The High Cost of Cheap Labor

Illegal immigrants in the United States (US) have long been a topic of debate for policymakers and the public. The rationale about them is that they do not pay taxes; they add to the costs of taxpayers and use up funds in resources meant for assisting citizens and legal immigrants (the legal citizens). Therefore, they are perceived as a threat to the US economy. The true impacts of illegal immigrants on the US economy are discussed by debating over the economic benefits as well as economic costs of these immigrants. The negative impacts, discussed first, presented the decreases in low skilled jobs’ wage rates for legal immigrants and citizens instigated by illegal immigrants, the social services such as educations and healthcare that they

This paper explores the United States, Immigration Policy from an historical, fair and factual perspective. The Immigration Act of 1990 States limited “unskilled workers to 10,000 a year. Skilled labor requirements and immediate family reunification were major goals. The Act continued to promote the nuclear family model, foreign-born in the US was 7%”. This paper will also explore the demographics and diversity, of immigrants, throughout the U.S. This paper includes an article form the website of the Washington, D.C., Immigration Policy Center, and American Immigration Council. This paper will examines significant research data from the Pew Research web site on Hispanic trends and immigration, around the United States. This paper will also cover numbers, facts and trends which shape the immigration policy. This paper will also include five different books written by authors concerning the immigration policy and public issues which most concern Americans. This paper will cover topics of history of social problems and the policies that address immigration, special interest groups advocacy groups, political party and supporters, social justice and ethical issues, policy outcomes of illegal immigrants and how other countries compare to the United States when dealing with immigration.

Are illegal immigrants or undocumented immigrants beneficial to America’s economy? Most illegal immigrants have a positive impact on the United States (U.S.) economy. Illegal immigrants have a positive impact on the United States economy because they increase our tax revenue, they add to our social security, and they also increase our employment rates.” In 2000, statistics revealed 8.7 million illegal immigrants resided in the United States” (Knickerbocker pgs.11-12). “A study of illegal immigrants living in Texas showed a 420 million dollar increase in the states economy” (Strayhorn). Companies risk hiring illegal immigrants

Mexican immigration has a large impact on the United States both politically and economically. Focusing on the labor market, and how over history, especially throughout the 20th century, American employers in various industries, have benefited from the immigrant workers crossing the U.S.-Mexico border. Recognizing the value of immigrants willing to work various job positions for low wages, during worker shortages in America. In the 1990s alone the number of Mexican Immigrants workers grew by 2.9 million, a 123 % increase. (PP.

But amazingly, the flow of foreign-born is so large that immigrants currently account for a larger share of labor force growth than natives (“U.S. Immigration and Economic Growth: Putting Policy on Hold”, 2003) When you do the math, it makes a good deal of sense to spend the little that we do—if not more—to keep them healthy (Karvounis, 2007). Care for undocumented immigrants represents a tiny fraction of the nation’s health care burden. They receive minimal care; some pay taxes. Between one half and three quarters of undocumented immigrants pay taxes and some work “off the books” jobs as well (What Immigration Reform Could Mean To The US Economy, 2009). Illegal aliens provide as much as 7 billion dollars a year to the Social Security Fund although they cannot claim benefits for this program (Immigrants’ Economic Contribution, 2009). Further still, undocumented workers pay sales taxes where applicable and property taxes—directly if they own and indirectly if they rent (“Undocumented Immigrants as Taxpayers”, 2007).

Immigration is a topic on everyone 's minds these days. With presidential candidates vying for votes in debates and political campaigns, immigration has been talked about quite a bit. But what is truly known about immigration? Since it is such a divisive issue, it is hard to know what is true and what isn’t. Unfortunately, the information most readily available to us comes in the form of opinionated articles and biased speeches by presidential candidates. Because the information we receive is biased, not necessarily true, and only a piece of a larger picture, it’s hard to know what to believe. With some saying immigration hurts our economy and others arguing for the benefits of immigration, no one truly understands the actual economic impact of immigration. For this paper, I have chosen three academic journals on the topic of the economics of immigration that agree on one important point: our immigration system is broken.

Whether with a cold shoulder welcome or a open arm embrace, the United States has constantly received a range of global immigrants, over half whom originate from Latin America (migrationpolicy.org). Largely driven by the prospect of the “American Dream,” the Latino immigration movement began in the 1840s and has fluctuated with new policies, including the bracero program, an oppressive operation for temporary migrant workers, during World War II, and the Immigration Act of 1965, which created the first immigration limit for the Western Hemisphere (Gutiérrez, Ewing). Since 1960, the Latino population in America has grown from 3.24% of the U.S. population to 16%, and recent estimates proclaim an approximate 11 million undocumented Hispanics, revealing the growing need for for a political reassessment of immigration policy (Gutiérrez, whitehouse.gov). Today, immigration policy, particularly pertaining to Hispanics, has become a controversial subject in the United States, bearing opposing views and proposals, accompanied by diverse impacts that could reverberate throughout the Americas.

Empirical investigation is thus required for estimation of responses' magnitude to immigration by investors, employers, by earlier immigrants and native-born workers, and by the public sector, and also in consumer and housing goods markets. Using the U.S experience, immigrants have been represented in low-skilled occupations. However, a significant and growing share of immigrant is skilled in great manners. Due to the challenges of mechanisms shaping the economy, empirical literature has created some employment and wage impact estimates which experts debate about. One of the approaches used is spatial studies, which compares the outcome of workers across geographic areas. The second method used is the skill cell studies, which examines the results of employees across groups that are defined to have similar experience and education. The structural studies implement the approach of power cell with close connections between empirical estimation and theory (Blau and Mackie

Immigration-related discussions could always cause vehement debates and arouse ambivalent feelings among both policy makers and the general public. On the one hand, we appreciate that immigrants contribute to cultural diversity, social vibrancy and economic prosperity; on the other hand, we sometimes could not resist to express our concerns and complaints about how immigrants constantly drive competition in job markets, put strain on public resources, and pose threats to social peace. Although classical economic model predicts with the expansion of labor force caused by increasing immigrants, wages or per capita income will fall and living standards will deteriorate, there might be a subgroup of immigrants who could, in contrast,

Mexico was estimated up to 70% from those undocumented workers. (Reiff, 2013) In 2001, Bush and congress hoped to help Mexican immigration to U.S. by the legislation immigration reform but the reform had to hold on since the terrorist attacks in September 11, 2001. In 2005, the U.S. House of Representatives supported the Border Protection and the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act were passed by the Senates in 2006. However, both of these cannot be a law because their contents are a few differences and had conflicts with conference committee. (Nakamura, 2014) In 2009, Barack Obama restarted this comprehensive discussion of immigration reform. In the speech of November 20, 2014, U.S. president Obama stated the current immigration system is broken and summed up the necessary of the immigration reform such as new immigrant families were flout by others, business owners provided the less wages and benefits to undocumented immigrants and most of immigrants only wanted to earn the money, regardless of the responsibilities of living in the U.S., which caused them being apart from the others and society, staying in the dark shadows all the time. (Obama, November 2014) In case of the problem coming worses, President Obama began a series of executive actions to fix the system on immigration. This article introduces some key players in US politics and how their strategies to support

The chapter begins by explaining how Cecilia Munoz, an immigration advocate was working towards immigration reform in the White House in the early 2000’s. The author notes that news had broken that President Bush had met with Mexican President Vicente Fox to collaborate on plans to provide status to 3 million undocumented immigrants who were living in the U.S. Views from the White House put a stop to immigration reform plans and geared their focus on decreasing immigration patterns. After the terroristic attacks of 9/11 the topic of immigration took a different turn. Immigrants had yet another target on their backs, being labeled as potential terrorists. A shift in immigration had taken place after the attacks. Many people and organizations

“Households headed by illegal aliens imposed more than 26.3 billion dollars in costs on the federal government…and paid only 16 billion dollars in taxes, creating a net fiscal deficit of almost 10.4 billion dollars, or two thousand seven hundred dollars per illegal household” (Miller 1). Some people would argue that immigrants come to America to take jobs that no one else will do, but the illegal immigrants are in fact draining social services and stealing free health care benefits. In addition, immigrants pay little or no taxes to benefit the social services and health care providers that they drain. By doing so, the American tax payers must take on the high price of the American

Yee, V., Davis, K., & Patel, J. (2017, March 06). Here’s the Reality About Illegal Immigrants in the United States. Retrieved November 10, 2017, from https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/03/06/us/politics/undocumented-illegal-immigrants.html

Currently there are 168 million child laborers in the world. More than half of them, 85 million, employed at hazardous jobs, according to the International Labour Organization. In the article “In Praise of Cheap Labor Bad jobs at bad wages are better than no jobs at all”, Paul Krugman Professor of economics at MIT, explains that child labor cannot just be wiped away like so many other distasteful practices. That it takes a perfect storm of economic success and low child labor numbers for a full transition to labor laws that ban it. Employers will agree to follow the law; similar to what happened in the U.S. in the 1930’s when Congress passed the Fair Labor Standards Act. This Act established standards for the basic minimum wage and overtime pay. It restricts the hours that children under age 16 can work and forbids the employment of children under age 18 in certain jobs deemed too dangerous. Krugman believes that many developing countries are not at a point where they can support a full ban on child labor. He gives the example of countries like “Indonesia [who are,] still so poor that progress is measured in terms of how much the average person gets to eat” (Krugman 4). Professor of economics at Yale university, Christopher Udry, in his article “Child Labor” provides a definition of child labor as “ the sacrifice of the future welfare of the child in exchange for additional income” (243). The causes of Child labor are not as simple as cultural or economic reasons, and a