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Thanks for the post. I too think this was generally a very good article. However, I think Hansen underplays several facts. First of all, I think a good number of the illegals do eventually manage to make it into the middle class, or even the upper middle class, or their kids eventually do. Secondly, they often become quite wealthy in Mexico. Not all of the money remitted to Mexico is spent on superfluidities like snakeskin boots. Much of it goes to buy nice houses, land and to start profitable businesses which thrive off of fellow Mexicans who are stuck in Mexico. Mexico in general is much more of a "land economy" rather than a "wage economy" as compared to the U.S. So when you have got your land you have "made it", so to speak.

Between his tendancy to minimize acquired U.S. wealth and acquired Mexican wealth, I think Hansen paints in general too bleak of a picture for the immigrant, although many do suffer tragically or even perish arriving to the U.S.

However the biggest mystery to me is why everyone turns a blind eye to problems with the Mexican government and civil society. The whole discussion about illegal immigration is all about problems in the U.S. or with the immigrants. There is such a dearth of discussion in all of this which seriously criticizes the enormous problems with Mexican civil society or their government. No one talks about that. Go figure.