The welfare system is a corrupt racket and needs to be reformed even more, but by saying getting rid of welfare will get rid of illegal immigration is just a populist non truth.
"The welfare system is a corrupt racket and needs to be reformed even more, but by saying getting rid of welfare will get rid of illegal immigration is just a populist non truth."
I would agree that it's a non-truth although I don't agree it's a populist one. I'm hardcore anti-illegal immigrant and don't believe for a minute ending welfare would end illegal immigration. Would it affect it? Sure. End it, not even close.
You do know that people can work and still get welfare, right? If you have 5 kids and make 25K a year and live in CA, you are getting some welfare or starving.
We did reform welfare ten years and it haven't slowed down illegal immigration- most people on welfare are women with children, not the type most prefer when it is time to build houses, especially when they can have able bodied men from Mexico. Many of the men who grew up in welfare culture have criminal records that make them unemployable.
If we eliminated welfare, would force more Americans to accept low paying jobs. This would add more people to our already flooded low skill labor market that is flooded due to illegal immigration.
This might eventually result in a decrease in illegal immigration, but only because we would have lowered our low end standard of living to the point where fewer of them felt it was worth immigrating here illegally.
Dealing with corruption and abuse in the welfare system is difficult due to both good and bad aspects of human nature.
The people administering the program are often sympathetic and compassionate. Because of that they may overlook problems. There are also those who are greedy. As well as people who are lazy or simply depressed and disillusioned and can't seem take the steps to get their lives on a productive path.
The other part of human nature that lends helps continue the problems with the system is that there are those who seek to exploit others for their own interests and keeping them dissatisfied and dependent on the system is in their interests. Of course they claim the entire time that they are looking out for those people and it is everyone else that wishes to exploit them.
However illegal immigration is related to our welfare problems. If you reduce the number of illegal immigrants that are flooding the job market, and you have a tighter job market, the wages, benefits, and the quality work environment will on average increase. A tight job market has been shown to significantly decrease the number of people on welfare.
So why is the Democratic Party pushing to grant amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants, which will do even more to put them on par with Americans in the job market, and driver down the standard of living for poorer Americans even farther?
Why are the major labor unions who claim to represent the interests of workers nearly silent on the issue of illegal immigration? Their may make some comments on how illegal immigration is bad to their members, but they throw their political clout and their money behind the same politicians who are pushing for amnesty for the illegal immigrants.
Workers in a tight labor market don't need a union. Happy workers don't need a union. Twelve million or more new legal residents low skilled workers is a huge opportunity for the labor unions which are seeing their power wane.
Giving illegal aliens isn't supported by the majority of Americans. It isn't even supported by the majority of Hispanic voters.
The far left which has taken control of the Democratic Party gains little by improving the quality of life significantly for the poor. Helping them become self sufficient weakens their power. Even if the huge numbers of illegal aliens can't vote for a very long time even after becoming legal, their presence will strengthen the unions, and they will likely add more voters to those who are already dependent on the government.