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Illegal Immigration Costs California Over Ten Billion Annually
State's "cheap labor" costs average household $1,183 a year
Dateline: December, 2004
In hosting America's largest population of illegal immigrants, California bears a huge cost to provide basic human services for this fast growing, low-income segment of its population. A new study from the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) examines the costs of education, health care and incarceration of illegal aliens, and concludes that the costs to Californians is $10.5 billion per year.
> examines the costs of education, health care and incarceration of
> illegal aliens, and concludes that the costs to Californians is $10.5 billion
> per year.
Did the study look at the intangible items, such as the savings from cheap labor? Say we didn't have Mexicans working in restuarants, then perhaps the cost of eating out would be higher.
Second, do illegals pay taxes? It seems that they don't pay income tax as they don't have social security numbers, but when they buy stuff, they pay sales tax. I think they should be allowed to get drivers licenses, as that way they would pay vehicle license fees, and more sales tax for when they buy cars and gasoline.
Also, companies should have to pay a tax to hire illegals. How we might enforce this is I don't know, but at a minimum, companies should not be penalized (as under the current proposed immigration bill). Say I get $10 an hour, then my tax would probably be about $0.50 (after deductions, exemptions, etc), so companies should have to pay a tax of 5% when hiring someone without a social security number.
Also, the state's annual budget is $120 billion, so $10 billion is only about 10%. Hence I conclude that the bulk of California's bulky budget is due to other factors. Maybe the real reason behind California's bulky budget is socialism, entitlement spending, social and corporate welfare, and so on.
Also, I've been looking for statistics on how California schools fare with and without illegals. They said California is the 49th worst for K-12 education. But if you remove the scores of illegals (or children of illegals), how does California fare? My guess is that California will fare much better. This is an indication that more needs to be done to integrate the illegals (and children of illegals) such as teaching them in Mexican, and slowly transitioning to English as a primary language.
If California is the 49th worst with all students considered, and 25th or so when illegals are excluded, then the talk about California being the 49th worst in the nation is a scare tactic to get taxpayers to pay more and more.
Hope you're not getting a heart attack reading this!
> examines the costs of education, health care and incarceration of
> illegal aliens, and concludes that the costs to Californians is $10.5 billion
> per year.
Did the study look at the intangible items, such as the savings from cheap labor? Say we didn't have Mexicans working in restuarants, then perhaps the cost of eating out would be higher.
Second, do illegals pay taxes? It seems that they don't pay income tax as they don't have social security numbers, but when they buy stuff, they pay sales tax. I think they should be allowed to get drivers licenses, as that way they would pay vehicle license fees, and more sales tax for when they buy cars and gasoline.
Also, companies should have to pay a tax to hire illegals. How we might enforce this is I don't know, but at a minimum, companies should not be penalized (as under the current proposed immigration bill). Say I get $10 an hour, then my tax would probably be about $0.50 (after deductions, exemptions, etc), so companies should have to pay a tax of 5% when hiring someone without a social security number.
Also, the state's annual budget is $120 billion, so $10 billion is only about 10%. Hence I conclude that the bulk of California's bulky budget is due to other factors. Maybe the real reason behind California's bulky budget is socialism, entitlement spending, social and corporate welfare, and so on.
Also, I've been looking for statistics on how California schools fare with and without illegals. They said California is the 49th worst for K-12 education. But if you remove the scores of illegals (or children of illegals), how does California fare? My guess is that California will fare much better. This is an indication that more needs to be done to integrate the illegals (and children of illegals) such as teaching them in Mexican, and slowly transitioning to English as a primary language.
If California is the 49th worst with all students considered, and 25th or so when illegals are excluded, then the talk about California being the 49th worst in the nation is a scare tactic to get taxpayers to pay more and more.
Hope you're not getting a heart attack reading this!
What planet are you from? The state does not save any money because illegals work in restaurants. Yes, illegals pay sale tax when they buy things. Everybody pay sale tax when they buy things. Illegals are not contributing anything here. Sale tax is what everyone must pay when they buy things.
Teaching them in Mexican, and slowly transitioning to English? Is this question serious? That is precisely why they don't want to learn English. There are places in Texas where only Spanish is spoken.
The bottom line is if people want to come to America they are welcome to come here legally. We can not let people come here illegally. We can not let people stay here illegally. The cost is our society is too great. This burden is unfair to American tax payers.
Build that fence and deploy troops to secure our border now.
> examines the costs of education, health care and incarceration of
> illegal aliens, and concludes that the costs to Californians is $10.5 billion
> per year.
Did the study look at the intangible items, such as the savings from cheap labor? Say we didn't have Mexicans working in restuarants, then perhaps the cost of eating out would be higher.
Second, do illegals pay taxes? It seems that they don't pay income tax as they don't have social security numbers, but when they buy stuff, they pay sales tax. I think they should be allowed to get drivers licenses, as that way they would pay vehicle license fees, and more sales tax for when they buy cars and gasoline.
Also, companies should have to pay a tax to hire illegals. How we might enforce this is I don't know, but at a minimum, companies should not be penalized (as under the current proposed immigration bill). Say I get $10 an hour, then my tax would probably be about $0.50 (after deductions, exemptions, etc), so companies should have to pay a tax of 5% when hiring someone without a social security number.
Also, the state's annual budget is $120 billion, so $10 billion is only about 10%. Hence I conclude that the bulk of California's bulky budget is due to other factors. Maybe the real reason behind California's bulky budget is socialism, entitlement spending, social and corporate welfare, and so on.
Also, I've been looking for statistics on how California schools fare with and without illegals. They said California is the 49th worst for K-12 education. But if you remove the scores of illegals (or children of illegals), how does California fare? My guess is that California will fare much better. This is an indication that more needs to be done to integrate the illegals (and children of illegals) such as teaching them in Mexican, and slowly transitioning to English as a primary language.
If California is the 49th worst with all students considered, and 25th or so when illegals are excluded, then the talk about California being the 49th worst in the nation is a scare tactic to get taxpayers to pay more and more.
Hope you're not getting a heart attack reading this!
Your post make sense to me but I feel you're trying to justify the import of poor quality immigrants. I mean, even if you open immigration only for the worst criminals around the world, believe me, YOU CAN FIND SOMETHING GOOD IN HAVING THEM HERE. But that is not the purpose of an immigration system. I prefer to pay more at restaurants, I prefer to pay more for fruits, but I want my America like it used to be, peaceful, quiet, with good values, patriotic. I don't wanna see cafeterias and taquerias everywhere, I don't wanna see poor people on the streets and living by 20 in one single apartment.
Besides, costs are raising due to incresed demands in the nation. And that demand comes from the massive immigration and Americans relocating accross the country. If we control the brokin immigration system we can level up our own costs.
We fled CA because of the immigration issues and the never ending bonds that will be coming due. CA is a very rich state and I think it will survive, but it will become ever increasingly more expensive in the near future. So where did we go? AZ LOL.
What planet are you from? The state does not save any money because illegals work in restaurants. Yes, illegals pay sale tax when they buy things. Everybody pay sale tax when they buy things. Illegals are not contributing anything here. Sale tax is what everyone must pay when they buy things.
Teaching them in Mexican, and slowly transitioning to English? Is this question serious? That is precisely why they don't want to learn English. There are places in Texas where only Spanish is spoken.
The bottom line is if people want to come to America they are welcome to come here legally. We can not let people come here illegally. We can not let people stay here illegally. The cost is our society is too great. This burden is unfair to American tax payers.
Build that fence and deploy troops to secure our border now.
Sales tax goes towards the tax revenue base and is part of the $120 billion the year the state spends on all sorts of stuff. Sales tax is 27% of the tax revenue base, and apart from property tax is the largest tax that lower income people pay. For fairness, Mexicans should pay income tax as well. A person making $10 an hour wouldn't pay much in federal or state income tax (probably under 3% after deductions).
They speak Spanish because that's all they know, and living in a close-knit community they don't have exposure to English or even American values. Imagine the Italian, German, etc immigrants who came here. In the beginning, they could only speak their native language and they lived in close-knit communities that spoke their native language only, but over time they learned to speak English well, and integrated with the surrounding community. Government can play a helping hand by teaching them in their native language and transitioning them to English.
This would probably also boost test scores. Suppose they only speak Spanish. If they are taught in Spanish, then they'll understand what they learn, and likely will do better in tests. This is good in general, but also good for me taxpayers, because if California does better in test scores, they may stop bugging the taxpayers for more and more money for education, which I think is already too much.
But it's important that the schools also teach them in English and transition to English as a primary language. I think given the tools and the chance, people will want to learn English. After all, this happened to me (when I was small I spoke an Indian language only and quickly moved on to English, although I'm not from India and the community around me spoke English mostly), as well as countless of immigrants from India who come to the US and do extremely well (although their community spoke the Indian languages mostly).
The fence and border patrols is not a good idea in my opinion. It will be very expensive. Let's say there are 18,000 agents, costing the government $60,000 each (base salary, employee costs for social security etc, some food, some housing). That's around $1 billion a year. The bridge will cost say $5 billion, but to maintain it will probably costs $200 million a year.
Plus straining relations with Mexico could hurt the US. We're dependent on them for oil and other things, and they also buy some of our crops and other stuff we make.
Your post make sense to me but I feel you're trying to justify the import of poor quality immigrants. I mean, even if you open immigration only for the worst criminals around the world, believe me, YOU CAN FIND SOMETHING GOOD IN HAVING THEM HERE. But that is not the purpose of an immigration system. I prefer to pay more at restaurants, I prefer to pay more for fruits, but I want my America like it used to be, peaceful, quiet, with good values, patriotic. I don't wanna see cafeterias and taquerias everywhere, I don't wanna see poor people on the streets and living by 20 in one single apartment.
Besides, costs are raising due to incresed demands in the nation. And that demand comes from the massive immigration and Americans relocating accross the country. If we control the brokin immigration system we can level up our own costs.
Be aware that the extra cost for restuarants and fruit would also amount to an increased demand on the nation.
But I agree with you, that I like to see an America that is more peaceful, quiet, and with good values. Most of the Mexicans who come here are peaceful, but some join gangs. I've been in gang-ridden areas of Chicago and LA, and it's scary. Even in San Francisco (where gangs are less), I'm still careful about not walking in some places. So something needs to be done to fix this aspect of crime.
However, American values are still in need or repair. Sometimes patriotism can blind us, like when four years ago, anyone who questioned the war was considered unpatriotic. Yet the war has costed us over 3500 US soldiers, 300 allied soldiers, 25,000 injuries, etc. An also over $1 trillion in direct costs, around $2 trillion once you consider care of veterans, strained relations with foreign countries, etc.
And Americans spend too much and save too little. The US Federal Reserve keeps reporting a negative savings rate (but I'm curious how they calculate this number), and credit card and mortgage debt keeps rising. We could learn a thing or two from the thriftier Mexicans, Chinese, and Indians.
Anyway, the direct cost of taxpayers for supporting immigrants is quite small (10% in California, less in other states). The biggest costs are corporate and social welfare, an entitlement mentality, socialism. I read John Stossels book "Give me A break", and he mentions all sorts of government boondoogles. My idea of teaching kids in Spanish then English sounds a bit like a boondoogle too, but I think it can be done with minimal cost increase, and public schools should also be allowed to charge fees for special programs. This would make many people in California gasp, but it seems fair to me.
Illegal Immigration Costs California Over Ten Billion Annually
State's "cheap labor" costs average household $1,183 a year
BTW, how did they calculate $1,183. The cost of illegals is 10B, there are 15M tax returns, so that's $666 per tax return.
In any case, the poor in California pay little in personal income tax. 64% is paid by those tax returns making 100K or more per year, although they are only 9% of tax returns; 50% is paid by those making 150K or more though they are only 4% of the tax returns (http://countingcalifornia.cdlib.org/xlsdata/csa00/D10 (broken link)). So the cost of supporting illegal immigrants is borne mostly by the wealthy.
hahaha. ok ok but you see? every time we discuss this topic we start diggin for some justification. So let's put it plain and simple:
- I brake a window in your house
- I stay inside hiding from you
- I start cleaning your kitchen
- You discover me, but I order you not to touch me because I am doing what you don't want to do in your own house
- You try to convince me that you don't need that extra service, but I refuse to leave and demand the right to stay there and have a bedroom for me.
- I stay there and you discover that although I'm clenaing the kitchen everyday, you are paying more at the end of the month for the extra food for me (is my right), the extra electricity (my right) extra water usage (my right)
- Finally, you decide to take me out of your own house by force, I sue you and you go to jail for hate crime.
DOES THIS SH*T MAKE ANY SENSE??
Well, bottom line, that is the situation. No more, no less. It doesn't care if illegals are 1 penny every month for citizens. The problem is WHY IN THE WORLD WE HAVE TO PAY THAT EXTRA PENNY FOR SOMETHING THAT WE DON'T WANT/HAVEN'T ASK.
cheers.
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labor savings, taxes, drivers licenses, taxes, schools
