools attended mostly by children of undocumented (often not born here either) is not about teachers unions, research, or “language obligations.”</p>
<p>To put it another way, where the illegal immigrant population is a hugely critical mass, those districts (& often states) are unable to manage or control the school system, despite official policies, pretty research, or any such factors. I said it earlier – on this or another thread: it is simply educational anarchy.</p>
<p>And further on the educational impact on legal residents, this article just appeared, illustrating a different element of an already overburdened, overwhelmed school system within one of a handful of states with a disproportionately immense illegal immigrant population. Add this to a system under seige, and one can envision clearly the tipping point to native at-risk youth.</p>