As time progresses, more and more people from different countries come into the United States. They help combating demographic issues, resolve worker shortages and help the economy by participating in a number of fields. However, some people fear that they may cause crime in America, deprive native-born residents of job opportunities and put the country in debt. In the following text, I will review both the supportive and the opposing side and add my own opinion.
It is important to mention how immigrants tend to affect the economy of the country. According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, they are quite dedicated employees and represent over a third of America’s workforce in certain fields. The immigrants’ presence helps resolve worker shortages and issues that could have otherwise severely damaged the country’s economy. By residing in the country, they assist the senior part of the population by outnumbering retirees and supporting the trust funds of Medicare and Social Security (Sherman et al., 15 August 2019). Children of said immigrants may benefit not only their households, but America’s economy in general.
Immigrants have had a positive effect on working spaces in America. According to the statistics received from the US Bureau of Labor, the participation of foreigners in the workforce was 3.4 percent higher than for native residents. Immigrants had a higher employment rate as well, which was 3.6 percent higher than among locals (Sherman et al. 15 August 2019). The former partake in jobs that have a crucial impact on US economy and communities. Although immigrants without undergraduate degrees tend to be the main focus of this phenomenon, they represent a significant amount of employees in some industries. Employers will face dire consequences if foreigners will no longer have the chance to come to America or stay there.
Yet another important advantage is that immigrants improve the situation in specific fields. The decreased growth rates among the native-born part of America’s population leads to the conclusion that immigrant families contribute to its increase (Sherman et al. 15 August 2019). The recent data received from the Census Bureau states that immigrant-fronted households account for almost 40 percent of household growth. This creates quite a promising future for the housing industry.
At times, families of immigrants who work in jobs with low salaries require financial aid. Programs similar to SNAP and Medicaid assist them in such cases, just like they do with many other US residents. Most foreign-born US residents who receive aid from such programs tend to either be employed themselves or married to a person who works. Nearly 77 percent of those who get financial aid either worked or were married to an employee (Sherman et al., 15 August 2019). This is known as a common feature among low wage workers.
It is necessary to emphasize that the immigrants who receive aid from such programs eventually have higher employment rates. According to data from the years 1999 to 2015, most of the foreign born citizens who benefit from such programs were employed most of the time (Sherman et al., 15 August 2019). The received data reviewed by CBPP demonstrates the connection between financial aid and employment during any year.
Currently, most Western countries, including the US, are experiencing a demographic problem caused by a low birth rate and a large amount of retired citizens. This issue leads to a spike in the dependency ratio, which may severely damage the economy (Pettinger, 14 November 2020). Immigration is the easiest and most useful way of combatting this situation, for it helps fill the country with a significant number of young workers who contribute to government finances and increase the amount of workforce.
Immigrants may also have a positive effect on the demand of the service and goods area. They are known for being one of the causes of GDP growth (Pettinger, 14 November 2020). Even at the beginning of the 20th century, immigration has lead to the fast rate of growth. Said economic growth was measured to be over four percent. This adds to the large list of the positive effects foreign-born residents have on US economy.
Unfortunately, there are some negative views related to this aspect. Some people fear that immigration may lead to the decrease in average job wages and job opportunities (Nowrasteh, 2 May, 2018). As mentioned before, many immigrants without college degrees usually partake in occupations with low salaries. This, in turn, raises concern that employers will no longer create vacancies with decent wages. According to George Borjas’ research, the increase in population has negatively affected salaries in Miami. However, findings that responded to the research have implied that the professor may have changed whom he had surveyed. This leads to the possible conclusion that the discoveries are somewhat biased. Moreover, there are researches that invalidate those fears, since the smallest immigration surplus ignores the positive contributions caused by immigrants.
Some people fear that immigration may lead to a spike in violent crimes. This concern has been around for over a few centuries in America (Nowrasteh, 2 May, 2018). However, as multiple findings from the years 1896, 1909, 1931 and more recent ones have shown, this is not true. According to statistics, Texas’ crime rate was mostly caused by native residents, as opposed to both legal and illegal immigrants (Nowrasteh, 2 May, 2018). The following years have witnessed an even larger decrease in crime among immigrants compared to US-born residents.
The people opposed to immigration fear that their presence may lead to government debt and budget issues. They justify it by stating that foreigners tend to take more from the government than the amount they give to tax revenue (Nowrasteh, 2 May, 2018). In a way, the people opposed to immigration imply that foreign-born US residents seek nothing but benefit, without wanting to be useful to their country of residence. Fortunately, there is some data that can debunk this viewpoint.
What invalidates this fear is that recent findings have shown that immigrants have an almost non-existent effect on the government budget. The model provided by the National Academics of Sciences in their survey related to economics and immigration has demonstrated that native-born US residents are more likely to poorly affect government than foreign born citizens (Nowrasteh, 2 May, 2018). There are two groups of immigrants that may negatively affect the economy: high school dropouts under 25 and highly educated citizens over 64. However, said negative effect is rather minimal, almost nonexistent.
There is a quite common misconception in the list of anti-immigration arguments, which claims that it is easy to move to the United States. In reality, this is false, for the process may take decades. This caused a rather low flow of immigration compared to other OECD countries (Nowrasteh, 2 May, 2018). Another reason for this situation is that other countries are significantly more open to legal immigration. This, perhaps, could explain the existence of illegal immigrants in the United States as well.
Having reviewed the data, I have come to the conclusion that most of the arguments against immigration are either based on negative biases or misinformation. There are many studies that debunk the negative views on that issue and reviewing them has made me certain about my support of immigration. Foreign-born citizens are just as valid as native-born citizens are, and their existence needs to be destigmatized. That way, a brighter future for immigration in the US can be created.
Works Cited
Nowrasteh, Alex. “The 14 Most Common Arguments against Immigration and Why They’re Wrong. Cato Institute 2.5. 2018.” (2019).
Pettinger, Tejvan. “Pros and Cons of Immigration”. EconomicsHelp., 2020
Sherman, Arloc, et al. “Immigrants Contribute Greatly to US Economy, Despite Administration’s Public Charge Rule Rationale.”Center on Budget and Policy Priorities., 2019.