EDITORIAL

Garbage in, garbage out


By: North County Times Opinon staff

Our view: Costs of illegal immigration deserve serious analysis, but county's study isn't it

Once again San Diego County supervisors have sent a bill to the federal government ---- mostly as a publicity stunt ---- seeking reimbursement for the costs of illegal immigration to the county ---- $100 million, they say. This time the ploy relies on a study that purports to show the financial burden that the undocumented place on county services. This issue deserves a thorough examination, but this report doesn't provide that.

In May 2006, Supervisor Bill Horn, R-Valley Center, who was in the midst of a re-election campaign, stood with then-congressional candidate Brian Bilbray and called for a study into the costs of illegal immigrants to the county. Both said this was needed to accurately tell the feds the precise dollar costs of caring for the undocumented.

To the dismay of those (us included) who believe that a fact-driven discussion is long overdue, the county's report leaves much to be desired.

The findings ---- that the cost of illegal immigration to the county amounted to $256 million last year alone ---- are staggering. Upon closer inspection, however, the sticker shock gives way to a litany of unanswered questions and dubious assertions.

To begin with, it's important to keep in mind that this study was commissioned to measure the costs of illegal immigrants to the San Diego County government, not the county as a whole. That could mean that the costs are even more than $256 million a year, we just don't know.

Also, of that $256 million, $155 million is traced to uncompensated medical costs that are borne not by the county but by hospitals, mostly in the form of emergency room visits. That's a big number, but it's just a portion of the more than $600 million that the Hospital Association of San Diego and Imperial Counties estimates our hospitals spend to treat all patients, legal and illegal, who do not pay for care.

The study's worst flaw is its unscientific methodology. By the authors' own telling, they reached the $100 million figure by asking the heads of the county's various agencies what percentage of the people they served were undocumented. Some were able to provide a "best guess." Others didn't have a guesstimate because they don't keep track. In the latter instance, the researchers decided that 10 percent seemed right. The agency's budget was then multiplied by the agreed percentage, some indirect costs were added, and the total of $100 million was calculated.

For this it took over a year?

A long list of studies has tried to quantify the costs and benefits of illegal immigration, mostly at the national level. The conclusions of those studies usually reflect the beliefs of the organizations conducting them.

That these studies are inadequate and incomplete is not surprising. It's hard to measure any illegal activity. While common sense and anecdotal evidence suggest that the presence of illegal immigrants has societal costs, particularly in counties such as San Diego that sit right on the border, determining what they are is complicated.

One of the greatest costs to local and state governments associated with the problem of undocumented workers is public education. The problem with including those costs in these studies is that the children of illegal immigrants were very often born in this country. And they are citizens, not liabilities.

In addition, much of the costs are for services we would probably be paying for anyway. According to the study, three-quarters of the county's costs for serving the undocumented are related to law enforcement. It's hard to know exactly how many fewer sheriffs, prosecutors and judges we would have if illegal immigration weren't as prevalent in our county.

Finally, no one doubts that illegal immigrants use government services, but they also pay taxes. In fact, Standard and Poor's estimated that they contribute up to $7 billion to Social Security a year. That's money that will go to Americans, not aliens.

Once all of the bluster is stripped away, the county's report on illegal immigration costs becomes nothing but a jumble of misleading numbers, simplistic calculations and unexamined assumptions. Horn may have gotten his headlines, which we and other news organizations willingly supplied, but the county isn't going to get its $100 million.

Then again, maybe that was never the point.

http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2007/09 ... _29_07.txt
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THE STUDY
http://www.sdcounty.ca.gov/cnty/bos/sup ... _study.pdf

Previous Story:

Supervisors vote to send Bush immigration a 'bill'

http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2007/09 ... _25_07.txt