Thread: Undefended Border Keeps Robbing Americans of Vital Jobs

Our undefended border keeps Mexican unemployment low...while our own rises to Depression levels

Dave Gibson
Immigration Reform Examiner

For several years, Mexico has been solving their own unemployment problem by sending their jobless citizens to the United States. The result has been a low, steady rate of unemployment in Mexico since 2000. Of course, the unimpeded flow of cheap labor headed north, has had a disastrous effect on U.S. workers.

Consider the following facts:

-Between 1991-1999, Mexico had an average unemployment rate of 3.7 percent. Now, as economies around the world are falling apart and experiencing record joblessness, Mexico still has a relatively low unemployment rate of 5.5 percent (July 2010).

-While the U.S. currently has an anemic GDP (Growth Domestic Product) rate of 1.6 percent (September 2010), Mexico has a GDP rate of 3.2 percent (July 2010).

-As millions of illegal aliens entered this country from Mexico annually, the rate of U.S. unemployment has continued to rise, and now stands nearly double the average rate in 1995 of 5.5 percent.

In Feb. 2009, the financial institution Merrill Lynch announced that the nation’s actual unemployment rate had reached 13.9 percent. A year later, that number had risen to 17.3 percent. This figure represents Americans who have been laid off from full-time positions and are now working part-time, as well as those who have simply stopped looking for work, and workers whose unemployment benefits have run out.

The official unemployment figure given monthly by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics is now listed at 9.7 percent (September 2010), but represents only those Americans currently receiving unemployment checks, and is not truly indicative of the dire employment situation now facing the U.S.

The nation’s actual unemployment rate is now close to 18 percent.

A recent study conducted by the Chicago Urban League and the Alternative Schools Network showed the tremendous impact illegal aliens are having on the employment levels of low-skilled American workers, particularly for young workers.

The study revealed a rather shocking revelation, in that, the unemployment rate among teens and young adults is soaring to unprecedented level, while millions of illegal aliens continue to hold jobs.

Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) and Rep. Gary Miller (R-CA) released the following joint statement on the study’s findings:

“During the course of the 2007-2009 recession, the employment rate of the nation’s teens fell steeply to 26.2% by October-November 2009, setting new record lows each year. No other age group has experienced employment declines of this magnitude in the current recession. Young adults 20-24 years old in both Illinois and the nation also have been adversely affected by the deterioration in labor market developments in the state and nation in recent years, especially men, Blacks and Hispanics, and non-college graduates.â€

For far too many years, Mexico has been allowed to dump their economic problems on the United States, and instead of being punished, they have been rewarded with one-sided trade policies such as NAFTA as well as even a provision in the USA Patriot ACT which dictates that U.S. banks accept their Matricula Consular cards as identification for the millions of Mexican nationals living illegally in this country. Illegal aliens use the cards to secure loans and bank accounts, even though Mexican banks consider the cards to be unacceptable forms of i.d.

Well said.