United States Of The American Dream

As a flourishing country, the United States of America has been a recurring land of hope and prosperity for immigrants. These foreigners may have been looking for religious freedom, job opportunities, escape from economic and environmental problems, shelter from war, or simply a fresh start at life. With immigration becoming larger and larger as every years passes, with it comes reasons for more legislation and new trends that are contributed by the different array of people who come together in the crucible that is the United States. The nationality or ethnicity of the immigrants vary from the Germans, Irish, Mexicans, Japanese, Chinese and Vietnamese. While there are many cases of immigrants to the United States, they are not always honest, there is always the issues of illegal immigration, that is believed to threaten the American society, “Americans perceived that the large number of immigrants from ethnically, religiously, and culturally different places

The United States of America, being a country founded by immigrants, is known all over the world as the land of great opportunities. People from all walks of life travelled across the globe, taking a chance to find a better life for them and their family. Over the years, the population of immigrants has grown immensely, resulting in the currently controversial issue of illegal immigration. Illegal immigrants are the people who have overstayed the time granted on their US, visa or those who have broken the federal law by crossing the border illegally. Matt O’Brien stated in his article “The government thinks that 10.8 million illegal immigrants lived in the country in January 2009, down from a peak of nearly 12 million in 2007.”(Para, 2)

Immigration involves the movement of a group of people from one country to another where they do not possess citizenship. There are many reasons in which people may leave their country such as employment, lack of resources, family, fear due to violence, exile, the American dream. In 1965, Congress changed immigration law in ways that allowed much more intake from Asia and Latin America than earlier. Before 1965, the intake was mostly from Europe. Since then, over half has come from Latin America—28 % just from Mexico. The share of population composed of non-Hispanic whites plunged from 84 % in 1965 to only 62 % in 2015 while Hispanics soared from 4 to 18 %. (Mead, L.M., 2016)

Immigration has existed around the world for centuries, decades, and included hundreds of cultures. Tired of poverty, a lack of opportunities, unequal treatment, political corruption, and lacking any choice, many decided to emigrate from their country of birth to seek new opportunities and a new and better life in another country, to settle a future for their families, to work hard and earn a place in life. As the nation of the opportunities, land of the dreams, and because of its foundation of a better, more equal world for all, the United States of America has been a point of hope for many of those people. A lot of nationals around the world have ended their research for a place to call home in the United States of America. By analyzing

Immigration is both a domestic issue and global concern. It involves economics, politics, and culture. Unlike other current issues, it has been at the center of the American experience for hundreds of years (Tirman, John). Every year, hundreds of thousands of immigrants from around the world, come to the United States. These immigrants have many different motivations as to why they leave their home country; but as currents events indicate, it is injustice, poverty, and violence in their own country that generally make people move to save themselves and to ensure a better future for their families. Many of these people believe the United States is the best place to go, because there is more freedom, protection, and benefits,

Another motivation for immigration is economic improvement and prestige. Success, term related with the “Californian Dream”, is usually measured based on social, political or economic status. Economic crisis or a difference in minimum wage are one of the factors why most choose to move to prosperous cities in California. Most employees in Latin America are overstaffed and underpaid. Therefore, most people from Latin America move to United States in search of a better salary and working conditions. This problem is currently happening in developing states. In countries like Mexico and Peru, lack of job opportunities and low minimum wage have forced employees to work in two different jobs in order to be able to afford a decent livelihood. For instance, in a country like Mexico, if an engineer works 51 hours per week, his or hers net monthly income would only be $1,081 (World

By the decades the number of immigrants doubles, triples and quadruples going one up the scale each decade.” Most people immigrate for “economic opportunity”. Most of the people that immigrated for “economic opportunities” are women with 41% and men with 37%. The second highest reason people immigrate is for a better life for their family. 36% of woman immigrate for a better life and 40% of men immigrate to look for a better life. The number of legal immigrants arrested in 2017 increased by 250 percent, up to 13,600 compared to 5,498 in 2016. “Immigrant population hit a record of 43.7 million in July 2016” Today we need skilled workers and some immigrants did not immigrate to become a skilled worker. They might have immigrated because they wanted to find a good home or a better

As history has shown, millions of immigrants have flocked to the United States in attempts to find a better life. The complexity of immigration is much greater now than it was in the early 1900’s. Most immigrants arriving on boats to Ellis Isle would have only been denied if they were deemed to be a criminal or with disease. Individuals must now endure an extensive application process to obtain a green card or visa. Without one of these documents, the person is considered to be here illegally. Today we have scores of people attempting to circumvent the laws of our country by crossing the border and many prove successful. These undocumented immigrants, otherwise known as illegals, continue to be a hot topic of debate in our country. Estimates currently stand at around 11 million illegal immigrants in the United States today. Of theses 11 million, 41 percent reside in either California or Texas. The overwhelming majority of illegal entrance into the US takes place at the southern border from Mexico. In this paper I will attempt to explain how illegal immigrants play in role in employment, our society, and how they impact the overall economic welfare of the United States.

Why is there such a vast population of illegal immigrants in the United States? The Obama Administration stated that discord and destitution are the typical circumstances in Mexico and Central America that instigates illegal immigration into the United States. According to a report released by Pew Research Center's Hispanic Trends Project, “The total number of migrants living in this country without papers edged up from 11.3m in 2009 to 11.7m last year, with those from countries other than Mexico at an apparent all-time high” ("US Illegal Immigration May Be Increasing, Study Shows"). There are, in fact, some solutions currently instituted by the government to control the immigration issue, such as deportation or amnesty. However, another option should be disclosed to both help the suffering immigrants seeking refuge in America as well as to crack down on Mexican and Central American criminals in the United States and those living in America illegally. The United States has an obligation as a global superpower to adopt legalization without citizenship.

Vigorous debates about immigration policy have been part of U.S. history since the first settlers began arriving from Europe (Novas, 1994; Kessler, 2001; Reichman, 2006). Those who favor more stringent restrictions on entry to the country, and greater penalties for violating those restrictions, argue that it is necessary for the safety and economic security of our nation and to preserve jobs for U.S. born workers (Camarota, 2011). Those who favor more leniency, and even amnesty for those in the U.S. without legal documentation, argue that the U.S. should maintain its standing as a nation of immigrants where everyone is welcome and where differences add value to the economy and our quality of life (National Council of La Raza, 2008). In today 's heated debates, immigrants from Mexico, Central and South America are most often at the center of the controversy (Camarota, 2011; National Council of La Raza, 2008) as sixty-two percent (62%) of undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. are originally from Mexico, and another twelve percent (12%) from other Spanish-speaking countries of South and Central America (Hoeffer, Rytina, & Baker, 2010).

Illegal immigration has been a controversial issue that has benefitted and harmed the country in several ways; however, many issues dealing with the subject have transformed the future for America dramatically. Although the United States has absorbed and benefitted from the contributions of the undocumented, their presence has imposed harm to the country’s economy and political stability. They have taken over American jobs by retrieving several advantages that come along with the country’s policies, as well as harming the country by not assimilating to the culture and sustaining their identities. The influx of immigrants from other parts of the world has prompted an overwhelming change in society and the immigrants themselves due to more opportunities available in the United States. These immigrants have different motives for entering the country, hoping to obtain a better life in the land of opportunities. There is a greater chance of freedom, protection, and benefits, which are a priority to the migrants to achieve the American dream. Although the immigrants are advancing to achieve their goals, the government is advancing towards stabilizing the overcrowding population due to the hazards caused to the environment and the country. Many of these aliens have aspirations and hopes for a better future in this country, and they do not plan to harm it. On the other hand, some are a threat, but they come to reach that goal of self- independence and a new opening of opportunities.

The United States has always been termed as land of opportunity which attracted immigrants to come to country so as to manage better living and to cash in employment opportunities. Immigrants coming to US are either low skilled or high skilled people however they have made their significant respective contribution to enable economic growth for the country (Diana, 2014). The Immigration and Naturalization Act provide permanent immigrants limit of 675,000 and these immigrants could be family based like spouse, unmarried minor children and parents of US citizens or employment based immigrants working on temporary visas (AIC, 2014). Presently there are around twelve million immigrants in the US who even have partial papers or no paper works and considered as illegal immigrant. The largest immigrants are Hispanic-Americans who represent the 16.7% of US population (Aguilar, 2013).

The term illegal immigration refers to the diversity between whom the United States will accept as an immigrants and the desire of foreign nationals to live and work in this country. About 90% of the illegal immigrants in the United States are of Mexican nationals. Throughout the history, the United States has been raised to be the shelter for immigrants all around the world. Foreign nationals have flocked to its shores, slaving for the American freedom and its economic opportunities (Chiswick, 1988). As these immigrants are suffering from poverty, unemployment and lack of education. It is also seems to be attractive for low skilled workers that cannot afford the expenses of legal immigration and tend to be illegal aliens to fill jobs in agriculture

Often depicted as “the nation of immigrants”, immigration policies have been highlighted in news media and pushed to the forefront of recent political debates in the United States. In 2014, more than 42.4 million, or 13.3%, of the 318.9 million people in the U.S. were immigrants (MPI, 2016). There was an 11 percent increase in 2014 in the number of foreign-born individuals that moved to the United States, with India and China the two countries of origin with the most new immigrants (MPI, 2016). In terms of unauthorized immigrants, however, the population has essentially remained stable over the past five years, as the number of new unauthorized immigrants is roughly equivalent to those who are deported. In 2014, there were an estimated 11.3 million unauthorized immigrants (3.5% of U.S. population) living in the United States according to the Office of Immigration Statistics in the Department of Homeland Security (Pew research Center, 2014). Although unauthorized immigrants reside all over the United States, one half of them are concentrated in four states: California, New York, Texas, and Florida (ACOG, 2015).

Immigration is the process of entry of individuals into a new country (23). Throughout past centuries, immigration has been a means of discovery and exploration of new lands. In today’s culture, immigration to the United States is an avenue for individuals who wish to start new lives and take advantage of the capitalistic, entrepreneurial system. People from many countries have migrated into the United States. Most recently, the migrants have come from Central and South American countries. These Latin American countries influence America’s society culturally and economically through their language, traditions, and workforce. From the 1990s to the present time, immigration from Latin American countries has more than