Posted on 04/19/2008 5:12:20 PM PDT by Clintonfatigued
In 2007, "remittances," money sent back by Mexican workers to families in Mexico, beat out tourism as the second largest source of foreign money into the country. Only oil exports accounted for more.
That is $24 billion that was taken out of the American economy. It was not spent in American stores. Best Buy sold fewer televisions. Ford sold fewer cars and trucks. Winn Dixie and Safeway sold fewer groceries. U.S. Steel sold less steel. And yes, even Exxon/Mobil sold less gasoline than it could have. Those fewer sales curtailed the growth of jobs for Americans in those companies. It was taken completely out of our economy.
Most of this $24 billion was earned by illegals. That is not my statistic, it comes from the Mexican Government. According to the Washington Post.
Still, an estimated 400,000 to 650,000 Mexicans -- three-quarters of whom are undocumented -- cross the border each year to look for work in the United States, according to Mexican government estimates.
And it has really helped out down in ol' Mexico.
The money has transformed the landscape of many small towns, paying for new houses and new kitchens, cars and childcare, medical care and clothes.
So we know they paid the mortgages in Mexico. What about all the Mexicans in America that are having their homes foreclosed on in record numbers? How many mortgage payments were sent to Mexico instead of to American mortgage companies? How many American neighborhoods could have kept up their property values if not for so many of these foreclosures?
So not only did the money not stay in the United States, it was earned without paying federal or state income taxes, Social Security taxes, or Medicare taxes.
(Excerpt) Read more at redstate.com ...
Thanks for the open borders, Jorge Bush!
Giant sucking sound continues....
Seems like California ought to get some of that money to help pay for all the social services that the illegals aren’t paying for. Which is probably why they can afford to send a whole tanker car full of money back to Mexico.
Something verrrrrrrrry wrong with this picture.
But FairTax will fix all this, as we give them monthly checks and they send that money flying on home to Mexico.
That is SO true!
Nearly everybody at FR worships (rightfully so) Sowell and Williams, and yet, hardly any of us, it seems, have read what they have to say about sending greenbacks out of the country.
Butt, butt there was that clown on c-span this morning talking about how much good the Latino thieves did for America, you know doing jobs no one else would do and etc.
No problemo. Just print more more money to make up the difference. The gov knows how to do that.
Isn't that a sad state of affairs? What the heck, we still have GOOGLE!
Ford Motor Company. Last Trade: 7.45
We had a trade deficit last year with Mexico of $75B. That is, we bought $75B more of their stuff than they bought of our stuff. Adding that to the $24B, we now have a $99B cash flow deficit with Mexico.
I don’t believe Mexico is hoarding all this money — they would be foolish to be piling up a pyramid of greenbacks — so it either gets recycled into purchases from other countries, investments in other countries, or investments in the U.S.
This $24B figure doesn’t necessarily mean anything at all.
The dollar isn’t worth much so maybe it is just as well that we export it..........................
You should be censored. That in not supposed to be the way to think!
Luckily, free speech and free thought still go together! Here, at least...
1) its the most efficient form of "foreign aid." It goes right to families and the poor instead of to some government agent's cousin's son. It is earned income, not just a gift. And it is spent by poorer families on what they need, not what the government thinks they should need.
2) People making this money are buying a lot of things in the U.S. as well, thus increasing demand for goods. You can't talk about people earning money and sending it home if you don't talk about the money they spend in the U.S. as well.
3) This is not a zero sum game. If a worker did not create that wealth, it may not have been created at all. The pie grows every year because we have more people creating more wealth. The idea that the pie is one size and every dollar one person gets comes out of the pocket of another person is a fundamental flaw in the economic thinking of the left. I hope the right doesn't go down that path of ignorance. The wealth creation happening because workers are working inside a capitalist society should be applauded, not derided.
None of this takes away from the fact that people illegal working should not be working. But that's a rule of law issue, not an economic issue. The economics are in favor of allowing more people to migrate to where they can create the most wealth for their work. Thanks to our successful capitalist system, that means economics alone would lead to an inflow of working immigrants.
Also if it wasn't a rule of law issue, then the easiest solution (which fixes most of the "don't pay taxes, taxpayers cover their expenses" etc arguments) is to legalize all of them. Lift the cap on immigration and those problems disappear.
Illegal immigration is a law and order issue, not an economic issue.
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