Thread: Illegals costing Colorado millions

I think this study was done to offset the estimated costs by Defend Colorado Now. I think the numbers are bogus because they have factored in how much sales tax illegals pay which is an impossible number to come up with. They have also factored a property tax payment by counting rent payments as indirectly paying property tax. I beleive that Defend Colorado Now's numbers are closer to the acutal cost than the study this reporter chose to use.

http://www.gazette.com/display.php?i...&secid=1Study: Illegals costing Colorado millions

U.S. should reimburse state for gap, official says

By PERRY SWANSON THE GAZETTE

Illegal immigrants in Colorado use nearly $225 million in state and local government services annually, while paying between $159 million and $194 million in state and local taxes, according to a new study.

That leaves an estimated gap of $31 million to $66 million that must be paid so illegal immigrants can attend schools and get emergency medical care. The cost of incarcerated illegal immigrants is also factored in.

Because the federal government mandates that most of those services be provided, it should pick up a larger portion of the tab and help offset the gap, said Wade Buchanan, president of the Denver-based Bell


Policy Center, which issued the findings Friday.

He said proposals to deny services to illegal immigrants sidestep the problem of who pays for what.

“The real issue may be that the federal government should do a better job reimbursing the states for these costs,” Buchanan said in a statement accompanying the research. The federal government makes some small reimbursements that should be increased, the center says.

The study is the latest contribution to Colorado’s red-hot debate over illegal immigration. Colorado is home to an estimated 225,000 to 275,000 illegal immigrants. Gov. Bill Owens has called state lawmakers to Denver starting Thursday to sort out policies including whether some services should be denied to illegal immigrants.

The services measured in the Bell Policy Center study can’t be denied because federal law requires them. Jail costs are included because illegal immigrants suspected of committing crimes are held in county jails.

Questions about how much illegal immigrants cost taxpayers, and how much they pay in taxes, are at the heart of the debate. Answers to the questions are slippery, though, because experts can only guess at the illegal immigrant population and the range of government services illegals use.

A group called Defend Colorado Now, which supports measures to stop illegal immigration, issued a report in March claiming illegal immigrants cost state taxpayers more than $1 billion annually.

Rich Jones, the Bell Policy Center’s director of research and policy, acknowledged the conflicting assertions might be confusing to people following the debate.

“The average person does have to kind of read through and look at the sources and look at how they figured it out,” he said.

Sales taxes are the biggest source of revenue from illegal immigrants, at $125 million to $151 million annually, the Bell Policy Center found. Many illegal immigrants also pay state income taxes and, indirectly, property taxes via rent payments.

For the typical illegal immigrant household, the annual bill for state and local taxes amounts to $1,861 or 6.8 percent of annual income, the study found. The calculation assumes a household pays state income tax and that the annual household income in Colorado is the same as the national average for illegal immigrant families.

Education accounts for the largest portion of costs identified in the study, at nearly $176 million. The Bell Policy Center estimated 28,480 illegal immigrant children are in Colorado and assumed each receives school services worth the average $6,167 in government funding.

Accounting for the costs of illegal immigrants and their tax contributions, state taxpayers are paying $31 million to $66 million per year to support illegal immigrants.

But it’s normal for lowwage workers to receive more from the government than they contribute, said Dan Griswold, director of the Center for Trade Policy Studies at the Cato Institute, a Washington think tank. Griswold, who was The Gazette’s editorial page editor from 1983 to 1995, said fixing that imbalance is important, but it’s secondary to other issues in the immigration debate.

“For the governor and other people to talk about illegal immigration as imposing some kind of crushing burden on Colorado and local governments is, I think, an exaggeration that is not supported by the evidence,” he said. “The costs are real, but they are not overwhelming, and I think the proposal of establishing some kind of federal aid program is not unreasonable.”

A federal aid program like the one the Bell Policy Center proposed is part of the sweeping immigration reform proposal the Senate passed in May, said Sheri Steisel, an immigration expert for the National Conference of State Legislatures. The House of Representatives passed a different measure last year, and now leaders are working to resolve the differences.

The program would get money from fees that immigrants pay when they apply for legal residence or a guest worker program, Steisel said. The money would be sent to states, which could use it to offset spending on education, medical care and jails.

CONTACT THE WRITER: 636-0187 or perry.swanson@gazette.com

As an accountant, I know, very well how the sales tax structure works. I have to calculate it for many of my clients.

For the typical illegal immigrant household, the annual bill for state and local taxes amounts to $1,861 or 6.8 percent of annual income, the study found. The calculation assumes a household pays state income tax and that the annual household income in Colorado is the same as the national average for illegal immigrant families.

I would be very interested to know how they come up with this number. Our sales tax structure here is a very convoluted one (you have state sales tax, county sales taxes, regional sales taxes, RTD sales taxes, and city sales taxes) depending on where you live. So, the total could be anywhere from almost 9% to a low of 3.9%.

And I wonder if they factored in the amount of food that can be received by various county social services agencies FOR FREE.

Many, many, many years ago, I had a boss who was absolutely wonderful. He was the Chief Accounting Officer for a company I worked for. He once said:

"Statistics don't lie - but remember, liars are statisticians. You can make statistics say anything you want if you structure the questions correctly."
Enuf said!!!