What are immigrants by definition and what motivates them to leave their country to become a minority in a country that not always appreciates their presence? An immigrant is someone who comes into a country from where he or she was not born to become a resident. They are motivated by the desire of doing better in life. They hope for a better future for themselves, and their families, a brighter future with all the opportunities they do not have in their native country. Knowing this , is now pertinent to consider two facts: “U. S. minorities will be majority by 2042”, said the Census Bureau in August 2008 and even though illegal immigration can lead to internal problems, if the process can be regulated, immigrants benefit the workforce and enrich one nation’s culture.
Griswold is the associate director of the Cato Institute's Center for Trade Policy Studies. Grinswold’s writings on trade and immigration topics have been heavily published all over the world. H e said in February 2002:” Immigration always has been controversial in the United States. More than two centuries ago, Benjamin Franklin worried that too many German immigrants would swamp America's predominantly British culture. In the mid-1800s, Irish immigrants were scorned as lazy drunks, not to mention Roman Catholics. At the turn of the century a wave of "new immigrants" — Poles, Italians, Russian Jews — were believed to be too different ever to assimilate into American life. Today the same fears are raised about immigrants from Latin America and Asia, but current critics of immigration are as wrong as their counterparts were in previous eras.”
At late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, immigrants from different races and ethnic origins aroused an uncomfortable feeling on the “natives”. The Exclusion of the Chinese laborers in the 1880s started the opposition process to immigration in the United States, followed by the establishment of a literacy test and national origin quotas. On the Seventies and Eighties, Latin American Immigrants, exceeded dramatically the number of the traditional European immigration. The focus on the opposition side was on the Mexican illegal immigration and that is how the issue that still discussed nowadays started. The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 (IRCA) was the climax of all these problems involving immigration. “The history of this struggle illuminates how a changing polity resolved contentious debates about race, vulnerable populations, labor, and security, and its outcome cast a long shadow on American immigration reform politics.”
How is the immigration issue in 2009 after United States election? What President Barack Obama has to say about immigration? Well, with the economy in recession, serious issues concerning healthcare and energy, the President will have more obstacles than ever to pass the laws for immigration he used in his election platform. Mr. Obama initially intended to work in a solution to come up with a new bill for amnesty, bill that would benefit 12 million illegal immigrants.
Officials declared the Obama management supports the legislation that would transition illegal immigrants into the legal system. This movement would be processed through admitting these immigrants had violated the law and in consequence of this crime a fine would be imposed to be paid and some other penalties for the misdeed.
The new bill would also pursuit to forestall future illegal immigration by reinforcing the border patrols and taking control of the situation of employers that frequently hire illegal aliens. That would be done through a national network of data information that would be capable of establish accurately the legal status of a job’s candidate.
At the President’s agenda for this year, there will be organized a debate with both sides of the matter in order to try to come up with a solution. The resistance, mostly Republicans, promise to seek for popular outrage based on the problematic situation of Americans losing their jobs. The Democratic Party worries about the President’s popularity being affected by the controversy in such difficult times to the country that has so many other problems urging for solution. Both parts can see the disastrous potential in taking up at this time an America secondary problem, such as immigration. For illegal immigrants, any time is a good time for a debate that would bring a solution to their predicament of living outlaw.
President Obama said in March 18th in Costa Mesa, California, recognizing the flammability of the immigration issue: "I know this is an emotional issue; I know it’s a controversial issue. I know that the people get real riled up politically about this."But, he said, immigrants who are long-time residents but lack legal status “have to have some mechanism over time to get out of the shadows.”
One way or another, the immigration problem should be discussed in time. Will President Obama be able to come up with a solution to satisfy both sides of the issue? The results of this debate are unpredictable, with so many segments pushing in different directions…
In order to analyze properly immigration in an unbiased way, it is necessary to take in account advantages and disadvantages of immigration in this country. What has recently driven Americans protesting is the fact that with the economical struggle, there has been thousands of Americans that have lost their jobs in these last few years. The concern is that illegal workers would be the ones that would be taken up these jobs.
In the state of California, because of the heavy concentration of immigrants, that might be true that the economic stimulus that was suppose to create two million jobs with the help of Americans tax payers would end up benefiting illegal immigrants. Some conservatives estimate that about 15% of these jobs could be taken by unauthorized workers.
The other side of this controversy is to notice that illegal immigration take only the jobs that most American would refuse to do. Illegal immigrants even because of a matter of lack of documentation, take the jobs in service, such as servers, house cleaners, baby sitters. Some jobs at landscape, construction and such.
Unfortunate news to United States shows that the graduation rates for Latinos established in the country is of 20 % only or sometimes less. Higher education, meaning anything further than high school diploma, is not even a consideration for the majority of young Latinos.
Considering what is already known; the education system in the country is in crisis and in desperate need of reform. The fact that Latino immigrants are the majority of the 20.2 % of the nation’s school-age demographic is of the second generation of immigrants, makes a big negative impact on the future of America’s education.
On this recent research it is possible to precise the immigrant population in the public system in some specific American cities. Observe that the demographic referred in this graph is of the percentage of school-age people with immigrant fathers, once just a forth of this children can be considered illegal immigrants because they were not born in this country.
On the other side, in a globalized world, who failed to have noticed that immigrants from Asia especially have taken high-paying jobs? The dream of students from India, for example, is to only perform at their best to peak in an American company as an IT engineer, electronic designer or doctor. These immigrants also have taken up American jobs, this time, the desired ones, but no blames to take, but Americans themselves. Lowering standards in schools have not helped Americans to outperform students from the rest of the world…Reforms on education are also in time to been taken care of!
Another controversial side of illegal immigration concerns to tax payment and capital evasion. The truth is that the vast majority of illegal aliens work to save money and send to their families in other countries. Some of them save money to invest in businesses in their native countries as well. That is American generated money that would and should be welcomed to the consumer’s market that in time would be extremely helpful to boost the so weakened economy.
The taxpaying issue is even a more complicated problem that affects Americans and immigrants in both ways. Immigrants as being illegal do not pay the same amount of taxes as regular Americans do. Some people push the topic on the total negative side, saying that under documented workers do not pay taxes at all, which would not be accurate to say, once it is well-known that products and services, for example, only reach the consumers after having been heavily taxed already. Hence, illegal immigrants are paying some percentage of American’s taxes. The other aspect of taxpaying is of the majority of illegal immigrants working under some false documentation. These are the ones who pay most of the proper taxes when cashing their payments. The only difference is that they pay without even being able to have back a little part of what they paid.
Most states will by law, refuse to accept illegal immigrants into their public school system. The government will deny financing a loan for college if a Green Card cannot be presented. The roads are not for illegal immigrants either, once the right to apply for a driver’s license is another necessity these people cannot pursuit as well.At the end, illegal immigrants might pay less tax than regular Americans but it is clear that they also benefit way much less from taxes than citizens do.
Another point that seems to support the segment that pushes against immigration is the rise of crime rates. Another fallacy! Plenty of studies and searches have been made on this aspect and nothing has been proved against immigrants. In February 2008 a research by the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) was released and published at Time magazine. Immigrants are 35% of California population, but they are only responsible for 17% percent of crimes in that area. Considering that men, between the ages of 18 and 40 years old are the majority of the population incarcerated. Among this demographic population, Americans were 10 times more likely to go to prison than immigrants. The PPIC also pointed out through research that between the years 2000 and 2005, cities like Los Angeles, for example, which had a high share of immigrants moving there, noticed that their crime rates decreased if compared to other cities that had lower number of immigrants established there.
Another research done by the Washington-based nonprofit Immigration Policy Center, verified in the United States that although the number of illegal aliens doubled between the years of 1994 and 2005; violent crime rate dropped by nearly 35% and property crimes decreased by 26% over the same period. Based on these studies is easy to conclude that immigrants, although judged as a reason to increasing crime rates, cannot be blamed!
Immigrants benefit the workforce by increasing the labor supply. More laborers make possible that Americans make better and more efficient use of the land, natural resources and capital. Therefore, United States gains in productivity and competitive prices. Immigrants are the force that pushes this country to stay young, renewable and productive! For the xenophobic people who are not the majority, only rest to embrace immigrants, hope and cooperate that the immigration process can be regulated as soon as possible. Will immigration have its relevancy recognized by this country one day? Most Americans come from immigrant families anyway…. Color is just a matter of melanin, should not be a reference for good or bad precedence. Vive la difference that makes us all unique! Ole, bravo!!!
References:
Powell, John. (2005)"Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA)." Encyclopedia of North American Immigration. Facts On File, Inc. American History Online. Facts On File, Inc. Retrieved May 23rd, 2009 from http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?
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Ennell, C. (2005, March). U. S. Immigration and Migration Reference Library/U. S. Immigration and Migration: Almanac/U. S. Immigration and Migration: Biographies... Catholic Library World, 75(3), 237-237. Retrieved May 23, 2009, from Library, Information Science & Technology Abstracts database.
Immigrate. (2009). In Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary.
Retrieved May 23, 2009, from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/immigrate
Kingsburry, K ( 2008, March) Immigration: No Correlation with Crime – Time Retrieved June 3rd, 2009, from http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1717575,00.html
U.S. Minorities Will Be the Majority by 2042, Census Bureau Says (2008, August) Retrieved June 10th, 2009 from http://www.america.gov/st/diversity-english/2008/August/20080815140005xlrennef0.1078106.html#ixzz0JQGOdAiC&D
Grinswold, D (2008, February) NO: Immigrants have enriched American culture and enhanced our influence in the world. Retrieved June 10th, 2009, from http://www.cato.org/research/articles/griswold-020218.html
Sassen, Saskia.(2002)"America Must Cooperate with Other Nations in Regulating Immigration." Opposing Viewpoints: Illegal Immigration. Ed. William Dudley. San Diego: Greenhaven Press Retrieved May 23rd, 2009 from Axia college library.
Rubenstein, E. (2009) “The Twin Crises - Immigration and Infrastructure" Retrieved July11th, 2009 from http://www.thesocialcontract.com/artman2/publish/tsc_19_2/tsc_19_2_schools.shtml
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