Something we’ve all known has been verified based on surveys done after the 1986 amnesty program, that concludes that even during the recession, legalizing undocumented workers would benefit the economy.
The report said that legalization, along with a program that allows for future immigration based on the labor market, would create jobs, increase wages and generate more tax revenue. Comprehensive immigration reform would add an estimated $1.5 trillion to the U.S. gross domestic product over 10 years, according to the report.
“If we are going to create a solid recovery with good wages, we have to fix this hole that we have at the bottom of the labor market,” said the author, Raúl Hinojosa-Ojeda, an associate professor with the UCLA Department of Chicana and Chicano Studies. “This is not about bringing in a lot of workers. This is about your neighbors and if we are better off where everybody in the economy has the ability to fight for their families and to contribute more to the economy rather than staying in the shadows.”
Hinojosa-Ojeda based the study in part on surveys done after 1986 legislation that resulted in the legalization of nearly 3 million undocumented immigrants. Those surveys showed that immigrants who became legal moved on to better-paying jobs and became more educated, resulting in more spending and more tax revenue. That legislation was passed during a similar economic downturn, he said.
The study, released on January 7, 2010, comes shortly after a renewed commitment by the Obama administration to back legislation this year that would provide a path to citizenship for an estimated 12 million illegal immigrants living in the United States. The study is being released by two Washington-based immigrant rights organizations, the Immigration Policy Center and the Center for American Progress.
Hinojosa-Ojeda also projected that the economy would benefit from a temporary worker program, by raising the GDP by $792 billion. And the economy would suffer if the U.S. deported all illegal immigrants, which he acknowledged was an unlikely option. Mass deportation, he concluded, would reduce the GDP by $2.6 trillion over 10 years.
The Economic Benefits of Immigration Reform – Immigration Policy Center
Comprehensive immigration reform, including a legalization program for unauthorized immigrants, would stimulate the U.S. economy.
- CIR would increase U.S. GDP by at least 0.84%. This would translate into at least a $1.5 trillion increase in GDPover 10 years, which includes approximately $1.2 trillion in consumption and $256 billion in investment.
- The benefits of additional GDP growth would be spread broadly throughout the U.S. economy. Especially large increases would occur in immigrant-heavy sectors such as textiles, electronic equipment, and construction.
- The higher earning power of newly legalized workers would mean increased tax revenues of $4.5-$5.4 billionover 3 years.
- Higher personal income would also generate increased consumer spending—enough to support 750,000–900,000 jobs in the U.S.
- Experience shows that legalized workers open bank accounts, buy homes, and start businesses, further stimulating the U.S. economy.
Legalization increases workers’ wages.
- The real wages of less-skilled newly legalized workers would increase by roughly $4,405 per year, while higher-skilled workers would see their income increase $6,185 per year.
- Because of the additional certainty and stability in their lives, legalized workers invest more in their human capital, including education, job training, and English-language skills, making them even more productive workers and higher earners.
Legalization increases the wages of native-born U.S. workers.
- The wages of native-born U.S. workers also increases under comprehensive immigration reform because the “wage floor” rises for all workers, particularly in industries where large numbers of easily exploited, low-wage unauthorized immigrants currently work.
- Wages for less-skilled native-born U.S. workers would increase by roughly $162 per year, and the wages of higher-skilled U.S. workers would increase by approximately $74 per year.
Mass deportation is costly, lowers wages, and has a negative impact on the U.S. economy.
- Mass deportation would reduce U.S. GDP by 1.46% annually, amounting to a $2.6 trillion loss in GDP over 10 years, not including the actual costs of deportation. The Center for American Progress has estimated that mass deportation would cost $206 billion to $230 billion over 5 years.
- Wages would rise for less-skilled native-born workers, but wages of higher-skilled natives would decrease, and there would be widespread job loss.
Studies from various researchers with divergent political perspectives confirm these findings.
- A report by the right-leaning, libertarian CATO Institute using a similar CGE model came to startlingly similar conclusions. CATO found that legalization would yield significant income gains for American workers and households. Legalization would boost the incomes of U.S. households by $180 billion a year by 2019. CATO also concluded that tighter restrictions and a reduction in less-skilled immigration would impose large costs on native-born Americans by shrinking the overall economy and lowering worker productivity.
- A study of the national dairy industry confirmed the essential role of immigrant labor in that industry. A loss of just 50% of immigrant dairy workers would lower dairy farm sales by $6.7 billion and reduce total economic output by $11.2 billion. Removing all immigrant dairy workers would cost nearly 133,000 U.S. jobs, affecting both immigrant and native-born workers.
- An analysis by the farm credit system in the Northeast found that an enforcement-only regime would result in jobs lost, farms closed, and farmland converted to other uses. In New York alone, at high risk are 800 farms, $700 million in production, 7,000 on-farm jobs, and nearly 16,000 off-farm but farm dependent jobs.
NOT EVERYONE AGREES
The usual suspects in the anti-immigrant movement do not agree with this logical and well documented assesment by Dr Hinojosa.
Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) spokesman Ira Mehlman said that even with legal status, many immigrants would continue to work in low-wage jobs, meaning their tax revenue wouldn’t make much of a difference to the economy. Also, legalization would flood the labor market and drive down wages rather than increase them, he said.
Mehlman said those supporting amnesty know they have a difficult sell because of the state of the economy.
“They are trying to portray this as an economic shot in the arm,” he said. “But I am not sure the American public is going to buy it.”
That statement by the FAIR spokesman, a mainstream hate group founded by white nationalist and eugenicist John Tanton, show’s how that group ignores the statistical evidence in their blind haste to push their zero tolerance, zero immigration policies aimed at Hispanics.
Meanwhile a spokesman for William Gheen’s little group ALIPAC, had this pithy comment to make on the study.
The “statistics” are not actual evidence because the “statistics” are manipulated. So how do they come by those statistics? They never document the details of how they come by those statisics. They just throw some numbers at us, and then make claims based on those numbers. But if those numbers are manipulated, then the claims are…..lies.
Sure it helps the economy – of Mexico. All those remittances!!
When these pro amnesty folks talk about how making these thieves legal is good for the economy, we need to remind them that American citizens had these jobs stolen from them and we want our jobs back ! Citizens will pay taxes and buy things, educate our kids and stimulate the economy once we get our jobs returned.
So there you have it. The U.S. should eliminate the Border Patrol and move quickly to legalize millions of undocumented aliens who have violated federal law and inevitably countless local statutes. It’s guaranteed to help lay the foundation for robust, just and widespread economic growth, according to the laughable UCLA report.
More evidence of why ALIPAC and it’s maniacal leader William Gheen have very little relevancy in the debate over immigration reform. It might be noted that ALIPAC has closely aligned itself with FAIR and NUMBERSUSA nativist and xenophobic agenda.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Dr. Raul Hinojosa-Ojeda
He is the author of numerous articles and books on the political economy of regional integrations in various parts of the world, including trade, investment and migration relations between the U.S., Mexico, Latin American and the Pacific Rim. He is co-author of Latinos in a Changing U.S. Economy: Comparative Perspectives on the U.S. Labor Market Since 1939 (New York: IUP/CUNY, 1991) and co-editor of Labor Market Interdependence between the United States and Mexico (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1992). He has recently completed a book on the political economy of U.S.-Latin American relations in the late twentieth century including the impact of a potential Free Trade of the Americas Agreement ( Convergence and Divergence between NAFTA, Chile, and MERCOSUR: Overcoming Dilemmas of North and South American Economic Integration . Washington, DC: Inter-American Development Bank, 1997).
Together with Rep. Esteban Torres of California, Dr. Hinojosa Ojeda is the originator of the proposal for the North American Development Bank, which was created by the U.S. and Mexican governments in 1994. Dr Hinojosa is a board member of the Los Angeles Community Development Bank and has been appointed to the Economic Strategies Panel of the State of California.
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