I like the hyprocracy where Americans and Canadians will now (starting in 2007) need a passport in crossing their shared border for extra security because of the 'threat of terrorists coming in from Canada' when 11 million illegal immigrants have slipped across the border from Mexico so easily.
As a legal immigrant myself and seeing how hard it was for my parents to get into Canada (and for my cousin to be an american citizen) I think it's ridiculous that illegal immigrants should be given any sympathy at all. Then again if ONLY for practical reasons, things need to be fixed becuase you simply cannot deport 11 million people.
As for the economic impact of illegals, as Paul Krugman wrote in his OP-ED in the March 27th edition of the New York Times, since 1980 illegals have only contributed to a fraction of 1% of new GDP growth in the USA. The fact is, while it's true that they take a lot of jobs, it's also true that there's a lot of natural born Americans without jobs. These people would gladly take the jobs the illegals take if not for the fact that the never ending stream of illegals depresses the wages artificially because they are willing to do anything, and also have the connections between them to keep getting family members the job openings.
It's also a fact that when these people bring their families into the US, they suck local resources in health care and schools even as they pay little to no taxes because of their illegal status. In fact this is becoming a problem in staes like California.
As a legal immigrant myself and seeing how hard it was for my parents to get into Canada (and for my cousin to be an american citizen) I think it's ridiculous that illegal immigrants should be given any sympathy at all. Then again if ONLY for practical reasons, things need to be fixed becuase you simply cannot deport 11 million people.
As for the economic impact of illegals, as Paul Krugman wrote in his OP-ED in the March 27th edition of the New York Times, since 1980 illegals have only contributed to a fraction of 1% of new GDP growth in the USA. The fact is, while it's true that they take a lot of jobs, it's also true that there's a lot of natural born Americans without jobs. These people would gladly take the jobs the illegals take if not for the fact that the never ending stream of illegals depresses the wages artificially because they are willing to do anything, and also have the connections between them to keep getting family members the job openings.
It's also a fact that when these people bring their families into the US, they suck local resources in health care and schools even as they pay little to no taxes because of their illegal status. In fact this is becoming a problem in staes like California.
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