Posted on 05/07/2013 6:46:44 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
The Heritage Foundation has undertaken to back a plausible theory with numbers. The theory is that the amnesty contained in the immigration bill before Congress will cost taxpayers plenty; it is plausible because we have a large redistributive state, and many of the illegal immigrants to whom this bill will grant legal status — and the relatives their legal status will allow them to bring here — will be net recipients of government benefits.
The Heritage researchers assess, in substantial detail, the current benefits received and taxes paid by illegal immigrants and what those numbers will look like after legalization on the terms proposed by the Senate’s bill. The federal government currently spends about $50 billion more on illegal immigrants than it receives from them in taxes each year; after amnesty and an interim period in which access to benefits is restricted, that gap will open to about $100 billion. This adds up to $6.3 trillion in benefits that legal taxpayers will have to fund for legalized immigrants over their lifetimes; some of those benefits would have to be provided in the absence of amnesty, but a large fraction would result from the legislation.
Supporters of the bill are pointing out, quite correctly, that Heritage has not performed a complete analysis of the bill’s effects. The report looks only at the bill’s provisions affecting illegal immigrants, and not, for example, at its guest-worker programs. Further, Heritage does not claim to forecast the bill’s effects on the overall economy, and therefore does not include these effects in its calculation of the cost to taxpayers.
Theirs is a “static,” not a “dynamic,” score. So far, though, the Heritage analysis is the best available, and the attempts by supporters of the bill to produce dynamic analyses that further their cause have been sketchy at best.
The American Action Forum released a highly optimistic assessment of the benefits of higher immigration levels, calculating that GDP growth would rise by about a percentage point in the near term, which by itself would reduce the budget deficit by about $2.7 trillion over ten years. Liberal critics of dynamic scoring have always said that it is merely wishful thinking, and in this case the criticism holds. The Forum not only ignored entirely the impact of amnesty and of higher immigration levels on the cost of federal welfare programs, but relied on fanciful and discredited assumptions about the economic benefits of immigration. Their effort should be dismissed out of hand.
We may yet get something better. The Congressional Budget Office has said that it will take account of some of the bill’s possible effects on the economy in assessing the Gang of Eight’s proposals, and their attendant effects on economic growth, revenues, and fiscal outlays. Yet the CBO, too, will not produce a complete assessment. It will look at a ten-year budget window: Conveniently, the Gang of Eight’s bill bars amnestied immigrants from receiving most federal benefits for ten years; after that, the costs will stack up. In addition, the CBO does not take into account the Medicare and Social Security liabilities that amnestied illegal aliens will begin accruing immediately. Nonetheless, their approach provides hints as to what a true dynamic scoring might look like, and other such assessments will be worthwhile.
Economic interests should not be the sole determinant of our immigration policy. If granting legal status to illegal immigrants were a requirement of justice, we would just have to pay whatever costs it entailed. Senator Marco Rubio has, to his credit, said clearly that he does not agree with this view of justice: Legal status is something we provide, he argues, because it serves our interests as part of a larger reform. That means we have to know the costs and the benefits. Heritage has gone farther than anyone else so far in putting numbers on them. If supporters of the legislation have any better analysis to offer, now’s their chance.
USA is becoming California. Look how well that is working!
CATO - Promoting an American public policy based on individual liberty, limited government, free markets and peaceful international relations. HELLO???!!??!!!
Breitbart dot com reported Rubio co-opt’ed with Cato Institute and another think tank to message his amnesty bill so it would be more palatable for the conservatives. (Spit!)
The problem here is that Heritage assumes the those with newly minted legal status will have to wait 13 years before beginning to feed at the public teet. It won’t be that long. It will only take one liberal judge to declare them eligible for benefits. Obama won’t defend the Gang of Eight’s bill and even if he does, does any one expect the Democrat Senate to do a damn thing to reverse the judge’s ruling when it’s a boondoggle for them votewise?
Quick some one find some black conservatives and dress them as Black Panthers to police the precincts for voter fraud. Once the DOJ sees the BP outfits, they’ll look the otherway just like they did in Philly.
I am so tired of the Right being so stupid as to begin debating the immigration issue and using the false, fake, phony wordsmithed words of the communist left. We have lost the debate before our first point is made when we let communists define the terms.
There is no such animal as an illegal immigrant. PERIOD.
If you sneak into a country you are not immigrating. PERIOD.
They are Criminal Trespassers, Invaders, and have violated the law with the very first act entering this country.
To allow a single one to stay is a crime committed by government on its own citizens.
We absolutely need a strong verifiable temporary worker program where appropriate safeguards can be applied and appropriate taxes collected.
We should not continue to steal from productive legal citizens to feed, provide clothing, provide medical benefits, educational benefits to CRIMINAL TRESPASSERS and Illegal invaders.
I am so pissed at ALL our elected officials who will spend every possible penny of money stolen from me and other productive people to BUY VOTES. This criminal enterprise has to be stopped and if it takes a Thomas Jefferson moment then I can find no better time than NOW.
No amount of talk or elections will save America now.
CATO is about as Economic Anti-American as any of the Amnesty pushers
Your biggest Illegal Alien Amnesty supporters tend to be very Open Borders, support Free Trade, support bad trade pacts like NAFTA, and are treasonously weak on Border and National Security. In this age of Islamic Terrorism, cyber insecurity, and violent criminal cartels....the days of feel-good liberal Globalism are over
CATO needs to chill on its version of liberal utopia
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