Illegal Immigration: What's The Real Cost?

I keep hearing that illegal immigrants don't use social services yet a spate of articles today seem to belie that position...

Immigration bill passes Senate committee

Supporters of the plan say it will make Georgia safer by removing illegal residents with arrest warrants or deportation orders against them and free up state services now being used improperly by illegals.

Illegal immigration frustrates Sullivan

Illegal aliens are endangering Oklahomans by driving without licenses or auto insurance and straining local social services, Sullivan said.

Illegal immigrants' children costing N.C. more

RALEIGH (AP) — The cost of educating children of illegal immigrants in North Carolina is more than 20 times what it was 10 years ago, and some argue the money would be better spent on other students.

A study by the Kenan Institute of Private Enterprise at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill showed educating illegal immigrants' children costs the state an estimated $210 million a year. Ten years before, the figure was less than $10 million.

Illegal immigrants take advantage of our system

The illegal Mexicans are paid $7-8 dollars an hour but the living wage for a single person is at least $10.50, and many of the Mexicans have their families here––illegally, of course. Who pays the difference between what they earn and what they need to survive? We all do.

If they don't live on the farm, the illegals may be occupying subsidized housing. With no requirement to prove they are here legally, they may receive Medicaid, food stamps, and free education and school lunches for their children––who probably require expensive English language classes. The University of Vermont extension service pays a translator to teach English to the Mexicans and Spanish to the farmers, all at taxpayer expense. Pricey emergency rooms are where illegals get their medical care and if they are injured or have babies, we all pay their bills.

Virtually no illegals pay income tax and a lot of what they earn is removed from our economy and sent home to Mexico – while the taxpayers subsidize them and their employers. Those employers probably do not collect and remit state, federal, Social Security, or Medicare taxes. Could your local stores get away with that? This "cheap labor" is extremely expensive for all of us.

Common sense tells me that illegals almost have to be using public services that should rightly be for citizens. Yet proponents of illegal immigration would have us believe that there is no cost to society from the massive influx of illegal aliens.

That seems to fly in the face of reason. How can people be paid the wages that illegals earn and make ends meet? Answer, they can't, so there are costs somewhere. How much? We won't know until the flood stops and we see how much money is freed up.

My guess, it'll be a whole bunch.

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