Illegal-immigration studies reach different conclusions
Illegal-immigration studies reach different conclusions
Howard Fischer, Capitol Media Services
Two commissioned studies suggest contrasting opinions on either side of the employer sanctions argument. One report concludes that the costs of illegal immigration in Arizona are more than offset by the state tax revenue generated by the presence of immigrants here.
The other study suggests Arizona workers lose $1.4 billion in wages a year because companies here hire undocumented workers, according to a study commissioned by the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office.
George Borjas, a professor of economic and social policy at Harvard University, found that having unauthorized workers in the state has reduced the employment rate of legal Arizona residents.
Hit hardest in both wages and job availability, he said, are high school dropouts who, at the bottom of the wage scale, are the ones most likely to be competing with those who are in this country illegally.
FINDINGS DISPUTED
The Borjas study, being presented to U.S. District Judge Neil Wake, was dismissed Monday as largely meaningless by David Selden, the lead attorney for businesses seeking to overturn the new state law that makes it illegal for companies to knowingly employ undocumented workers.
He said it makes irrational assumptions that if all the illegal workers left they would be replaced immediately by legal U.S. residents moving here from other states. Even if that eventually were true, he said, Arizona’s economy would be in shambles by the time that happened.
And Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas conceded that the study, paid for by taxpayers, did not look at what benefits there may be to the state economy by having so many undocumented workers and their families here, both in filling jobs and paying taxes.
Selden wants Wake to pay attention to another study, this one done by Judith Gans, manager of the Immigration Policy Program at the Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy at the University of Arizona.
That report concluded that the costs of illegal immigration in Arizona are more than offset by the state tax revenue generated by the presence of immigrants here.
But that study has its own limits.
While concluding that illegal immigration costs $1.4 billion a year for education, health care and law enforcement, it puts the benefits to Arizona of all immigrant workers at $2.4 billion.
Gans does not, however, figure the benefits solely from those in the country illegally.
Selden acknowledged that gap but said the figure is impossible to compute.
STUDIES ARE CRUCIAL
The competing studies are legally irrelevant to the question of whether the law, known as the Legal Arizona Workers Act, is constitutional.
But they are crucial to efforts by the business community and allies from community activist groups to persuade Wake to prevent anyone from being prosecuted while questions of its legality work their way through the federal court system.
Both Wake and the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals have refused to suspend enforcement of the law, which took effect Jan. 1. But that is based on assurances from county prosecutors they won’t bring charges before Feb. 1; Wake has scheduled a hearing next week and promises to have a ruling by then.
If businesses lose, they will renew their request to block prosecutions while they pursue an appeal.
Thomas said the Borjas study shows why he should be allowed to enforce the law.
He pointed specifically to the conclusion that low-skilled workers are being paid 4.7 percent less than they would otherwise be able to command if they were not competing against undocumented workers.
“Enforcement of the employer sanctions law will help to protect and potentially increase wages in Arizona, especially among lower-skilled workers,â€
Re: Illegal-immigration studies reach different conclusions
Quote:
Originally Posted by GREGAGREATAMERICAN
Gans does not, however, figure the benefits solely from those in the country illegally.
based on assurances from county prosecutors they won’t bring charges
On other words, they include LEGAL immigrants in the benefits side, and leave out anchor babies on the cost side! It is a worthless totally skewed report.
