The Price Tag of Montezuma's Revenge
According to Columbia University economists David Weinstein and Donald Davis, it's $68 billion a year and counting:
Unlike earlier studies, this new model does not treat the movement of immigrant labor into the country simply as a result of abundant resources and demand for labor, assumptions more appropriate to the 19th century.
Rather, the model takes into account globalization, the technological superiority of the American economy, and the resulting high standard of living.
Among the report’s findings:
-In 2002, the net loss to U.S. natives from immigration was $68 billion.
-This $68 billion annual loss represents a $14 billion increase just since 1998. As the size of the immigrant population has continued to increase, so has the loss.
-The decline in wages is relative to the price of goods and services, so the study takes into account any change in consumer prices brought about by immigration.
-The negative effect comes from increases in the supply of labor, and not the legal (or illegal) status of immigrants.
-While natives lose from immigration, the findings show that immigrants themselves benefit substantially by coming to America.
-Those who remain behind in their home countries also benefit from the migration of their countrymen.
Small wonder that more and more center-right commentators are citing this issue as the one that can blow apart the GOP majority coalition. Dems, of course, have no respect for the rule of law and will welcome anything that can get them back into power, the law be damned. It is Republicans who have to step up and deal with this problem, and that is the precise opposite of President Bush's amnesty-by-any-other-name stance.
This matter has been slowly rising to a high-rolling boil for years. Throw in the national security imperative vis-a-vie the intersection of WMD proliferation and Islamist terrorism and the breaking point cannot be very far off.
Here's another of my old sayings: "Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me."
Keep that one in mind after the next 9/11, if the Bush White House doesn't keep it in mind beforehand.
Unlike earlier studies, this new model does not treat the movement of immigrant labor into the country simply as a result of abundant resources and demand for labor, assumptions more appropriate to the 19th century.
Rather, the model takes into account globalization, the technological superiority of the American economy, and the resulting high standard of living.
Among the report’s findings:
-In 2002, the net loss to U.S. natives from immigration was $68 billion.
-This $68 billion annual loss represents a $14 billion increase just since 1998. As the size of the immigrant population has continued to increase, so has the loss.
-The decline in wages is relative to the price of goods and services, so the study takes into account any change in consumer prices brought about by immigration.
-The negative effect comes from increases in the supply of labor, and not the legal (or illegal) status of immigrants.
-While natives lose from immigration, the findings show that immigrants themselves benefit substantially by coming to America.
-Those who remain behind in their home countries also benefit from the migration of their countrymen.
Small wonder that more and more center-right commentators are citing this issue as the one that can blow apart the GOP majority coalition. Dems, of course, have no respect for the rule of law and will welcome anything that can get them back into power, the law be damned. It is Republicans who have to step up and deal with this problem, and that is the precise opposite of President Bush's amnesty-by-any-other-name stance.
This matter has been slowly rising to a high-rolling boil for years. Throw in the national security imperative vis-a-vie the intersection of WMD proliferation and Islamist terrorism and the breaking point cannot be very far off.
Here's another of my old sayings: "Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me."
Keep that one in mind after the next 9/11, if the Bush White House doesn't keep it in mind beforehand.
posted by JASmius at 9:43 AM
<<< Home