Listing The Cost of Illegal Immigration (Help Complete The List!) - Vanity

soccer8 | 4 February 2007 | self

[batter]

The Utah State Legislature may consider a bill proposed by Utah Latino Leaders but not yet drafted that will “study of the economic impact of undocumented immigrants to Utah's budget and economy.” The bill appears to be in response to a legislative audit request (a legislator initiates these) to determine the cost of educating illegal immigrants' children.

You will note the bill will likely have an inherent bias and other legislators will hopefully attempt to amend the bill to allow a full accounting of the costs and benefits illegal immigrants provide (especially if tax funds will be used to pay for the study). The benefits are certainly taken care of, therefore, I am only interested in listing the costs.

In an effort to assist legislators, I compiled my own list regarding some of the costs which should be evaluated in the study.

I would like FReepers to add anything you think I missed.

Here's the list:

Health Care

• Emergency Room visits – uninsured patient costs (no reimbursement), increased use/stress on ERs due to caring for routine problems typically taken to family practitioners.

• Insurance costs – hospitals inflate bills to insurance companies in an attempt to recoup some of the uninsured costs, costs are passed along to the insured in the form of decreased benefits and/or increased premiums/deductibles/payments etc.

• Effect on legal low-incomes – resources reserved for the needy may be stretched thin or inadequate to fulfill needs due to the added burden of illegal immigrant families (and their 'health care subsidized' employers). This would include hospitals, clinics for the poor, and sundry charitable efforts.

• State/Federal programs – Emergency Medicaid (such as labor & delivery) is granted without verification of documentation. A contact working in a related state agency notes that, frequently, stolen/false SSNs are used on forms but nothing can be done due to medical confidentiality laws (even law enforcement and US Marshals cannot be granted the information). This all raises the burden on State and US taxpayers.

Law Enforcement (including local law enforcement)

• Incarceration costs.

• General enforcement costs – the apprehension of criminals prior to incarceration.

• Identity theft (1) – enforcement and manpower etc costs (such as the Swift Meats plant crackdowns by ICE).

• Identity theft (2) – costs to victims (time and monetary, also - "time is money") and companies assisting those victims (the credit companies, like Equifax etc, banks, various credit lenders and banks).

***NOTE: Portions of this are federal costs, but Utah taxpayers also pay federal taxes.

Monetary

• Money sent back to illegal immigrant's home country is taken from state and local economies. It may be argued that legal immigrants do so as well. However, the study is to measure the specific impact of illegal immigrants. Additionally, I would argue that, as a country and state, we fully accepted the cost of legal immigrants doing so (we provided their legal status); illegal immigrants, however, never gave us the opportunity to place their cost into our national balance sheets. Thus, the cost is not accounted for.

• Future value of the above money is lost – it is out of the economy (it's in Europe's, Asia's, South America's, Africa's,...).

Transportation

• Insurance – similar to health insurance – costs are increased due to uninsured motorists and under-insured motorists. Costs are passed on to the injured.

• General accidents with injury – health insurance and the injured (as well as their families) bear the costs (including lost wages, ER bills, etc). Lost wages may also affect house, car etc payments.

• Drunk driving incidents – recently an illegal immigrant rolled his truck and left it in the middle of a road. Later a nurse stopped to see if anyone needed help and was killed by another driver that ran into the overturned truck. In December, three members of a family were killed. This brings law enforcement cost as well as costs to the family (funeral, emotional, loss of a provider's income etc).

• Miscellaneous transportation – increased traffic on roads, pollution costs, (these may be relatively small depending on the proportion of illegal immigrants in a given area).

Labor

• Wages – wages are artificially suppressed by a labor pool willing to work at reduced rates and by employers more than willing to take care of that low cost labor.

• Loss of Monetary Fluidity (disposable income) – goes along with wage suppression – occupations once providing a middle or middle-lower income now only provide a low income resulting in the depressed economic activity. (For example, the meat packing industry wagers were in the $19 per hour range twenty years ago, now the rate is $9.50). The money is now used for food and make ends meet rather than providing an economic stimulus. Future value of the economic stimulus is also lost.

Education

• Specialized educators/training – ESL teachers, initial and ongoing training, resources and materials

• General educational costs – Classrooms, teacher salaries, lights, misc. overhead

• Universities – in-state tuition is granted to illegal immigrants (provided they attended high school in the state) while legal immigrants pay non-resident tuition (or even higher 'international student' tuition) rates. Even if they did attend high school in Utah, they would be ineligible for the tuition break. If illegal immigrants had obeyed the law the too would pay the higher tuition rate. This results in a monetary cost to the state's taxpayers.

• Question – are illegal immigrants enrolled in above state tuition programs eligible for Pell Grants/ or reduced/subsidized student loans?

General State/Federal (and Local) Programs

• Driver Privilege Cards – program administration, overhead, materials etc. (The fees may cover these costs or even generate revenues).

• It is believed (within regulating agencies) that illegal immigrants may also be eligible for subsidized daycare.

• Children born here (this may not be a valid cost as they are citizens, while their family is not) are eligible for welfare, food stamps, CHIP (Children's Health Insurance Program), WIC (Women Infants Children) etc. Nevertheless, there is a belief (within regulating agencies) that otherwise ineligible parties have acquired these resources. Again, the burden may be borne by taxpayers and charities and denied to otherwise eligible recipients.

• IMO – except for the "driver cards" (unless they have a trucking/delivery job), the above are, ultimately, a subsidy for employers of illegal immigrants.

Included in all this should be not only be the direct expenditures but also the indirect costs associated with program administration (including mundane form processing) by administrative staff and other professionals (such as the pay, health care benefits, special training, special recruiting, overhead etc).

Additionally, costs to local governments and entities (such as water and sewer districts) rather than just State Government should be evaluated. If we're really going to do this analysis – lets make it complete!

[ridesthemiles]

If I were the payroll person who had the same person appear with whole new identity, I would tell my boss to stop such practices. If they would refuse, I would quit/ report them to the IRS, and ICE in that order.
I would have ulcers within a week if I had to stay and watch that happening under my nose with forms I was required to sign to various state & Federal agencies, not to mention workmen's comp insurance reports.
My reputation means more to me than that kind of behavior from a boss.

[texastoo]

Please add any omissions etc you may notice!

Regarding health care, don't forget the $1 billion that was added to the Medicare Bill to pay for the illegal alien's hospital bills on the border. All Americans have to subsidize the border hospitals.

[azhenfud]

This should fall under the "HEALTH" heading, but millions of unimmunized/improperly immunized people entering the US is a health disaster in the making.

Americans also ought to be asking, "WHY was/is there an E-coli outbreak in spinach; Why was/is there e-coli in meats? Why are once-thought eradicated/controlled diseases again resurfacing? Do I want to expose my children to these improperly immunized/screened children?" Then Americans ought evaluate those specific industries and their association with the illegal alien population and those specific outbreaks to regions where more illegal aliens are enrolled in schools.



The answer is apparent.

[Nea Wood]

Your post could have been written by me. I don't eat out anymore, nor do I patronize businesses in my neighborhood. The employees do not speak English. They are surly and rude. They act put out if asked to speak English. The music and announcements over the stores' PA systems are in Spanish. Even the junk mail advertising the local businesses is all in Spanish. I have to drive miles out of my way to find businesses with courteous, competent, English-speaking employees, and it's getting harder and harder to find.

[who knows what evil?]

How about the cost in human life? According to Congressman Steve King's office (R-Iowa); 25 Americans PER DAY are killed by illegal aliens on our soil...that is nearly 50,000 DEAD Americans since 9/11. Apparently; not too high a price to pay for cheaper produce. Pictures of the victims, along with a lot of additional info, can be found at this link.

[lonewacko_dot_com]

Does Dane count as a cost? But, seriously, these are non-financial costs as well:

- giving political power to groups like NCLR, LULAC, etc.
- giving political power inside the U.S. to Mexico
- political corruption

[gubamyster]

ping

[taxed2death]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1676807/posts

[TLI]

What is the cost of the utter anger and frustration that comes from watching the federal government that is SUPPOSED to represent American Citizens kissing up to criminal illegal alien border violators?

What is the cost of having a government that is not the slightest bit interested in governing “from the consent of the governed?”

What is the worth of this nation prior to being destroyed by traitor politicians that are swallowing the lie of the “immigration vote?”

What is the cost of all the lives that were laid down to maintain the principles of our founding fathers and not the principles of cheap labor for cheating businesses?

What are these things worth? What priced to we place on the united States of America?

[LNewman]

Could go under several categories, but under "Law Enforement" - cost of interpreters.

[wolfcreek]

What gets me is why, with all these illegals in the US, do prices continue to rise on goods, food, services, etc. when they should make the *price of doing business* more profitable.


If We somehow rid ourselves of this invasion, what will the Corps and other businesses do to retaliate?


Since, IMO, We haven't been reaping the benefits of this of all this cheap labor, there must be laws designed to prevent companies from *sticking it to us* when their slave-labor is no more. (additional Leg. expense)

[calcowgirl]

I haven't thought the whole thing through, but here are a few items that come to mind:

• Courts. The cost of defending and prosecuting defendants in the courts, including deporation proceedings, etc. This would include the cost of making available judges, attorneys, court officers, interpreters, etc.

• Language. As long as people are not adequately fluent in English, there are a host of costs incurred by the public sector to make information available in a host of languages. Websites, laws, voting material, etc.

• Housing Assistance. This probably fits under your last category of "General State/Federal (and Local) Programs." I think there are a lot more benefits and services that are available to illegal immigrants under this category.

[maxwellp]

"Deterioration of neighborhoods as illegals cram three or four families into a unit designed for one."

Imagine trying to sell a decent house next door or nearby where such illegals are living. Particularly during warm weather. This happened to friends of ours in Long Island, N.Y. A real estate agent told them their lovely home would depreciate at about $10,000/week.

[rarenmrepublican]

How about deterioration of patriotism? Here in Southern New Mexico American students are being taught that the U.S. stole this land from Mexico. That the border crossed Mexico not that the illegal immigrants crossed the border.

[television is just wrong]

the printing of all documents, voting, schools, all businesses in bi-lingual. I notice most school notices are in english, spanish, and not some other of the 60+ languages now spoken in this state.

[TheLion]

Bttt!

[Dante3]

Negative environmental impact is enormous. The silence of many of the leading environmentalist on this topic is deafening. It cause controversy in the Sierra Club which ended up not speaking up on this issue - demonstrating that the environment is not the top priority of majority of those in charge of the Sierra Club.

[maxwellp]

There's that too. I feel illegals have absolutely no understanding what America is about and will never understand the miracle that is America.

[batter]

Thanks. In terms of the car accidents, I think it would fall under the insurance category. Those companies, the victim, and the rest of us get stuck with the bill (and higher insurance rates).

[batter]

Thanks! I forgot about all the translation costs (I just thought of the ESL stuff).