Mexico has some extremely wealthy elite people who feel they have earned that right by birth and no one else is entitled to gain status or wealth. They do a great job at protecting their status- no mingling of classes or marrying up in Mexico. The system doesn’t even force the rich to contribute to the infastructure- the rich keep all their money to spend, the majority of taxes they do pay go into the pockets of other elite (corrupt gov’t officials). Spending the money on infastructure would create jobs for the poor that would allow them to get ahead. That is why Mexico appears to be a poor country. Mexico is not a poor country; they have an abundance of natural resources- they just refuse to do anything that might upset their class structure.
This is why all efforts on the part of the U.S. to help Mexico have failed miserably. The elite simply pocket the money or take other resources we give them. When we attempt to help the poor in Mexico we are only further lining the pockets of the rich- there is no trickle down in Mexico, everything is closely held at the top.
There are really only two classes in Mexico, the rich and the poor; their system does not allow for a middle class. Poor people in Mexico are really limited as to what they can do to gain status or wealth- realistically the only way they can gain wealth is through illegal activities- and they have to pay off and keep the elite happy or they can’t even do that. The system is very discriminatory and centers on racism- against the usually darker skinned Mestizo or mixed race people that make up the poor class. They simply do not care what happens to their poor- they can starve in the streets for all they care- that is why they encourage the poor to come to the U.S. it is an easy way for them to deal with their poor. By allowing illegals to come here we are only enabling the elite in Mexico- to keep their system the way they like it.
I know of a U.S. District Judge who was appointed to the Federal Bench, by President Reagan, and unanimously confirmed by the Senate, in about 1985. He sometimes tells the story that shortly after he became a Federal Judge he visited Mexico as part of some sort of international judicial systems exchange program. While speaking informally to a group of leading Mexican jurists he was asked how he, a relatively young man of Mexican heritage, had been risen to be a Federal Judge, with lifetime tenure. With what he intended to be self-depracating humor, he said that his mother had worked as a maid in Los Angeles, and that he was the illegitimate son of Ronald Reagan.
None of the Mexican dignitaries present laughed, or even batted an eye, they just nodded sagely. That Ronald Reagan would make an important appointment based not on what was best for th ecountry, but to provide for a bastard son by giving him a prestigious lifetime job on the Federal payroll, and that the United States Senate would go along with it without protest, or even comment, made perfect sense to them -- it was how things worked in Mexico.
Excellent and insightful post.
Actually, we just may be supporting discrimination by allowing illegals to live here - they need to return or be returned to their own country and support an effort to change things - without an middle class, nothing can happen that will be good for poor people - it’s the same thing we are asking of people in Iran and Iraq - step up, we cannot continue to support the world. We need help.