Unless you live under a rock then you know that Donald Trump does not want immigrants to come to America. Trump has made it almost impossible for any immigrant to come to the country. This is especially true for those who want to Make America Great Again by their hard work. But even with Trump’s draconian efforts to curb immigration, America needs immigrants so much that Trump has been stymied in his attempts at closing the border. That has not stopped Trump from trying, however.
Studies after studies demonstrate how important immigrants are to the American way of life, especially its economic prosperity.
A recently released study by the University of California adds even more to the evidence that immigrants benefit the United States more than it hurts it. The study proves that immigrants enhance American’s way of life by increasing the wages of native-born Americans by creating jobs through innovation. The creation of jobs by immigrants not only benefits the wages of the native-born Americans but the immigrants’ businesses pay property and other taxes that enhances the neighborhood they live in.
These findings contradict the national narrative that blames immigrants for higher taxes and lower wages.
Likewise, the idea that immigrants only work in the low-skilled markets is contradicted by the studies.
According to the study, in 1994, one-in-ten computer scientists in America were born abroad. By 2012, the ratio jumped to one-in-four. The paper points out that the technology industry leaders at Google, Microsoft and Tesla are immigrants are children of immigrants.
The IT sector in America is driven by immigrants.
Low-skilled Workers
Even the so-called low-skilled workers enhance Americans’ lives. In addition to working in the agricultural sector that previous studies have found native-born Americans aren’t willing to work in, so-called low-skilled immigrants open restaurants and salons among other service industry businesses increasing job opportunities for native-born Americans. Immigrants end up increasing the tax base in their communities.
Legalizing Immigrants
The study also demonstrated that granting immigrants the right to work and live in the United States helped to create about 203,000 jobs each year in the ten-year study.
Crime and Immigrants
The study referenced Gallup polls between 2001 and 2017 showing that the general American population has bought into the false notion that immigrants make crime worse (45 to 58 percent).
However, as the study points out, there is ample scientific evidence that contradicts this notion.
According to the paper, a Robert Adelman study from 1970 to 2010 found that “increases in immigration are correlated with decreases in both violent (homicides, assaults, etc.) and property crimes (burglary, motor vehicle theft, etc.).” The study also points out that “incarceration rates are lower for immigrants and, far lower for newly arrived immigrants.”
These results have been collaborated by other academic studies on immigration.
On Taxes
Both legal and undocumented immigrants pay taxes in the form of payroll and sales taxes. The paper points out that in 2014, “immigrants paid $223.6 billion in federal taxes and $104.6 billion in combined states and local taxes.” The paper added that, “contrary to popular belief, undocumented migrant workers also pay taxes, mostly income taxes, which are estimated to at $11.7 billion.”
Most importantly, the paper adds that if undocumented immigrants were given the opportunity to legalization, they would contribute an additional “$2.2 billion” to the tax base.
The paper concludes, “strengthening migrant worker rights benefits native-born workers, outweighing any costs borne by them.”
Allowing immigrants to come to America will help America recover from the Coronavirus pandemic. The studies have demonstrated this.
