Posted on 11/27/2005 11:14:37 AM PST by yoe
In a surprising trend that's just come to light, more than half of Chinese immigrant mothers surveyed in New York are sending their babies back to China, a new study reveals.
Facing substantial debt and six-day workweeks, the majority of mothers - many of them illegal aliens - said the lack of affordable child care in the city forced them to send their babies to relatives in China for the children's early years.
Business cards printed in Chinese can be found littered around the streets of Chinatown offering to courier babies to China for about $1,000, the New York Sun reports.
The study, "Prolonged Separation Among Chinese Immigrant Families in New York City," was based on interviews with 219 pregnant women using prenatal services at health clinics in Manhattan's Chinatown and in Flushing, Queens.
Lead researcher Henry Chung, a clinical associate professor of psychiatry at New York University, found that 57 percent of the women surveyed at the clinics - who tend to be poorer and more recent immigrants than the overall Chinese population in New York - are being forced by economic necessity to send babies to China soon after birth.
One Chinese woman, an illegal immigrant, told the Sun she plans to send her infant daughter Angela to live with her grandparents in a small town in Fujian Province four months after her birth.
"I would love to be able to look at her face every day, but financially I can't have her," the woman, who lives in a one-bedroom apartment she shares with another family, said through a translator.
"I have to go back to work."
Since arriving in the U.S., the woman and her husband have worked at least 12 hours a day to pay off the $50,000 debt they owe to smugglers.
"For Angela, to move to China is the best for her future," the new mom said. "This way my husband can save money for our own place when she comes back."
Illegal immigrants whose children are born in the U.S. can qualify for subsidized child care, but many are afraid to provide proof of employment and worry about revealing their immigration status.
Private day care is far too expensive for most of the immigrants.
Children often return to America in time for kindergarten. But some face problems learning English, adjusting to American culture and relating to their parents, whom they have often spoken to only on the phone.
"They need time to adjust because their grandparents spoiled them in China," said a family worker at a school in Chinatown - where about a third of the pre-kindergarten class lived in China before returning to America.
Everything is wrong with this picture; what can our Senators and Congressmen be thinking of; where is the INS, ICE and the powers that be in New York; this woman can afford $1,000.00 but cant afford day care? She openly admits she is illegal but has a job, got medical care for and during her pregnancy in New York? What the un-holy heck is going on here?!!! You cant smoke in New York but you can have babies for free from illegal mothers???????!!!
In the spirit of Tammany Hall, she is given benefits in the exchange that she will vote Democrat.
From Wikipedia,
"The name "Tammany" is that of a Native American leader of the Lenape and the society adopted many Native American words and customs, going so far as to call its hall a wigwam. By 1798, however, the Society's activities had grown increasingly politicized and eventually Tammany emerged as the central proponent of anti-Federalist Jeffersonian policies in the city of New York. Aaron Burr adapted and expanded the Tammany society into a political machine for his election of 1800. Throughout the early 19th century Tammany continued to deepen its association with the Democratic Party, emerging as the controlling interest in New York City elections after Andrew Jackson's presidential victory in 1828. Throughout the 1830s and 1840s the Society expanded its political control even further by earning the loyalty of the city's ever-expanding immigrant community, a task that was accomplished by helping newly-arrived foreigners obtain jobs, a place to live, and even citizenship so that they could vote for Tammany candidates in city and state elections. The mass immigrant constituency primarily functioned as a base of political capital."
A thousand dollars probably doesn't go that far in child care.
What would you rather have? Someone who works twelve hour days and sends her newborn out of the country for a few years,
or third-generation welfare queens who've never had a job while birthing lots of children to lots of jobless fathers, all living off your taxes?
I know which I prefer.
Says something about a place when a parent would send a child to a communist controlled third world shit hole rather than rear him/her in that place.
- many of them illegal aliens
One Chinese woman, an illegal immigrant, told the Sun she plans to send her infant daughter Angela to live with her grandparents in a small town in Fujian Province four months after her birth.
"I would love to be able to look at her face every day, but financially I can't have her," the woman, who lives in a one-bedroom apartment she shares with another family, said through a translator.
----How about keeping them legs together and carry your ass back where you belong with your baby since you are here illegally? WTF is going on? This whole "illegally here" crap is wearing thin. They should NOT recieve one damn thing from America if they are not LEGAL citizens. We have enough people on the dole here already without exporting them from other countries for us taxpayers to keep footing the bill. I don't know about you other FReepers , but this gal is getting sick of supporting a bunch of illegals that keep coming in by the swarms every day while the bastards that hire them/give freebies to ,get richer and richer!
And none of us are surprised.
Actually, there are some things that they should receive from America. Detention, then deportation, then eternal scorn for violating our sovereign borders and laws barring them from ever reentering our nation.
I would rather have people who wait to have children until they can afford to raise them. I also question the love a a parent that would send their child away with a stranger for $1,000.
I'd rather have neither.
Yeah, but the companies are showing a profit.
I know a wonderful Chinese family down the street who jumped through hoops for a decade to get their family here. The woman I am talking about escaped China twice once only to be caught & sent to a prison work camp. She was eventually able to bribe her way out and finally made it to America where she worked in downtown Los Angeles sewing garments. She saved every penny she could & after 5 years started her own restaurant. When I met her, she had already brought her parents over & her brother had been on the "Waiting List" for 7 years. Legal immigration takes a lot of time. This family works hard & makes great food. They are only closed 4 times a year (New Years day, Chinese New Year, Thanksgiving & Christmas). She is a legal citizen now & so is her family. They waited their turn and are proud Americans. She has told me that she would never return to China and is still trying to get other relatives here to share the American dream.
Just in time for the nanny state to take over. With bi-lingual teachers, too, I bet.
"Since arriving in the U.S., the woman and her husband have worked at least 12 hours a day to pay off the $50,000 debt they owe to smugglers."
Muchas Gracias Sr. Presidente Bush.
If I knew how to say that in Chinese I would.
Our society is condoning this disgusting exploitation.
Plus, it's more than just money. It's cultural. I have a Chinese friend here in the US who has said that she would do the same thing. I was shocked. While she isn't wealthy by any stretch, it's just part of the Chinese expectation. Her brother, still in China, has his toddler living with her parents. The parents work hard and make a lot of money during the week and see him on weekends. My friend wishes to do the same thing, even though they live here in the US. I just looked at the pictures they took during a trip back this summer. The only babies I saw were with grandparents.
Despite the abortion clinics, the United States is - a baby farm? Who knew?
/sarcasm .
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