“Eirgal, you said it yourself, violent crimes are commited by legal citizens and illegal immigrants. Yes, some could have been prevented by stopping them at the border. Nothing justifies killing or raping ect. But there are far more legal American citizens who commit those crimes on a daily bases and some do it over and over. Jail or no jail. Crime is inevitable. I would name names of American people whose life will never be the same because of another American, but what good does it do? It's double standard when we bash illegal immigrants about commiting crimes when our own damn people do the same thing every single day.”
Yes I said it myself and I will say it again.
I said, “I know murder happens every day, rape happens everyday and all kinds of violent crimes happen everyday by illegal immigrants and legal citizens but those that have happened and will happen by illegal immigrants could have been and could be prevented simply by stopping them at the border.”
And I would say it a thousand times because every word of it is true. I know that Americans hurt Americans I could list a thousand of those crimes just as easily as I listed the ones in my previous post. That does not change the fact that the crimes committed by Americans would still be committed just as it does not change the fact that if we had better border security many of the crimes committed in the United States by illegal immigrants would not have happened because some of them would not have been here to commit them. To me that means some of the people who were murdered by illegal immigrants would still be alive and many of the women raped by illegal immigrants would not be suffering the consequences of being raped. They would not be having the nightmares and feeling the fear that someone is sneaking up behind them. Is it worth it to you for some of these crimes to be prevented by trying to hinder illegal immigration or would you prefer to just let them come…criminals and all? I agree…crime is inevitable and crimes will happen but is it worth it to prevent one if you can? I think it is.
“It's double standard when we bash illegal immigrants about commiting crimes when our own damn people do the same thing every single day.”
A double standard is when a rule or principle is applied more strictly to others than to oneself. A double standard is when a standard is applied with more indulgence to one than to another. The only double standard I see in regards to this topic (illegal immigration) is members of the government and society wanting to establish a form of “amnesty” that will reward people who entered the country illegally while others who have come here legally have to wade through the paperwork and wait out the process of becoming an American citizen the right way. TO ME THAT IS A DOUBLE STANDARD.
If anything I have said makes it appear that I am bashing on illegal immigrants…well I am sorry but so be it. It is not intentional and I do not feel that I have bashed on any illegal immigrant or illegal immigrants as a whole because I have not been verbally abusing them. Everything I have said is simple fact and I have not exaggerated any of those facts.
“Firstly, I happen to think the process is needed and should be there. But, how is making them go through it let you know if they will hurt your family or not? How would you even know if they went through a process of becoming legal? If someone wants to hurt someone else, they will do it regardless of being legal or not legal. How do you know the guy checking you out at the grocery store isn't going to hurt you? Or a co-worker. You don't and no one else does either.”
You basically asked how can making a person go through the legal process of immigration (and essentially entering another country) let anyone know if they will commit a crime or not. To be perfectly honest it is simple. There are thousands upon thousands of people rejected entry into the United States every year at border stations, checkpoints and ports of entry by identifying known criminals. Also many are caught trying to sneak across the border by border patrol agents and other law enforcement personnel. How does making them go through the legal process let anyone know if they will commit a crime or not? It will not let anyone know who will do what but by increasing border security and improving security methods even more of the known criminals could be disallowed entry into the country thereby decreasing an unwanted criminal element which leads to decreased crime. Also with better border security many of those who are denied entry then try to sneak across will be caught.
You are correct that when a person wants to hurt another person then someone is going to get hurt…unless someone does something to stop that person from hurting someone. The best way to do that would be to prevent them entry into the country…legal or otherwise. If you could possibly prevent someone from physically harming another person…would you do it?
I know we will never be able to completely eliminate illegal immigration but by doing all that we can it will be less than it would have been.
Please correct me if I am wrong…I get the impression that you do not care who comes into the United States.
Hugs,
Eiregirl _________________ All poems and stories posted by Eiregirl are
Copyright 2005 - 2008 Aoibhegréine
These literary works are my property under copyright. If you wish to use my work for any purpose please ASK FIRST.
Sun Aug 05, 2007 7:20 am
smart_cookie
Joined: 12 Aug 2006
Posts: 2310
Location: USA
The statement was made that Bush's policies on Iraq were successfully spun to the American public. While this may have been true four years ago, bearing in mind of course, what a divided nation we have become, it isn't true today. Poll after poll shows that the American public is rejecting Bush and his policies. Even his own party has begun to move away from him.
So, this man in trouble has turned to the oldest ploy in the book. Find someone relatively powerless to set up as a boogeyman, to take the focus off his own failed administration. Hence, the making of illegal immigration and gay marriage as hot issues. Not only does this--hopefully for him--take some of the heat off his own neck, he can look morally superior while doing it, by inflaming racism and homophobia, but calling it safe borders and family values.
As Pink Floyd sang:
With,
Without,
And who'll deny
That's what the fighting's all about
Cookie
Sun Aug 05, 2007 3:47 pm
realwoman
Joined: 05 Dec 2005
Posts: 1040
Location: under our tree in Africa
This thread has SO many issues tangled into it; I don’t even know where to start. I will try to focus on some of the issues that stand out most for me. Eire said that she feels uncomfortable with general amnesty given to illegal immigrants, and the reasons she gives for this is because her parents had to follow the legal route, and because she is afraid that her family will be affected by a crime committed by an illegal immigrant. She also asks what the situation is with regard to immigration in other countries.
Let me try to address these issues in the following manner:
1. Illegal immigration in my country
2. Crime and ‘illegal’ immigration
3. Amnesty for illegal immigrants
4. Other reasons for discomfort with illegal immigration
Illegal Immigration into South Africa.
To understand the present, one cannot escape history. This country has always been viewed as the ‘land of milk and honey’. Over the centuries, people migrated from the north from all over the continent to escape war and famine. Since there was no formal ‘drawing’ of lines, no one was considered ‘illegal’. Then, over 350 years ago, things changed when a Dutch trading company established a kind of a ‘filling station’ at the southern tip of Africa. All of a sudden, everyone had to follow the Dutch company's rules and, more important, the religion of the Dutch ‘immigrants’. And, through religion and alcohol, the people of the land was controlled, and the riches of the land taken. Other imperial forces saw these riches, especially the British, who about 100 years ago, invaded the country with military power, saying that they are ‘protecting the rights of their citizens’ who were here exploring for gold, and saying that the war would take only six weeks. In the end, the war lasted more than 3 years, and the British only won it because they burned down the farms of civilians and placed women and children of all races in concentration camps, which, due to appalling conditions, resulted in the death of more than half the population. As victors, the British introduced laws that made the original indigenous people second class citizens, based on racial profiling… These laws continued to be enforced, even after the British relinquished their powers.
Fortunately, the people of this country who had the right to vote in the late 1980’s, voted YES for Constitutional reform, and a new Government came into power in 1994, under a Constitution that grants everyone the same human rights... rights of freedom of expression, and equality, regardless of race, religion, sexual orientation, etc. This makes the country extremely attractive to people living in other parts of Africa, especially our neighbours Zimbabwe and Mozambique.
Between 2,000 and 3,000 Zimbabweans are now crossing the northern border into South Africa every night to escape the deepening social and economic crisis in their country. Those caught are deported back, only to return a few nights later. There are more than 20% of the total population of Zimbabweans currently in South Africa. The problem of illegal immigration of Zimbabweans into South Africa is much worse than the problem of illegal immigrants into the USA. My thoughts? Instead of deporting these people, they should be assisted in ‘refugee camps’, where they should be supported to find employment where their skills can best be utilised, and once their country is stable again, they could be given a choice to become South African citizens, or to go back to rebuilt their country. In this manner, there will be record of where they work and live, and they will not need to resort to crime to just stay alive…
Crime and ‘illegal’ immigration
The problem of crime in South Africa is way worse than in the US of A. It would be easy to attribute the high crime rate to the illegal immigrants from Zimbabwe and Mozambique... in fact, one of the most notorious serial killers caught here is a Mozambican. However, using crime as the reason why illegal immigrants should not be allowed amnesty would be a gross oversimplification of the reasons why people become criminal. Some people steal because they are hungry, and have no choice, some people have no respect for themselves or for others, and some people grew up not knowing anything but crime. Some people have psychological problems, and they bend the truth to serve their own purposes, albeit to commit fraud, or to deceive others in whatever way.
Let us consider a few questions in this respect:
Which country has the highest number of serial killers as a percentage of their total population? According to most sources, it is the USA, and of these serial killers, most are legal American citizens. In which country are gays killed on the road by ‘upstanding citizens’? The nice white boy living next door, he could be a serial killer, or be killing your girlfriend because ‘being gay is against God’s word’… What I am hearing is
“Someone who is not like me may become my neighbour,… Someone with a ‘strange’ sounding surname…. God forbid! I would rather have the bigoted whiteboy for a neighbour than someone called Hernandez… I cannot say what this implies better than eire:
quote:Originally posted by eiregirl:
A double standard is when a rule or principle is applied more strictly to others than to oneself. A double standard is when a standard is applied with more indulgence to one than to another.
It is becoming more and more clear to me, reading this thread, that crime is NOT the REAL reason for this fear of illegal immigration. Let’s move away from crime for a minute, and try examine WHY amnesty for illegal immigrants is being considered by the government:
Amnesty for ‘illegal’ immigration
Why would the government be considering giving amnesty to illegal immigrants? The answer is simple… I have worked in government for some time, and the reason why there are processes and procedures is to establish control. There are different kinds of control, and if one form of control does not work, another form is introduced. By giving amnesty, those already illegally in the country are placed ‘on the books’ so to speak, and can now be controlled, and also taxed. This means more money for the government, and also knowledge about where people are located. This implies improved enforcement capabilities. It is perplexing that the very thing done to address the perceived increased crime rate due to illegal immigrants is viewed as a slap in the face, and that the reason for this unease is given as the crimes committed by the immigramts...? huh?
Other reasons for discomfort with ‘illegal’ immigration
A few other reasons have been mentioned. Firstly, is it about competition for jobs? If the statistics Cat mentions is correct:
quote:Originally posted by MdmPrez:
... . I belong to a national business consortium and there are more jobs in the U.S. than people to fill them. Those jobs are at every level. It is a serious problem......
, then it appears not to be a good reason, because this fact means that there are more than enough jobs for legal citizens, and both legal immigrants and those immigrants that got amnesty.
Secondly, cost. I think there is no contest to the argument that the war in Iraq is costing America WAY MORE than deporting illegal immigrants. Just a little research will provide the details: in 2007, about $170 billion (that is $170,000,000,000.00) on the “War on Terror” alone, while any figures found for controlling immigration are lower by orders of hundreds. By the way, this topic on illegal immigrants has everything to do with the after-effects of 9/11, since the US government changed the structure of government dealing with immigration, where previously it was dealt with by the INS (Immigration and Nationalisation Services) it is now dealt with by Homeland Security. This is supported by the following statement by Eire:
quote:Originally posted by eiregirl:
… if a family of illegal immigrants can cross your border undetected what is to keep a group of terrorists from doing the exact same thing? Ohh wait…they have done that …
In one of these articles, it is shown how the British colonisation of Egypt used the same tactics as is currently used by the US in Iraq. True, no oil is being taken, but the profits from the sale of the oil most certainly end up in American pockets. Refer to http://www.asil.org/insights/insigh114.htm , http://priceofoil.org/thepriceofoil/war-terror/iraqi-oil-law/ and http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/06/14/1866/. Five Nobel Peace Prize winners made the following statement in this respect: "In support of the people of Iraq, we the undersigned Nobel Peace Prize Laureates state our opposition to the Iraq Oil Law. We also oppose the decision of the United States government to require that the Iraq government pass the Oil Law as a condition of continued reconstruction aid in legislation passed on May 24, 2007. A law with the potential to so radically transform the basic economic security of the people of Iraq should not be forced on Iraq while it is under occupation and in such a weak negotiating position vis-à-vis both the U.S. government and foreign oil corporations. The Iraq Oil Law could benefit foreign oil companies at the expense of the Iraqi people, deny the Iraqi people economic security, create greater instability, and move the country further away from peace. The U.S. government should leave the matter of how Iraq will address the future of its oil system to the Iraqi people to be dealt with at a time when they are free from occupation and more able to engage in truly democratic decision-making. It is immoral and illegal to use war and invasion as mechanisms for robbing a people of their vital natural resources."
It is also stated in one of these articles that
“Westerners need to question every basic assumption they hold”
. I cannot agree more. This brings me to what I see as the real reason for the unease with illegal immigrants that I detect here.
People moved around for economic reasons since the beginning of time. Someone mentioned a grandfather’ who was a proud legal immigrant. My girlfriend’s grandfather was born a proud landowner in his own country, and died in the same country, but the land did not belong to his people anymore… it was colonised by the Americans…for economic and military reasons. Did he want this? No. Did he have any choice? No.
There is no difference between ‘colonisation’ and ‘illegal immigration’. Face it, people don’t like people who are different from them. In Hawaii, white Americans are called ‘haole’, meaning ‘without breath’, and the entomology of the word seem to indicate lack of culture. In South Africa, black Africans from other countries are referred to as “makwerekwere’, a word which has the same entomology as ‘barbarian’, meaning it is used to indicate lowness of culture. I think what I am detecting with this unease with illegal immigrants is based in the same deeply internalised xenophobia… Statements such as
quote:Originally posted by MdmPrez:
... I also believe in racial profiling in airports, etc.......
seems to confirm this… and furthermore, I fail to understand how racial profiling will assist in addressing what seems to be a religious threat… (by the way, did someone steal MdmPrez’s account? the woman I came to know and respect as a friend and as a great supporter for human rights, as advocated by Eleanor Roosevelt, namely equality for all races and genders and sexual orientations and religions and creeds?)
Eire, you say the following:
quote:Originally posted by eiregirl:
... I am a very big advocate for peoples rights and will stand behind and argue for anyone who exercises those rights .....
I challenge everyone to think what that statement REALLY means, not only in the context of this topic, and the issues associated with it, but also beyond that, the implications there-of, and to challenge your assumptions, before deciding what is right and wrong...and maybe agree that there is no 'right and wrong, only grey areas in which we have to tread carefully...
Hugs,
~real _________________ .
.
light is to darkness as love is to fear...
Sun Aug 05, 2007 7:23 pm
Landie
Joined: 12 May 2007
Posts: 43
Location: South Africa
Illegal immigrants
Hi there Eire,
Here in my country illegal immigrants are a huge problem. I live in South Africa and we have thousands of Zimbabwean people crossing our border every day. The situation in Zim is going from bad to worse. It as a huge effect on us South Africans. These people often make for very cheap labour increasing our growing rate of unemployment, and when they can't find jobs they turn to crime. Many people think that South Africa has many crimanls, and yeah we do, but alot of our country's crime can be attributed to illegal immigrants.
Apart from the Zimbabweans fleing to our country for food, we also have a huge problem wih Nigergeans. Many of them contribute to our drug problem.
Illegal immigrants really have a huge negative impact on my country's economy and it just contrubutes to poverty. Unfortunately in Africa corruption is the thing that is going to destroy this magnificent continent. Africa's poverty and illegal immigrants are mainly fueld by corruption.
I feel very sorry for the illegal immigrants and refugees of Africa. These people don't leave their countries out of choice, they leave because they have to.
Unfortunately in Africa the white man (woman)'s voice is slowly fading into the backround and we are forced to watch as our continent, our country, and fellow people are being destroyed by arrogant, greedy and power-hungry men.
Illegal immigration is an international problem and in some cases it's unfair to the citizens of that country. But I believe that amnesy is a refuge for many people in need. Those people are people too, just like you and I. Our lives equall in measure. It must be horrible to leave your home in search of a new place to live amongst people who you know hate you. Things are diffrent in a third world country, life is tough, oppertunities few and far between.
I don't think there's an easy answer for illegal immigration. While the gap between the rich and the poor increase this will be a growing problem for many first world countries.
The only thing we can do really is to vote for the right people to lead us.
I say good luck to all the refugees out there, may God bless them and us who have to suffer their burden. _________________ We lose ourselves in the love we give and find ourselves in the love we receive. -me
Thank you very much for joining the conversation and for your thoughts.
“The statement was made that Bush's policies on Iraq were successfully spun to the American public. While this may have been true four years ago, bearing in mind of course, what a divided nation we have become, it isn't true today. Poll after poll shows that the American public is rejecting Bush and his policies. Even his own party has begun to move away from him.”
I have to agree with that. My own thoughts on why we should have or should not have gone into Iraq have no bearing on the current topic.
“So, this man in trouble has turned to the oldest ploy in the book. Find someone relatively powerless to set up as a boogeyman, to take the focus off his own failed administration. Hence, the making of illegal immigration and gay marriage as hot issues. Not only does this--hopefully for him--take some of the heat off his own neck, he can look morally superior while doing it, by inflaming racism and homophobia, but calling it safe borders and family values.”
For some people…a lot of people…it probably is a ploy by the current administration to take some focus off Iraq and the administrations policies there but illegal immigration has been an issue with me and many people like me since before most people knew who Saddam Hussein was let alone George Bush (the current one).
Many people like myself who were legally residing in the United States during the 1980’s when the Immigration Reform Act was passed in 1986 thought we (legal immigrants) might see more benefit from it than we did. It had no or little affect on current legal immigrants at that time.
Does the administration and other advocates for and against illegal immigration inflame racism by trying to apply more focus on this issue? For some people it probably does and that is a sad situation.
I know you did not say anyone is a racist so please do not misunderstand or misinterpret what I am about to say. My following statement is not directed toward you or anyone here at Mels.
To say a person is a racist simply because they have a problem with illegal immigrants is not only very untrue it is also unfair and inflaming in itself. I say that because there have been people who call anyone who has a problem with illegal immigration (which includes me) a racist because of our (my) opinions on illegal immigration and if anyone would like to piss me off…that is one way to do it. Are there people who are racists that have a problem with illegal immigration? Of course there are but to lay down a blanket statement that promotes the opinion that all who have an issue with illegal immigration are racist is not only unfair but totally untrue and in my opinion anyone who does lay down such a statement is a bigot.
smart, I thank you again for contributing to this topic and hope you continue to do so.
Hugs,
Eiregirl _________________ All poems and stories posted by Eiregirl are
Copyright 2005 - 2008 Aoibhegréine
These literary works are my property under copyright. If you wish to use my work for any purpose please ASK FIRST.
Sun Aug 05, 2007 7:42 pm
Start Over
Joined: 02 Nov 2005
Posts: 222
Location: Somewhere in the cosmos
Wow, I love this discussion
There is nothing more that pisses me off about illegal immigration than what Eire brought up—those that should have been deported that commit crimes that changes someone's (and their families) life forever.
One strike and your out, in my opinion, is the only way to keep illegals from harming other people when there is no reason why they shouldn't have been deported in the first place. The reason why they aren't? Politicians don't give a crap and, quite frankly, would only start if one of their family members were raped, murdered, assaulted, or some other such thing.
Also, I'm very sick of people just throwing out the 'racist' remark whenever they hear something that they don't like. It serves no purpose other than to halt debate. It is a very heavy word and one should not use it unless they are absolutely sure it's true. I have no problem with legal immigrants—in fact one of them I consider a friend (Eire). My problem stems from coming here illegally, and then demanding welfare, etc. And also from breaking the law immediately by crossing the border in the first place. And honoring your heritage is fine—my problem is when they refuse to learn the language that the majority of Amercans use, and demand 'bilingual' education, ballots, etc. If you want to speak Spanish at home, fine. But when you talk to me I don't wanna hear it. And I don't want an interpreter to have to translate for me.
Thank you for that excellent post and the information about illegal immigration in South Africa.
"Eire said that she feels uncomfortable with general amnesty given to illegal immigrants, and the reasons she gives for this is because her parents had to follow the legal route, and because she is afraid that her family will be affected by a crime committed by an illegal immigrant."
I guess you could say I am uncomfortable with “amnesty” but I think I said that I do not agree with it and outright do not like the idea of it. No…I never said “amnesty” had anything to do with crime but I have said (in a round about way) illegal immigration does bring a criminal element along with it. I have even said that there are some good arguments for “amnesty” but I will reiterate that I do not like it nor do I agree with the concept of “amnesty” in any form.
“Between 2,000 and 3,000 Zimbabweans are now crossing the northern border into South Africa every night to escape the deepening social and economic crisis in their country. Those caught are deported back, only to return a few nights later. There are more than 20% of the total population of Zimbabweans currently in South Africa. The problem of illegal immigration of Zimbabweans into South Africa is much worse than the problem of illegal immigrants into the USA. My thoughts? Instead of deporting these people, they should be assisted in ‘refugee camps’, where they should be supported to find employment where their skills can best be utilised, and once their country is stable again, they could be given a choice to become South African citizens, or to go back to rebuilt their country. In this manner, there will be record of where they work and live, and they will not need to resort to crime to just stay alive”
There are between 1 million to 1.5 million illegal immigrants caught…I repeat…caught and returned to their respective countries every year in the United States. The number of illegal immigrants that cross the borders of the United States every year are truly unknown but it is suspected that there is at the very least an equal number of illegal immigrants entering the country every single year that are not caught. There are many people who think and believe the number of illegal immigrants crossing the borders are 5 times greater than the number of those caught.
Refugee camps…support them…find them jobs…let them stay if they want. A noble concept.
You said that between 2,000 and 3,000 Zimbabweans cross your border everyday. I assume that is the number of those that are caught because you cannot truly know the numbers that are not but lets assume that it is 2,500 a day that are not caught. That would be over 900,000 people added to your population every year by illegal immigration. What would happen if you opened your borders and allowed anyone who wanted to come and live in “refugee camps” under the assumption that they would be assimilated into your society? If that was the case then you could take that 900,000 and multiply it by more than 10 within the first year. Or perhaps you would only allow certain people or a certain number of people into these camps. Maybe you would allow only people from certain countries or only people from the continent of Africa but then you could look at that 900,000 and dream of the past when 900,000 was all you had to think about. In many cases refugee camps are set up for people who are looking to escape war and genocide and that is a very different cause and effect.
Would you have the United States set up refugee camps? Can you imagine the number of people who would be lining up to get into those camps? There would be tens of millions if not hundreds of millions coming from all over the world. All would need us to house them, clothe them, feed them, provide them with healthcare and education. You would have us set up refugee camps just so we could know where the ones who wish to stay in the camps are? What about the ones who do not want to wait in the camp until a job is found? What about the ones that jobs cannot be found for and do not want to return to their home countries. How long do we hold them before we force them to go back or let them into society jobless and homeless?
Records of where they work and live…LOL
Aside from those who cross the border illegally there are also those who cross legally and then drop off the map. That number is much smaller than the illegal border crossers but that is no different than your refugee camp concept of holding them in a camp, finding them a job and then letting them into society only to later drop off the face of the earth.
Refugee camp or not with the exception of having to house them, feed them, clothe them, provide an education for the children and provide free medical care for them the overall process would be no different than it is now. But the costs everyone is talking about would be astronomical.
You said,
“using crime as the reason why illegal immigrants should not be allowed amnesty would be a gross oversimplification of the reasons why people become criminal.”
I know you are not saying that I’m using crime as a reason not to allow amnesty. I am not. It is one of many reasons I think the government should do all it can to stop illegal immigration. Also not allowing amnesty has no bearing whatsoever on who becomes criminal and who does not. In some cases the criminal activity is gang related and/or related to drug trafficking by illegal immigrants. And yes before anyone says “well Americans do it to Americans also” I am not stupid. I KNOW THEY DO. My point is that if we can reduce or stop criminal activity by illegal immigrants by stopping them from entering the country then we should do it period.
“Which country has the highest number of serial killers as a percentage of their total population? According to most sources, it is the USA, and of these serial killers, most are legal American citizens.”
Serial killers, murders, rapists etc. yes America has them and yes they are American and they kill and commit other crimes against other Americans and you are not the first to have mentioned this I have said it and so have others but that does not negate the point that illegal immigrants commit those crimes as well and that does not negate the point that many people would not have suffered at their hands if they had been stopped at the border. That is a fact.
Amnesty…hmmm
As I said before and will never deny…there are some good arguments for “amnesty” but I still do not like the idea of giving illegal immigrants a free pass toward citizenship.
Even when a country grants amnesty for illegal immigrants not all of them will step forward and be counted and the granting of amnesty will not stop others from immigrating illegally. The United States granted amnesty to illegal immigrants in the 1980’s and had the chance then to stem the tide of illegal immigration by securing the borders but they did little to nothing. Now some in government would do it all again and there are those in society who think it would be a great idea. Personally I don’t like the idea…never have and never will and most of those reasons are personal. All I ask of the government is that before doing anything else prove to me that the borders can be as secure as possible and at the moment it is very clear they have little to no intention of doing all that is needed to secure the borders. Will the borders ever be completely secure? No but everything that can be done needs to be done and right now it is not being done. I think amnesty actually helped increase illegal immigration. 2.7 million people received legal resident status from 1986 to the early 1990's as a direct result of the amnesties contained in the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986. Due to the amnesties of the Immigration Reform and Control Act there have been suggestions from independent studies and INS reports that this Act has caused an increase in illegal immigration since its inception.
Jobs…
Well unemployment has been in the mid 4% range since the last quarter of 2006 giving America about 7 million unemployed people. This percentage of unemployment is expected to remain in the mid 4% range for the remainder of 2007 and could possibly drop to the low 4% range before the end of the year.
Mdm mentioned that there are more jobs in America than there are people to fill them. In some cases that is true. There are some skilled and professional positions available that need to be filled but until there are people here trained or educated to fill those positions America does not have the people to fill them. It is the highly skilled and professional jobs that in the future will be hurting the most because currently there are not enough people going into certain professions such as the biotech industry and other hi-tech fields.
If you looked at it from the perspective of the number of people of working age to the number of jobs in America then Mdm would be wrong but looking at it from the perspective of skills to jobs then Mdm is correct. There are some area’s were there are too many people for the number of available jobs in that particular field just as there are some where there are not enough people to fill certain kinds of jobs because they do not have the training or skills to do the work.
Most of the illegal immigrants are not here looking for those types of jobs (hi-tech high skilled professional). The majority are here looking for the unskilled and manual labor type jobs.
Cost…
As I have mentioned several times…to me Iraq has no bearing on this discussion and the financial cost are not that great of an issue for me either. That does not mean financial costs are not an issue for me it is just not the major issue for me but since everyone seems to like tossing around dollar signs here are some for you to toss around.
I hope you are comfortable with the 170 billion dollar cost that has been mentioned for what it costs the American taxpayer to have troops in Iraq because from the numbers I am currently compiling about the cost of illegal immigration that is about 30 billion dollars less than what it costs Americans every year due to illegal immigration and those costs are wide ranging and cover everything from costs to cities, counties, states and the federal government in the areas of education, healthcare, incarceration, judicial costs, law enforcement costs, insurance costs, costs to individuals, lost tax revenue and the list goes on and on and I have not even come close to adding all the dollar signs up and I am well over 100 billion and if I keep digging I am certain I will reach 200 billion. I am sure just about everyone who reads this will like an entire break down of those numbers related to illegal immigration so I will endeavor to provide them once I have them compiled. The cost to the American taxpayer for being in Iraq is much easier and clear cut than the cost of illegal immigration. Why? Well that is very simple. Illegal immigrants are behind the scenes…hiding in the shadows so the entire cost to the American taxpayer for illegal immigrants will not and can not be entirely known so some of the numbers will be estimates and some will be ambiguous. Some of the financial costs will be a few years old because in some cases the costs are hard to find. The easiest numbers to track down are the healthcare, educational and incarceration costs. So for now…while I continue to compile numbers that are as current as I can find but until then I will discuss a study I found a while ago on the cost of illegal immigration to the American taxpayer.
This study deals exclusively with 24 border counties along the United States – Mexico border. This is the kind of stuff I have to read through to compile my figures because I want them to be as accurate as possible. If you think I do not trust all the numbers I run across on the internet you would be correct…that is why I read stuff like this.
There was a study performed by The U.S.- Mexico Border Counties Coalition which brought together four researchers. Nadia Rubaii-Barrett, the director of New Mexico State University master of public administration program. Tanis J. Salant, of the University of Arizona's department of public administration, the study's principal investigator; Christine Brenner, of the University of Texas-El Paso's political science department; and John R. Weeks, of San Diego State University's geography department.
“In Luna County, N.M., the poorly funded ambulance service of the small town of Columbus is frequently called to the nearby United States-Mexico Port of Entry to pick up sick or injured Mexican citizens who have arrived from across the border and carry them to the privately owned Mimbres Memorial Hospital in Deming, about 30 miles away.
Once the patients have been treated, the Luna County Sheriff's Office is called to take them back from Deming to the Columbus Port of Entry, where they are returned across the border. The number of the ambulance calls rose approximately 20 percent between 1998 and 1999, but 76 percent of the bills for the service remain uncollected write-offs, said New Mexico State University’s Nadia Rubaii-Barrett, one of four authors of a study on the costs to U.S. border counties of handling illegal immigrants from Mexico.
In 1999, Luna County's total cost for law enforcement, criminal justice and emergency medical services related to undocumented persons was $943,000, and of this it was reimbursed $8,000 from the federal government, approximately 0.8 percent. The federal law that provided the reimbursement covers part of the expense of detaining criminal illegal immigrants, but doesn't cover ambulance service or hospital costs, Rubaii-Barrett said.
Hidalgo County, one of the most sparsely populated counties in New Mexico, spent approximately $485,000 in 1999 in law enforcement, court costs or emergency medical services connected with illegal immigrants, but was reimbursed only 0.5 percent of its costs by the federal government, Rubaii-Barrett said.
Dona Ana County is more urbanized than either of the other two New Mexico border counties and its costs of handling illegal immigrants are more evenly spread among detention services, emergency medical and indigent health care. It spent $3.2 million in 1999 to provide legal, judicial and emergency services to illegal immigrants, but recovered only 12 percent of those costs from the federal government, Rubaii-Barrett said.
The study, released Feb. 2 and 3 (2001) by the United States-Mexico Border Counties Coalition, a coalition of county government officials from California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas, says that, in all four states, counties on the U.S.-Mexico border are paying a disproportionate share of the costs of illegal immigration from Mexico and deserve increased financial help from the federal government, Rubaii-Barrett said.
Between them Dona Ana, Hidalgo and Luna counties spent $4.7 million in 1999 -- the fiscal year covered by the study -- to detain illegal immigrants in jail, to process them through county judicial systems and to provide emergency medical and indigent health care, Rubaii-Barrett said. This compares with $23 million spent by border counties in Texas, $24 million in Arizona and $43 million in California, according to the study.
But, Rubaii-Barrett notes, the impact on individual taxpayers in the New Mexico counties is actually higher than in any of the other border states. The cost per capita in New Mexico's three counties was $23.45, while in Texas the per capita cost was $12, in Arizona it was $22 and in California it was $19, she said.
Hidalgo County incurred the second highest per capita burden on any of the 24 counties studied, at $80.50 per person for each of its 6,000 residents, she said.
"The burden is falling on the poorest counties, which can least afford it. They either have to cut services or raise taxes to cover the costs of what we think is a federal government responsibility," she said.
Rubaii-Barrett said some members of Congress recognize the counties are suffering and have initiated steps to lessen the burden. Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., the author of the 1995 State Criminal Alien Assistance Program (SCAAP) law, which partially repays county detention facilities for holding criminal illegal immigrants, has authored a new bill, SCAAP-II, to expand the payments to the costs of prosecution, as well. The bill is co- sponsored by all senators from the four border states, including Sens. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., and Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M.
Sens. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, have co-authored a bill to increase the number of federal district judges in border states. Rep. Silvestre Reyes, D-Texas, has introduced a bill to distribute $25 million a year to border counties to help offset the cost of medical services to undocumented persons. Also, the current federal budget earmarks $300,000 for the U.S.-Mexico Border Counties Coalition to study health care costs along the border, she said.
But, she added, more reforms are needed.
"One of the reasons the payments from SCAAP have been so low is that its payment formula has less to do with the number of undocumented persons held in a county's detention center, than with the population of the county. As a result, the bulk of SCAAP's payments are going to places like New York City, Chicago and Los Angeles," she said.
She added that the federal government should also consider giving more funding to states affected by illegal immigration. One limitation of the current study, she said, is that it concentrates on counties that are in direct proximity to the border, yet other counties are also affected.
"When a van containing 17 illegal immigrants crashed on Interstate 40 east of Albuquerque killing 13 people, it placed a burden on state and local law enforcement and health care systems in Bernalillo County, more than 200 miles from the border," she said.”
Note...A more recent report from the border counties coalition is forthcoming within the next few months.
Just in the counties of this study which deals with emergency medical care and the associated transportation costs the costs reaches well over 200 million dollars…just 24 counties. I wonder what I will end up with when I finish collecting my data from all over the United States…I already know it will be well over 100 billion and probably close to 200 billion.
Everyone keeps defending illegal immigration and nobody has come out and said it yet so I will keep people from beating around the bush anymore and say it. It seems to me that everyone who defends illegal immigration feels that America and all countries should just open there borders and allow anyone who wants to come in to come. If that is how anyone who reads this feels then just come out and say it then defend your opinion. I for one do not have that point of view…which is obvious. Tell me and convince me how it can be done without destroying the country both economically and culturally while also providing a level of security.
Yes I said the following
“I am a very big advocate for peoples rights and will stand behind and argue for anyone who exercises those rights…”
I also said “…just as I would for anyone who immigrates legally and in some cases even for those who do it illegally but those cases will be very few and very dependent on what the situation is that made them be an illegal immigrant.”
I am very adamant about the rights people have. In some cases those rights are clear cut and black and white while in some instances they fall into grey areas. I know what the above statement REALLY means to me…what does it mean to you?
Hugs you tight mmmmmm
Eiregirl _________________ All poems and stories posted by Eiregirl are
Copyright 2005 - 2008 Aoibhegréine
These literary works are my property under copyright. If you wish to use my work for any purpose please ASK FIRST.
Mon Aug 06, 2007 8:39 am
Mdm Prez
Joined: 19 May 2005
Posts: 1536
Location: U.S. of A.
real
Mdm Prez: "I also believe in racial profiling in airports, etc..."
real: "...I fail to understand how racial profiling will assist in addressing what seems to be a religious threat...(by the way, did someone steal Mdm Prez's account? the woman I came to know and respect as a friend and as a great supporter for human rights, as advocated by Eleanor Roosevelt, namely equality for all races and genders and sexual orientations and religions and creeds?)"
real, you have crossed the line here by making this personal. How dare you question whether I'm a 'great supporter of human rights', HOW DARE YOU!
You have made a malicious, abusive attack against the core of who I am, my values, my morals. It is slanderous and hurtful.
Yes, real, I am the same person as you knew before. I am not a racist nor a religious bigot, as you infer and I will not defend myself to you.
I do not believe this site is intended to defame or calumniate each other. It is veering way off track by your comments.
Mdm Prez
N.B. To Admins and Mods, I respectfully request you DO NOT lock this thread. It is important for all to see.
_________________ If you're not getting the answers you want,
you're not asking the right questions.
Tue Aug 14, 2007 1:54 pm
Hawaiian
Joined: 01 Dec 2005
Posts: 816
Location: Transplanted to Africa
Now wait one second Mdm
Sit down, take a deep breath, calm down.
This is the debate forum, but more than that we challenge, question, argue and even occasionally anger each other. It is regrettable that you have perceived any manner of personal attack.
Real didn't question whether you are a supporter of human rights, she knows from prior threads and conversations. She was questioning your belief in racial profiling...prodding you to defend THAT belief. (I would have liked to see that response too, as a person who is vehemently against racial profiling.)
The personal attack just came from you. I've re-read this entire thread, and it's you that's made this personal by 1) publicly posting your hurt and anger instead of PMing Real to ask for an explanation or retraction 2) resorting to name calling (not only in this thread but in a couple of others well).
Defend your beliefs, but please don't post this kind of rubbish again.
~Miki _________________ 'A'a i ka hula, e waiho i ka hilahila i ka hale.
Dare to dance, leave your shyness at home.
Tue Aug 14, 2007 3:46 pm
Mdm Prez
Joined: 19 May 2005
Posts: 1536
Location: U.S. of A.
miki
First of all, I am sitting and I am and have been calm.
Secondly, I did not make this personal. Her response is directed to me. By responding in this format rather than PMg, frankly I didn't think there were rules regarding that. Asking for an explanation or retraction is not something I'm interested in. I read it, digested it, and made a conclusion.
Thirdly, a healthy debate or discussion is respectful of one's opinion, even while offering a differing one.
As far as name calling, it's not usually my style. I, too, have just read this entire thread, and see nowhere that I've called someone a name. But prove me wrong if you choose.
And, if you think my post is rubbish, I guess that speaks to the issue of, once again, respecting one's feelings and opinions.
Mdm Prez _________________ If you're not getting the answers you want,
you're not asking the right questions.
A lot of people keep talking about financial costs and pointing to what it is costing America to be in Iraq and how that costs more than illegal immigration. I have tried to avoid this but since everyone people I talk to about this (not just here) seem to like focusing on money instead of having secure borders and reducing the criminal aspects of illegal immigration…especially in relation to violent crimes. So for the last week or so I have been doing some digging now lets take a closer look at money.
The primary focus of this post will be on 3 areas. Education, healthcare and incarceration. I know as well as anyone that there is absolutely no way to pin any absolutely accurate figure on the financial costs of illegal immigration as a whole and if anyone tries to say differently…well they would be wrong. For the most part illegal immigrants live outside the zones of the number crunchers. The most accurate numbers will come from what it costs to incarcerate illegal immigrants…well we have then behind bars so we know more about what the costs are and who they are but even those numbers are not totally accurate. We have some idea of the costs to educate illegal immigrants but those numbers are vague because not all illegal immigrants in schools are documented as illegal immigrants and most schools do not ask the question but in some states that is changing. The cost of healthcare for illegal immigrants is also shadowy but more and more hospitals have started noting who is illegal and who is not because the federal government has allocated some money for taking care of them. Other areas will also be discussed. In many instances I will focus on some individual states, counties and towns but for the most part I will remain in the areas of education, healthcare and incarceration.
Now I want to make it perfectly clear (again) that some of the information I was able to gather does not and cannot be 100% accurate for the very reasons I have stated many times…illegal immigrants for the most part are behind the scenes and off the radar scope. There is absolutely no way to nail down specific totals because there is no comprehensive accurate data. Many of the people who performed the studies I will use admit that they intentionally used bottom of the scale numbers for that very fact. In the area of education many of the studies include children born in the United States to illegal immigrants and not just illegal immigrant children.
A lot of people keep tossing around numbers between $10 billion to $20 billion as being the cost to the America (in other words the taxpayers) annually for illegal immigration. Hmm cough cough BS cough cough. Most people don’t believe what the government tells them on anything else so why believe them now. Well I don’t believe that number and for very good reason…I checked. 20 billion dollars would NOT cover what it costs California every single year and would not even cover the low end of the estimated costs for educating the children.
Since the 1990’s there have been a few studies performed on the affects of illegal immigration on local communities, states and in some respects the federal government but most deal primarily with border states and communities. All of these studies come to the conclusion that there is a major impact and cost to the taxpayers. Recognizing the affects of illegal immigration led to these studies being performed and in turn led to many states and communities suing the federal government for compensation which ultimately led to congress adopting programs that moderately compensate states and communities for some of the costs in the area’s of incarceration, education and emergency medical care for illegal immigrants.
The most recent studies that I have currently found, other than a few states conducting studies of their own, have been conducted by the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) which has issued fiscal cost studies for California, Arizona, Texas and Florida looking at the same cost factors studied by the Urban Institute in the 1990’s in the areas of education, emergency medical care and incarceration. These studies were done in 2004 and 2005 so those numbers would be higher today mostly based on 2001 to 2003 numbers. The Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) has also conducted some studies relating to the cost of illegal immigration in 2004 based mainly on 2001 to 2003 numbers. Other studies have been conducted by various organizations and in some cases they simply cite figures from the studies conducted by the Urban Institute in the 1990’s, by FAIR or CIS. Some universities, individual communities or counties have conducted illegal immigration impact studies. What I have found so far? Read on…
Education
What does education cost?
From the department of education I found that in 2005 the United States Department of Education budget request for discretionary spending was $57.3 billion. In 2006 $56 billion. In 2007 $54.4 billion and for 2008 the request is $56 billion.
In 2006 (the latest actual figures) the United States Department of Education paid the states a grand total of $34,303,212,040.00 (Funds for State Formula-Allocated and Selected Student Aid Programs U.S. Department of Education Funding) www.ed.gov
That is a lot of money but it is less than ten percent of the actual cost to educate children in the United States from kindergarten to the twelfth grade but we will get to that later…lets move on.
Cost estimates can be determined by using the per pupil cost expenditures provided by the U.S. Department of Education and/or the individual state Departments of Education and multiplying that by the number of illegal immigrant children determined by…estimates.
These costs do not include costs of providing English as a second language or bilingual education programs and other programs such as extracurricular programs. In some cases the extracurricular programs are paid for by individual schools, school districts, fund raising or by the parents. Those costs would take me far to long to find, document and verify (to the best of my ability) so if you want to look them up…get to it and please get back to me in ohh a year or two with your preliminary findings.
This will be a constant reminder throughout this post. There is currently absolutely no way to determine with 100% accuracy exactly how many students in the United States are illegal immigrants. Generally the estimates for all of my figures on illegal immigrants and the cost associated that I use will be low to mid-range estimates based on literally hundreds of documents, articles, studies and reports that I have read and many of those are 2 to 5 years old.
According to Michael Fix and Jeffrey Passel, "U.S. Immigration-Trends and Implications for Schools," Immigration Studies Program, The Urban Institute, 2003. There are 1.5 million school aged illegal immigrants in the United States and 2 million school aged children born to illegal immigrants.
In 2004 the average cost per student in public schools was $8,287. In 2005 that went up to $,8,701 per student. In 2005 the state that spent the most was New York at $14,199 per student and the state that spent the least was Utah at $5,257 per student. My math tells me that is over 13 billion dollars at 2005 costs for an estimated 1.5 million students…using 2003 figures for school aged illegal immigrants. Using the same 2003 and 2005 figures the 2 million school aged children born to illegal immigrants cost over 17 billion dollars. We are already over 30 billion dollars and this is just the figures for cost of education using dated numbers…but it is hard to find any reliable current figures…unreliable ones are easy to find so we will skip those.
Now the above figures are based on average cost which in this case will slightly inflate the total cost so to be fair we will go with the following costs which are not that much lower.
In her Testimony Submitted to the House Judiciary Subcommittee Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security and International Law Deborah A. Santiago Vice President for Policy and Research said the following.
“a FAIR study estimated that the cost of educating unauthorized immigrant K-12 students nationally was almost $12 billion, and for U.S.-born children of unauthorized immigrants $17 billion in 2004. The report calculates taxpayer costs between $581million and $756 million for in-state tuition discounts by states to unauthorized immigrants for college in 2004. A similar study conducted by the Center for Immigration Studies in 2004 concluded that illegal immigrants cost the federal government $10 billion more than they pay in taxes. The bulk of these reports, and others, confirm that state and local governments experience more costs than benefits for educating immigrants in a single-period.”
To me that looks like a $27 billion to $29 billion expenditure.
I wonder what the costs to the states will show us in the realm of education. In 2006 the federal government funded $34,303,212,040.00 in education costs to the states and its territories. This money is used to reimburse the states for costs of educating the children in the United States but it does not cover the entire cost so the states have to pick up any cost above what they are given by the federal government. Lets see what that cost is for illegal immigrants.
Utah spends at least $55 million annually to educate illegal immigrants. (report to Utah legislature)
California spends $8 billion to 9 billion annually, after collecting whatever taxes the illegal immigrants pay, on the education of illegal immigrants and that number gets higher every year.
New York spends $5.1 billion annually to educated children of illegal immigrants. Oh and umm New York only collects about 735 million dollars in taxes from illegal immigrants to offset some of that cost. (New York Times)
Illinois Spends over $3 billion annually to educate illegal immigrants. (University of Illinois)
New Jersey spends over 1.5 billion annually to educate illegal immigrants. (FAIR)
Texas spends $2 billion to $5 billion dollars annually. (reports vary widely ranging from 1.5 billion to 5.2 billion)
Florida spends more than $4 billion annually. (University of Florida)
Wow…
Did you know that the federal government only pays around 10% of the education budget for the states with some of the reports stating the average being 8.5%. We will go with 10%…it’s a nice round number. Some states get less than 10% while others get more…Oregon for example gets 10.6% and that number comes from the Oregon Department of Education. The individual states and communities pick up the remaining approximate percentage by state and local taxes with that percentage being around 90%. In some states the state lottery funds some of the education budget for schools. The national center for Education statistics states in their report for the 2003-2004 school year that the United States as a whole spent $473,862,737,000.00 on primary and secondary school education.
What does this tell me…I looked at these numbers and said to myself, “This does not add up. Something has to be wrong. The cost figures for the education of illegal immigrants and the children of illegal immigrants takes almost all of the federal budget for education. Something just does not make sense to me.” So I dug deeper and found…nothing different even using low end numbers the cost is staggering. Then I remembered…the federal government only pays about 10% of the education budget of each state. The states and communities pick up the major portion of the bill for education. I am not going to list every single state and the cost of education for illegal immigrant children. Just the 8 states listed above total $23,655,000,000. Lets just go with the FAIR statistics and say $27 billion. That is the extreme low end…very low end.
I will continue my research in this area and I am sure I can find at least another 10 billion dollars easy and probably more depending on just how far I want to dig.
Here is a good example of how these costs keep growing higher and higher every year. In 2002 it cost Georgia $231 million dollars to educate children of illegal immigrants. 3 years later in 2005 it cost Georgia of $900 million dollars. In 2007 I would not be surprised if that cost climbs to well over $1 billion.
Like I said I am not going to list every states budget for education. If you want to do that…hop to it.
At the moment we have $27 billion + and this is just for education…time to move on…I will keep digging here and if you wish to refute the numbers…please do but I can promise you that I barely scratched the surface of what it costs for education. The current cost is at the very least $30 billion and probably over $40 billion and still climbing. For this discussion however I will stick with the low end number just to be very conservative. I know there will be people saying, “but with over $400 billion dollars spent nation wide on education $27 billion is nothing…just a drop in the bucket”…yeah right whatever.
NOTE: PLEASE IF ANYONE READING THIS FINDS ANY INACCURACIES PLEASE LET ME KNOW AND EVERYONE KNOW BY POSTING A REPLY
Healthcare
What about healthcare costs? What impact does illegal immigration have on healthcare?
Those are very good questions that deserve answers. Before we get to looking at any answers let me ask a question. Do you have insurance? Has your health insurance been increasing higher and higher…guess what…some of those higher costs for insurance are due to paying the free healthcare many illegal immigrants receive. While this is a fact it is only a small part of the total cost illegal immigrants pose to the healthcare system. The major cost in my personal opinion is in the article below that I ask everyone to please read.
I was at the Library doing some research for this post when I came across an article in the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons written by Madeline Cosman Phd.
When I got home I found the article online and would ask that you please read the entire article…I am sure you will find it interesting and I know some of you will find it disturbing. Please read it.
http://www.jpands.org/vol10no1/cosman.pdf
Here is an excerpt from the article, “Every legal immigrant before 1924 was examined for infectious diseases upon arrival and tested for tuberculosis. Anyone infected was shipped back to the old country. That was powerful incentive for each newcomer to make heroic efforts to appear healthy. Today, immigrants must demonstrate that they are free of communicable diseases and drug addiction to qualify for lawful permanent residency green cards. Illegal aliens simply cross our borders medically unexamined, hiding in their bodies any number of communicable diseases.”
This is the kind of costs that absolutely cannot be totally documented or even estimated with any determinable accuracy but there is no doubt in my mind that it is astronomical and poses astronomical threats to the health of everyone.
“Medicaid, unlike hospitals, does try to separately account for illegal-immigrant care. Spending on such care in North Carolina doubled from $25.8 million in 2000 to $52.8 million in 2005, according to the N.C. Division of Medical Assistance, the state's Medicaid manager.” Staff writer Jean P. Fisher for the NewsObserver.
We could easily assume that the 2006 costs were $60 million if not more and this is ONLY what they were reimbursed for by Medicaid. I have been unable at the moment to find any reliable information on the un-reimbursed costs.
In the Medicare Prescription Drug Improvement and Modification Act of 2003 (MMA), $250 million per year for fiscal years 2005 to 2008 was made available to reimburse the cost of treating illegal immigrants medical costs…well some of those costs. Two hundred and fifty million dollars a year is only a drop in the bucket and would not even cover “today’s” cost to the 24 counties mentioned in a study performed by The U.S.- Mexico Border Counties Coalition (you can read about it in my previous post). Who has to absorb the costs above and beyond that $250 million? The states, the counties, the towns, the hospitals and care providers which all leads back to who? The taxpayer and on top of that if a person pay taxes and has health insurance they get hit twice. I will admit that many illegal immigrants have some form of health insurance (mainly through their employer) but sadly that is less than half.
Nico Gomez the director of communications for the Oklahoma healthcare authority stated:
“In FY 2005, Oklahoma spent $7.8 million on emergency health needs for illegal
immigrants, which are federally protected benefits for all persons regardless of immigration
status.
More than 80 percent of that money was spent on labor and delivery costs.
Oklahoma will spend approximately $9 million of its allotted $3 billion Medicaid money on
approximately 4,450 illegal immigrants in FY 2006, but this expenditure will also go toward
emergency services and labor costs.
At least 83 percent of the $9 million will pay for labor and delivery costs.
The estimated Medicaid cost for illegal immigrants is 0.6 percent of the total Oklahoma will
spend on its poor.” Report on the task force for illegal immigration issues for the state of Oklahoma.
9 million dollars does not seem like much does it…but that is only a drop in a bucket that is getting fuller and fuller with each drop.
In California alone in the last 10 years, more than 70 hospitals have closed their doors, 11 of them since 2004, and most of those were primarily in the greater Los Angeles area. Part of the reason is that they simply could not absorb all the un-reimbursed costs of medical care they were forced to provide. This highly degrades the medical care in those communities and also adds to the unemployment in the region which further impacts the economy of the region. Is the reason for these hospitals closing their doors entirely due to illegal immigrants? Of course not but this is a major factor for many hospitals across the country in border states and especially in border counties and towns. This leads to many unknown costs that simply cannot be determined or directly attributed to illegal immigrants because there is no paper trail to follow.
On top of the hospital closings the state of California has spent close to 1 billion dollars annually and for 2006 the cost was over $700,000,000 for the healthcare of illegal immigrants and for 2007 the costs will be back up to between $1,000,000,000 and $1,500,000,000.
According to the Arizona Hospital and Health care Association Arizona hospitals spend $150 million annually to provide care to illegal immigrants.
According to a congressional field hearing on immigration's effects, Tennessee's TennCare has spent over $15 million on emergency care for illegal immigrants in 2006.
By law, hospitals must provide emergency medical service to illegal immigrants regardless of their ability to pay. What does this mean? It means hospitals such as Vanderbilt Universcity Medical Center absorbs nearly 4 million dollars a year in medical expenses treating illegal immigrants.
In 2005 Los Angeles hospitals reported and annual loss of $350 million dollars. The New Jersey Hospital association reports losing $200 million a year treating illegal immigrants in New Jersey hospitals.
The total cost for medical care provided to illegal immigrants at Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas Texas is 21 million dollars every year.
I could keep listing hospital after hospital and hundreds of thousands and millions of dollars each of them lose every year just to treat illegal immigrants emergency needs. I will admit that I have found several reports that show different numbers for costs such as the New Jersey report above…I found one that said $250 million and the Parkland cost reporting $22 million.
With just what I have mentioned so far on the cost of healthcare for illegal immigrants the “popular” numbers reported of just over $1 billion dollars annually gets smothered by California alone without even mentioning the total costs spent in Illinois, Texas or Florida…yet.
In 2002 a study the Florida Hospital Association estimated that uninsured non-citizens cost the state's hospitals an average of $63,612 per patient.
FAIR estimates Illinois will spend $340 million dollars annually on illegal immigrant healthcare.
I could keep listing the costs to the states, counties, towns and individual hospitals but that will take time and I am already on page 6 of the post.
The question is…how can anyone make such determinations about what it costs Americans for the healthcare of illegal immigrants? You cannot nail it down to a good solid figure…THAT IS ONE OF THE REASONS I DID NOT WANT TO GET INTO THE FINACIAL COST ASPECT OF THIS DISCUSSION. A person could say it only costs 200 million, 1 billion or 10 billion dollars every year but there is no clear documentation for the medical care of all uninsured illegal immigrants who seek medical attention at taxpayer expense. It can only be estimated. The fact is the federal government pays out very little to compensate for the healthcare costs associated with illegal immigrants and forces the states, counties, towns etc. to pick up the tab that totals into the billions of dollars every year.
In the big picture how much does it cost America every year for the healthcare of illegal immigrants?
When everything is brought together and the numbers are crunched most studies conclude that the total cost to Americans in the area of emergency medical care is between 1 and 5 billion dollars but when you start looking through these studies and adding up the costs to individual states you get different numbers when it is all added up. When you look at costs to counties and individual hospitals you get another set of numbers and it just makes you want to throw your hands in the air and scream because you cannot get all the numbers to equal. The reason for that is because the federal government only pays out a certain amount for the healthcare of illegal immigrants then the states will pay out a little more to help cover costs then the counties will cover some costs (mainly for county hospitals only) then the city will cover some costs (mainly in larger cities). Finally there are the costs that the hospitals have to absorb which in the end are eaten by people with insurance in the form of higher premiums. In addition to this there are other costs such as emergency transportation.
What is the total cost for illegal immigrant healthcare? Unknown. There are just to many variables and to many numbers that do not fit together. There are just to many hospitals that do not and will not ask if the patient is an undocumented immigrant. From all that I have looked at if I had to make a guess I would say it is between $10 billion and $15 billion a year. For this discussion however I will go with the midrange documented numbers and say 2.5 billion dollars. That is the cost for emergency medical care only.
A lot of people will argue that everyone is entitled to basic rights and while that is true and I will not argue against that and I AM NOT so if anyone dares say I am they better be ready to defend that claim. My argument is against illegal immigration. If anyone wants to make this about something other than illegal immigration start a new thread. In my opinion they could get that medical attention in the country they illegally came from. Michael Moore seems to think Cuba has such a great medical system…let them go there and he can go with them.
Oh by the way…if you go to other countries and get sick then have to go to the hospital…who pays? Who pays if you are in that country illegally?
Incarceration of criminal aliens (I will not even call them illegal immigrants here because these people do not even deserve that)
As I stated at the beginning of this…the numbers for incarceration would be the most accurate numbers but even here they are not totally accurate. Here is an example why:
“AB 1081 would require the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to enter into a memorandum of understanding with Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) as outlined in Section 287 (g) of the Immigration and Nationality Act. Section 287 (g) authorizes ICE agents to train corrections officers on how to work cooperatively with federal immigration officials to identify illegal immigrants in our prisons and forward their information along to the federal government for deportation.
“California has no idea how much the total price tag of incarceration because we don’t know how many criminals illegal immigrants are in our prisons,” said Garrick “If we can’t accurately count the number of criminal illegal immigrants and determine the total costs, how can we properly bill the federal government for reimbursement?” continued Garrick.
This program is already in place on the state level in Florida, Alabama and Arizona. In California, we have four counties- Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino that have trained officers under the 287 (g) program. Since October 2006, over 4,600 criminal illegal immigrants have been identified.”
For fiscal year 2006 the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program awarded $333,695,957.00 to state and local governments for the incarceration of criminal aliens. If you think this covers the entire cost…HAHAHA not even close and when you throw in the cost of prosecution and the cost of the crime itself…the cost is beyond astronomical.
How many criminal aliens are in prison in the United States?
As of June 23 2007 the Federal Bureau of Prisons has 53,100 inmates that are non citizens at a cost of around $25,000 per inmate (average from all federal prisons). At a total cost of about $1,327,500,000
That is at the federal level…what about the state level?
Lets look at California (yes California leads the nation in almost every area dealing with illegal immigration).
According to the General Accounting Office California spent 510 million dollars in 2002 and 635 million dollars in 2003 on criminal aliens. For those two years combined California received less than 150 million dollars to offset a cost of over 1 billion dollars.
The cost to California has risen to an estimated $700 million to $750 million (according to many estimates floating around but lets look at what the California Department of Corrections has to say.
"CDCR expects to spend approximately $850 million in 2006-07 for the incarceration of undocumented persons. During 2005-06, the Administration worked closely with the Federal Government to increase the reimbursement that the state receives for incarcerating undocumented felons. As a result, the state will receive $114.1 million in SCAAP funding for 2006-07. Undocumented persons are expected to comprise 10.5% of inmates in the prison system. The CDCR's costs in 2007-08 are estimated to increase to $897.3 million, an increase of 5.6%.” As stated in Assembly Bill 1081
5 states incarcerate 80% of criminal aliens in state prisons. California, Florida, Arizona, New York, Texas and are reimbursed less than one quarter of the cost to incarcerate them from the federal government. Between 75,000 and 80,000 criminal aliens reside in states prisons in the United States that the prisons received some federal funding for.
What is the cost per inmate? Some prisons have a cost of over $60,000 per year per inmate…(New York City $60,068.05 a year in 2004) wow. There are prisons with higher cost and much lower costs.
In 2005 the average cost nation wide per inmate was $67.55 per day or $24,655.75 per year per inmate.
Sources: American Correctional Association, 2006 Directory of Adult and Juvenile Correctional Departments, Institutions, Agencies and Probation and Parole Authorities, 67th Edition (Alexandria, VA: ACA, 2006), Harrison, Paige M. & Allen J. Beck, PhD, US Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, Prisoners in 2005 (Washington, DC: US Department of Justice, November 2006).
California reports an average cost per inmate of $42,000 year, New York State average of $32,000, Florida $21,000. By this you can see that the average cost per inmate is going to be higher in 5 states with the highest criminal aliens than the national average but to remain with my earlier statement I will use the national average.
In local jails in the United States (for example the LA County Jail) combined house around 140,000 to 150,000 criminal aliens annually that they receive some federal funding for. As you can see above being in the New York City jail can be expensive and that is the way it is in most large cities…the cost per inmate will be higher but I will stick with using the national average.
140,000 at an average cost of $24,655.75 gives a total of $3,451,805,000
From the numbers reported under SCAAP we are looking at $4,779,305,000
But what is the real cost of criminal aliens?
What does it cost for the entire process from the time the police are called until all the prison and parole time have been served? WOW
Even though I have some numbers for that and even though I asked the question I will not even justify it with an answer because of what I heard today I am finished with justifying cost of illegal immigration when it is not even what I wanted to talk about…when an illegal immigrant allegedly rapes a five year old girl…the daughter of a woman who was just being kind to him…then I hear about a bastard criminal alien who also raped a 5 year old girl…then kills 3 college students…how do you justify cost?
Answer that for me…tell me how you can justify that?
I know there is no way to end crime in America or even completely stop illegal immigration but when you read stories like that do you not think everything possible should be done to minimize it and to immediately send all criminal aliens to the deepest darkest reaches of their home country once they have served their time and to make damn sure they never make it back into this country. Better yet…don’t tell me go tell that 5 year old girl and I do not want to read one damn thing about “Well Americans do it to”. You can’t put a cost on that. No way and there is no justification for it and never will be.
I know about loss…I know
I know America has lost a lot of good people in Iraq and there is no price that can be placed on those lives just as there is no price that can be placed on the lives of all the innocent Iraqis who have died. Money is not the cost we should be talking about. Does money play a part in both cases? Yes, it sadly does but in the discussion of illegal immigration the money should be spent keeping as much of the criminal element out of the country while allowing easier flow of the good, hardworking, honest immigrants. As I have said…I know that the criminals cannot be totally kept out and that illegal immigration cannot be totally stopped but we should make every effort to do so.
Edit #1 had to change a figure ($473,862,737.00) the figure was in thousands and I forgot to add the three zeros to make it ($473,862,737,000.00) _________________ All poems and stories posted by Eiregirl are
Copyright 2005 - 2008 Aoibhegréine
These literary works are my property under copyright. If you wish to use my work for any purpose please ASK FIRST.
Last edited by Eiregirl on Wed Oct 10, 2007 7:24 am; edited 1 time in total
Wed Aug 15, 2007 10:37 pm
Hieloz
Joined: 20 Sep 2007
Posts: 10
Location: Midwest
First off being of Latino origin let me say that I have experienced my fair share of racist remarks, the issue in my opinion is not the actual act of undocumented people [I say this because no human is illegal to me], it is the actual system that is broken and the current Administration being resistant to changing it because there are profits in undocumented workers and it is just not enough of an issue for the next presidential election, Iraq is more important.
Have any of you heard of the DREAM act? Google it and read about it, it is actually a very beneficial bill for the USA, it will let talented and intelligent undocumented children who have committed no crimes continue their post-secondary education but people believe it is amnesty.
The issue is really this: people will not stop coming through the border, why? Because south of the border the quality of life is degrading, these people mainly come here to work and feed their families, of many I have known, they wish they could go back to their country but the government there is corrupt and they cannot survive even with a master's degree, they just cannot find work, and you might ask why, this is another point I won't touch on, but the reality is that the USA takes advantage of what are called "third-world countries" and their resources, one good example is NAFTA.
Now don't get me wrong, I am not saying the USA is evil etc. I do not believe in evil, hence I am not religious, I am simply stating the facts, it is true the USA has done many good things as well, but it has also committed atrocities against many nations in the world.
The issue then is that the government is trying to fix a broken system with band-aids, some people ask and I have asked this before as well, why they just can't come in with papers? But the system that was there 100 yrs ago is not the same as the one now, if you don't have monetary assets you cannot get a visa, so if you just want to visit your family, and you basically have no substantial amount of money, we are talking properties, millions of pesos, you can't get one, even for just a week [and who has millions of pesos?
The mafia/drug sellers
, another reason why people are able to get visas who are criminals]; so here you are, a decent person, you barely make enough money to survive and feed your family, and you can't go visit your family because you aren't rich, does that seem like a just system?
When the system is taken and really mended, which let me say I don't believe is possible in a short amount of time, then things will be more controllable, but in the meantime people will continue to cross the border because they need to survive and feed their families, as for criminals, they have the money to get visas, if people want this to change they need to support good and just bills [such as the dream act] and not use immigrants as a escapegoat to blame them for every single problem. _________________ "Every system fails to return to an equilibrium"
“First off being of Latino origin let me say that I have experienced my fair share of racist remarks, the issue in my opinion is not the actual act of undocumented people [I say this because no human is illegal to me], it is the actual system that is broken and the current Administration being resistant to changing it because there are profits in undocumented workers and it is just not enough of an issue for the next presidential election, Iraq is more important.”
I have not seen the “current Administration” being resistant to changing the current system. What I have seen is an administration wanting to weaken the current system even more by not fixing the flaws within the system.
“Have any of you heard of the DREAM act?”
Yes I have heard of the DREAM act and I did not support it in the past but with the changes proposed for the act I may support it when it is presented in 2008.
“The issue is really this: people will not stop coming through the border, why? Because south of the border the quality of life is degrading, these people mainly come here to work and feed their families, of many I have known, they wish they could go back to their country but the government there is corrupt and they cannot survive even with a master's degree, they just cannot find work, and you might ask why, this is another point I won't touch on, but the reality is that the USA takes advantage of what are called "third-world countries" and their resources, one good example is NAFTA.”
I will do not disagree with everything you said in the above statement but I do not totally agree with everything in it either. You said that the USA takes advantage of third world countries and that is true because many of the USA’s companies and corporations have relocated much of there manufacturing to those countries because of the low wages they have to pay and in many cases the lack of any real environmental laws. I will grant that in many other countries the environmental laws are becoming on par with or better than the those in the United States. As to NAFTA…Mexico and Canada went all out in their support of it…I happen to disagree with NAFTA as it was presented.
“Now don't get me wrong, I am not saying the USA is evil etc. I do not believe in evil, hence I am not religious, I am simply stating the facts, it is true the USA has done many good things as well, but it has also committed atrocities against many nations in the world.”
Why not say the United States is evil, everyone else does but if you are going to say it has committed atrocities against many nations then I would like an example of many nations. Russia and the former USSR have committed atrocities, Iraq has committed atrocities, Iran, Mexico, Panama, Vietnam, South Korea, North Korea, Japan, England, Spain, Germany and the list could continue of countries that have committed atrocities against other countries or the citizens of other countries and even there own people. Does the fact that other countries commit atrocities make it right? No it does not just as it does not matter whether people believe in evil or not…it still exists.
“The issue then is that the government is trying to fix a broken system with band-aids, some people ask and I have asked this before as well, why they just can't come in with papers? But the system that was there 100 yrs ago is not the same as the one now, if you don't have monetary assets you cannot get a visa, so if you just want to visit your family, and you basically have no substantial amount of money, we are talking properties, millions of pesos, you can't get one, even for just a week [and who has millions of pesos? The mafia/drug sellers , another reason why people are able to get visas who are criminals]; so here you are, a decent person, you barely make enough money to survive and feed your family, and you can't go visit your family because you aren't rich, does that seem like a just system?”
They can come with papers. The only problem is getting those papers…the greencard…the visa. No it is not the same system it was 100 years ago or even 50 years ago.
You said, “if you don't have monetary assets you cannot get a visa, so if you just want to visit your family, and you basically have no substantial amount of money, we are talking properties, millions of pesos, you can't get one, even for just a week”
That is not true…not from my personal experience or from the experiences of friends and other people I know who are not rich with thousands of pesos let alone millions.
“so here you are, a decent person, you barely make enough money to survive and feed your family, and you can't go visit your family because you aren't rich, does that seem like a just system?”
We can look at this question from the perspective of someone in the United States and from the perspective of someone in another country. Lets say someone has immigrated “legally” to the United States and they want to go back to there home country and visit their family…there is nothing stopping them except perhaps money so are you saying that we should pay their way to go visit their family if they can’t afford to pay their own way? Lack of money does not seem to be much of an issue for people crossing the borders illegally and in many cases they pay $2000 to $10000 US dollars to people to sneak them across the borders into the United States . On top of that the money sent back to Mexico from the United States every year is second only to income from oil to the GDP of Mexico. I have friends from many countries, Mexico included and my friends from Mexico are not rich with millions of peso’s and their family is not either but they still come to visit at least once a year. Are there poor people in other countries who have family that have moved to the USA either legally or illegally and there is no way for them to afford to visit? Yes…just as there are poor people in the United States who wonder if they will be able to afford their rent and enough food to eat.
“When the system is taken and really mended, which let me say I don't believe is possible in a short amount of time, then things will be more controllable, but in the meantime people will continue to cross the border because they need to survive and feed their families, as for criminals, they have the money to get visas, if people want this to change they need to support good and just bills [such as the dream act] and not use immigrants as a escapegoat to blame them for every single problem.”
I find that I somewhat agree with what you say in the above statement. What I do not agree with is the statement that people are using what you call immigrants (illegal immigrants as I see it) as scapegoats to blame for every single problem. Are there illegal immigrants who are a problem and who cause problems? Yes, that is most definitely and undeniably true.
Should everything possible be done to prevent illegal immigration and to keep the criminal element of illegal immigration out of the country? Yes and that is also a definite and undeniable truth in my opinion.
I have sympathy and compassion for all the people who come to this country in hopes of bettering their own lives or to escape persecution in their own country but that does not change the fact that some who come here do cause problems.
The system needs to be fixed that is also undeniable and the very fact that it will take time to correct the problems with the immigration system is one of the very reasons we need to increase the security of our borders and to increase the personnel who process the requests for visa’s and citizenship. _________________ All poems and stories posted by Eiregirl are
Copyright 2005 - 2008 Aoibhegréine
These literary works are my property under copyright. If you wish to use my work for any purpose please ASK FIRST.
Mon Sep 24, 2007 7:45 pm
luvinmomofone1
Joined: 26 Oct 2007
Posts: 40
Location: oklahoma usa
ok i think this debate is very well spoken and i am out of my league trying to give my opinion..but i personally dont understand all the legalities of the illegal alien thing..i am a natural born usa citizen. but i dont believe that just because you as an illegal come to the usa to have a baby should make that baby a usa citizen and 2 i dont believe that unless they go thru the correct channels to become a us citizen that anykinds of benefits like welfare or ssi or even a drivers license should be given to them! i dont know if its true or not but i was told that bush and the senate were trying to vote on letting illegals collect welfare and disablity benefits..if that is true then that is wrong..we as a nation work and pay into those programs for unfortunate ppl like me...who is on ssi for a disablitiy...not for someone who is not leagally allowed to be here to begin with ..why should they be allowed to collect benefits they did not earn or pay into?? i understand that there are real ppl that have real needs to get away from the country they are in..but they need to go about it legally!! just like a us citizen would have to apply for citizenship in another country! and yes. i dont believe that they should put a criminal illegal in prison here..he should be deported and his crime must be given in the country he is from!! it is like that young man years ago from the usa who stole in thialand and got his feet caned..that was their law..why should he be above the law..and why should UN members be above the law in the usa? or AMBASSADORS from other countrys who break our laws?? the illegal that commits the violent crime should have a choice..death or go back to his country and let them deal with him.! but no i dont believe that like that woman who is a lesbian and will be stoned to death if deported back to her country deserves to be deported she deserves amnesty especially since the government knows thats is what she faces if deported!! she did no crime to deserve to die by stoning..just like refugee criminals and killers that run to canada..canada will not release them to the usa if they think they will get the death penalty!! i personally dont think that should matter ..the crime happened in the usa..the usa should be the one to met out the punishment weather the other country agrees or not! they wouldnt want a serial killer from their country to come here and not let us send him back for his punishment!!.. thats all i have to say..sorry if i dont know as much as you all do on this subject and sorry if what i hear is not true..i just hear what i hear and feel what i feel..thanks _________________ ~welcome to my world! grab a cuppa and have a seat~/
Fri Oct 26, 2007 11:31 pm
awnidea
Joined: 13 Oct 2007
Posts: 40
Location: 3rd planet from our Sun
Consider this
The question I feel is missed completely in the "debate" of "LEGAL/ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION" (for quite apparent reasons), is the following :-
- "What constitutes 'legal' (or 'illegal', in a matter of fact) immigration ?"
To travel TO or FROM a country (political state), one is
required
to have a ... "
PASS-PORT
" ... !!!
What I am here to be reminding my fellow conversationalists is that,
it is NOT an "accessory" readily or even plainly, AVAILABLE to ALL the people on our precious Earth
Will not even contemplate on the "financial/economics" side of it all ...
Also, to add the following thought ...
If the intention exists to "invade a home", this may be done in ANY way or form, possible !!!
Thank you for your attentive consideration.
my truth
awnidea _________________ " ... 'what distinguishes the men from the boys, is the size of their toys' ... what distinguishes women from girls, is the size of their decisions ... " - Noetis
Last edited by awnidea on Tue Oct 30, 2007 8:06 am; edited 2 times in total
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