To: Elton William Gallegly,
U.S. Representative for California’s 24th congressional district
From:
Date:
Re: Illegal migration
Introduction
Introduction
The problem of illegal immigrants persists for the American government, especially owing to the fact that the rate at which these immigrants flow into the country is much higher than the rate at which they are successfully stopped from illegally migrating in. Immigration, being mainly caused by the low income that the Mexican natives receive is facilitated by the fact that most Americans that provide jobs prefer cheap labor. Mexicans are ready to move out of their country and go looking for a job they are guaranteed to get. However, instead of returning to their countries on completing their jobs, the immigrants bring in their families from their countries and start a life in America (Hanson, 897).
Key stakeholders
The Mexicans pay little or no tax, a factor that has adverse effects on the economy of the country. This is so due to the fact that the distribution of resources available cannot support very large populations. Sharing of social amenities, meant for the citizens is done between the natives and the immigrants. In these situations, the rate of depletion of resources outdoes the rate at which tax is paid to cater for the resources used and to generate new resources. This has diversified effects on the taxpayers, who comprise the natives of the land. The latter is felt in schools where the number of children in a single classroom in an area with illegal immigrants may double with the addition of the children of these aliens (Hanson, 902). In the case of hospitals, doctors have to serve their responsibility on all patients, including the same immigrants that pay little or no tax. From statistics, as depicted in the table, numbers of immigrants are soaring each year. The rate at which immigrants enter the country for productive reasons such as labor is eventually decreasing. This means that the immigrants have practically nothing to offer to solve the crisis. The best solution lies in keeping these immigrants out of the country.
Efforts input by the government
The government of the USA has put much effort in ending this problem. This has been through implementing various strategies, among them inserting limitations for ownership of the green card that allows a person to stay in the country. These measures have left only few people being eligible to own the green card, leaving those that are lawfully registered as permanent residents and individuals that have spent five or more years under the act of naturalization or three years for being partners to citizens. The government also tolerates people who have been physically present in the country for at least half of the period they have been present as residents of the country. Them that can read, write and speak good English are also tolerated by these policies. Good moral character and good understanding of the country’s constitution has also been used as a strategy to have people tolerated, regardless of their country of residence or history in life. These strategies have been inadequate to help in limiting the number of illegal immigrants that enter the country. Worsening the situation is the fact that some of these policies tolerate illegal immigrants, as they are assured of having permits legalizing their stay in the country over a prolonged duration of time. This is responsible for the ever-increasing rates at which permanent residences are sought.
Following this realization, it is the appropriate time for trying new ways in which the problem would be solved and eliminated for the country’s resources to be used by only those who have contributed in raising them. The best way in which the problem would be solved is by eliminating problems for the people that welcome these immigrants into the country. These are mainly the employers that seek cheap labor, readily provided by the Mexican immigrants. Meeting the needs of the employers would give the best solution to ending the persistent problem owing to the fact that the people that bring in the immigrants will have an alternative, better source of labor, lacking reason to tolerate the immigrants to their firms.
Strategizing on ending the problem
One such solution would be replacing manual labor force with technologically advanced sources of labor. For instance, in firms where these immigrants are given roles of harvesting and packaging farm produce, these tasks could be replaced using automatic devices which would serve the purposes more efficiently and with greater speeds. Digital technology can also be used to make replacement in companies that solely depend on cheap, manual labor to run efficiently (Faces of immigration: Man can’t compete with illegal workers. 4th January 2011). It is putting this factor into consideration that actions such as record keeping would be done with digital technology devices such as computers. This would serve to make replacement for the people that are employed to serve as record-keepers. Several such replacements of personnel would serve to reduce the role of immigrants.
Implementing new policies to help employers to solve the problem would also entail increasing assistance to farmers by providing public means of technology assistance, such as distributing farming machines. This will also serve to eliminate the need for manual labor, which serves the purpose of these devices, with less efficiency. To add onto this, the government also needs to run campaigns against the toleration of illegal immigrants for cheap labor. This will also entail educating people on the adverse effects these immigrants would cause on the future of the country’s economy (Rogers, M. Smith: The terrible mistake of revoking birthright citizenship).
The government should also find necessity in placing punitive measures for companies and individuals that provide immigrants with the low-paying jobs. This would entail coming up with new acts that cater for the farmers’ and companies’ needs as well as giving restrictions to the immigrants and labor facilitators who are responsible for the presence of the immigrants (Lakeisha 22). Heavily taxing these employers based on the number of employees hired to run their firms would slowly make the employers incur huge losses for hiring immigrants for cheap labor (Baldwin 12). To reduce this expenditure, employers would seek alternative sources of labor force. For the businesspersons that do not abandon the practice, permanent revocation of business licenses would be an efficient means of stopping the practice (Eastman, 33).
Of all the means discussed as strategies to assist the employers in reducing the rates at which they employ immigrants for cheap labor, introducing policies to fine employers was found as the most efficient in this research (Lakeisha 22). This can be attributed to the fact that revenue that would have otherwise been obtained from the immigrants is compensated by the employers. Taxing these individuals a double amount means that they would represent those individuals they employ for cheap labor, an efficient method in achieving taxing that would have otherwise be done on the immigrants. On realizing this fact, the employers would find it inappropriate to seek cheap labor and embrace other more suitable means of running their enterprises.
Such new strategies would entail competitively looking for more efficient methods of providing labor, a factor that would cause competitiveness among providers of labor, a factor that would be advantageous to the government of the country because the output of labor would be improved. To work most efficiently, this strategy should be used together with the other policies outlined to completely bring down the rate at which immigrants illegally find way into the country.
Work cited
Athens Banner-Herald, ONLINE ATHENS: Forum: Stop employing illegal immigrants. 14th December 2010 .Retrieved 8th January 2011 from
http://www.onlineathens.com/stories/121410/opi_756073721.shtml
Cindy Carcamo: THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER: Faces of immigration: Man can’t compete with illegal workers. 4th January 2011. Retrieved 8th January 2011 from
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40913030/ns/local_news-orange_county_ca/
Grossman, Jean Baldwin Industrial & Labor Relations Review; Jan84, Vol. 37 Issue 2, p240- 251, 12p.
http://ehis.ebscohost.com/ehost/detail?hid=123&sid=08fc3333-2f64-4a2f-82b0- 99d003f8363e%40sessionmgr111&vid=1&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZQ%3d%3 d#db=bth&AN=4461661. Retrieved 8th January 2011 from
Porter, Lakeisha .lInternational Social Science Review, 2006, Vol. 81 Issue 1/2, p66-72, 7p. Retrieved 8th January 2011 from
http://ehis.ebscohost.com/ehost/detail?hid=123&sid=c798e7ef-5e0e-4b5a-bb5a- ddbb214563ff%40sessionmgr114&vid=1&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZQ%3d%3 d#db=f5h&AN=21409438
Eastman, Roger. Illegal Migration. Birder’s World. Dec 2005. Vol. 19 Issue 6, p32-34, 3p. Retrieved 8th January 2011 from
http://ehis.ebscohost.com/ehost/detail?hid=123&sid=bbd6c7ef-fd4a-486e-b8cd- 14375cb1292e%40sessionmgr104&vid=7&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZQ%3d%3 d#db=f5h&AN=18851420
Hanson, Gordon H. Illegal Migration from Mexico to the United States. San Diego: Birder’s World. December 2006. v. 44, iss. 4, pp. 869-924. Retrieved 8th January 2011 from
http://ehis.ebscohost.com/ehost/detail?hid=123&sid=bbd6c7ef-fd4a-486e-b8cd- 14375cb1292e%40sessionmgr104&vid=10&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZQ%3d% 3d#db=eoh&AN=0886622
Rogers, M. Smith. DAILY NEWS: The terrible mistake of revoking birthright citizenship: U.S. owes Mexicans more, not less. 6th January 2011. Retrieved 8th January 2011 from
http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2011/01/06/2011-01- 06_the_terrible_mistake_of_revoking_birthright_citizenship_us_owes_mexicans_more_n o.html
Michael Patrick. THE METROPOLITAN: The Dream Act – A First Step toward Immigration Reform? January 03, 2011. Retrieved 8th January 2011 from
http://www.metrocorpcounsel.com/current.php?artType=view&artMonth=January&artY ear=2011&EntryNo=11804
