Posted on 10/19/2006 12:21:32 PM PDT by SwinneySwitch
Though they're able to make a modest living off their ranch, Juan León's parents back in Mexico probably would join the ranks of the poor were it not for the precious dollars sent from their children working in the United States.
León, owner of La Taquería Huentitán Jalisco on the near Northwest Side along with his brother Anselmo, sends between $500 and $1,000 to his parents back in Jalisco about four times a year.
"They really count on that money," León said. "Especially if the growing season is not going so well, they depend on those dollars to keep the ranch running."
Their remesas, or remittances, are part of a staggering $24 billion infusion that Mexican immigrants — legal and illegal — will give their homeland this year, according to projections in a report released Wednesday by the Inter-American Development Bank, a lending institution akin to a World Bank for Latin America.
Mexico's chunk is the largest of a total of $63 billion that Latin American migrants all over the world are expected to send home this year, according to the report — more than $45 billion sent from the United States, home to more than 17 million of the estimated 20 million Latin American expatriates.
Don Terry, an administrator with the bank who spearheaded the remittance study, said the issue wasn't analyzed much until a few years ago. The bank's own examinations, dating to 2001, prove that the quantity of migrants and the volume of the money they send home has skyrocketed, and projections show the trend is likely to continue.
"People are flabbergasted when they realize the impact of this issue," Terry said. "For Latin American countries, remittances from abroad add up higher than direct foreign aid."
The remittance influx to Mexico now matches oil as the country's top revenue source. And for smaller countries such as Honduras and El Salvador, a cut in remittances would usher a dive into bankruptcy, said Sergio Bendixen, a Miami-based pollster who conducted a survey of 2,511 U.S-based migrants as well as 30 focus groups throughout Latin America for the IDB report.
The money from abroad is so crucial for many of these countries that it keeps 20 million Latin American families from falling into poverty, Terry said.
In the United States, the money transfers are coming from a wider geographical base than ever — the report lacked figures only for West Virginia and Montana — but the traditional destination states still dominate the tally.
Migrants in Texas will send $5.2 billion this year, second only to California's $13.3 billion. Contributions from Louisiana ballooned from $61 million in 2004 to an estimated $208 million this year, a product of the labor of thousands of migrants who moved to the state for hurricane reconstruction jobs.
In the past five years, based on the poll and the focus groups, Bendixen concluded that the number of migrants sending money home increased from 59 percent to 73 percent — most now dispatching dollars monthly rather than quarterly.
The average transfer went up from $200 to $300, Bendixen said.
Confirming past studies, the IDB report noted that more than half of migrants leave their homelands in search of work in the United States because they couldn't find jobs at home.
Migrants typically find jobs within two weeks to a month, with average earnings of $900 per month.
Readily acknowledging the remittance issue has created political controversy over the issue of illegal immigration, Terry dismissed what he deemed as myths about migrants not contributing to the U.S. economy.
Most migrants, in fact, pay taxes and send only 10 percent of their earnings back home, he said.
But even that amount equates to millions that should remain within U.S. borders, said Jack Martin, spokesman for the Federation for American Immigration Reform, the country's largest immigration-restriction lobbying organization.
"It's a net reduction on our economy. It negatively impacts on our balance-of-payment deficit," Martin said.
The IDB hopes the money going to Latin America can help turn around its economies. Families back home shouldn't be the only ones benefiting from remittances, the report concluded. A system needs to be developed so the money could be used to help Latin American economies prosper.
If they had decent jobs at home, many migrants would stay put, Terry said. A good first step, he noted, would be for the receiving families to look to invest instead of just cashing in — depositing cash into bank accounts instead of taking a wad of bills home, for example.
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hrozemberg@express-news.net
Now you know why Western Union advertises their money wiring service so heavily on television. Money for your Brother-in-Law to fix his car, indeed.
New euphamism alert: "Latin American expatriates."
I'll bet it funds a population explosion. Maybe people should be checked for hospital bills etc before they can remit.
¡Banco de los Estados Unidos!
"Now you know why Western Union advertises their money wiring service so heavily on television."
The Mexican restaurant by my house has a check-cashing service and Western Union in it. You don't have to be a genius to know why.
Move on, nothing to see here.
Motto of the, I am tired of the illegals subject.
Only they arn't supporting with their taxes tens of thousands of them in their county as here in San Diego
Can we write 'em a check for about $200 billion in exchange for not coming here anymore?
A 10% 'fee' on non-business money sent from the U.S. would certainly help offset the costs of illegal immigration. Hello, Congress??? Anybody home???
Bad things are taxed, right? Like tobacco and booze? Cuz we want LESS of the bad thing?
And our gov't needs revenue, right? For the nice midnight basketball games...?
-->WE SHOULD TAX REMITTANCES TO LATIN AMERICA AT 50%.
It will do far more good than any direct foreign aid ever will, as it ends up in the hands of people who will use it effectively, as opposed to foreign aid that will wind up in the offshore bank accounts of the powerful and the connected. Or funneled into one of the several NGOs that are organizing insurrections among the populace.
Seems to me that it should be taxed at the highest tax rate for individuals 38%. The amount withheld in taxes should give a good start on a state of the art wall.
"Any idea why there would be such a big discrepancy?"
Paying off human smugglers/slavers?
Higher cost of living?
Welfare doesn't pay much?
ping
Thanks to our do-nothing congress & president, pretty much anyone can sneak into the US.
So Mexicans in the US have fewer relatives to send money to.....all their relatives are here already.
Mexicans that go to Canada or Spain have a harder time bringing their relatives into those countries. So they still have lots of people in Mexico to send money to.
The Fed is actually making it easier for them to send money home..
"Federal Reserve Bank Assists Illegal Alien Lawbreakers
October 16, 2006
Vox Populi, Jim Kouri
by Jim Kouri, CPP
While the mainstream news media are hard at work covering the Rep. Mark Foley “Pagegate” scandal or helping the Democrats to achieve their dream of capturing control of the House of Representatives and Senate, the Federal Reserve Bank is working with the Mexican government to make it easier for illegal aliens to export US money to their homeland.
The Fed is currently devising several programs that will extend banking services to illegal aliens, according to The Wall Street Journal. Most of this money transfer scheme is being created under the radar and few, if any, political figures are discussing the subject.
One proposal is for a new remittance program with the ultimate goal of bringing illegal Mexican aliens — who send money home — into the mainstream the US financial system, regardless of immigration status. In other words, The Federal Reserve Bank is attempting to aid lawbreakers in moving their cash around in the US and Mexico.
“Directo a Mexico,” the name of the program, enables US commercial banks to make money transfers for Mexican workers through the Federal Reserve’s own automated clearinghouse, which is linked to Banco de Mexico, the Mexican central bank. Few Americans are aware of the connection between the Fed and foreign banks and this program would be just another that exists in the shadow world of international banking.
To use the service, a Mexican need only possess a matricula consular, an ID issued by the Mexican consulate in most major US cities to those with proof of Mexican birth or citizenship, or a picture ID card issued by the US or another foreign government. The idea is to make it cheaper and safer for illegal workers to send funds to their relatives in Mexico."
Read the rest here:
http://mensnewsdaily.com/2006/10/16/federal-reserve-bank-assists-illegal-alien-lawbreakers/
My wife is a legal Mexican immigrant and we send money monthly to Mexico to help out her sister who is in a bad way. So I guess we're part of this "problem". But it's our money and this is what we choose to do with it. And that's true of the other people who send money south as well. People helping their families is a problem? Please.
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