Have We Progressed Enough To Embrace Comprehensive Immigration Reform?

According to Newsweek, immigrants are leaving the United States -- willingly and unwillingly -- and countless others are deciding not to come.

The reasons cited by Newsweek for the new trend include:

More stringent Border Controls

Apprehensions are down sharply along the 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexico border—in fiscal 2007, 859,000 illegal immigrants were stopped, compared with 1.07 million in 2006. This suggests, at least to Newsweek, that fewer people are attempting to cross the border illegally.

Expanded Border Patrol

Use of the National Guard to Support the Border Patrol

Deportations of Illegal Immigrants

Deportations rose from 178,657 in fiscal 2005 to 282,548 in fiscal 2007—up 58 percent.

Prosecutions for Illegal Entry

Prosecuting Employers Who Employ Undocumented Workers

The Slowing Economy

The slowing economy means less work for immigrants, and for the people who make a living providing services to them.

The Weaker Dollar

Mexico's central bank said remittances from the United States fell 2.9 percent in the first quarter of 2008

A survey released by the Inter-American Development Bank in April found that 3 million fewer Latino immigrants are sending money home from the United States this year compared with two years ago.

Strength In Emerging Economies

Today, about 84 percent of the graduates of the prestigious Indian Institutes of Technology decide to pursue careers at home, compared with only 65 percent seven years ago.

That's the good news. On the other hand, U.S.News & World Report tells us about a new study confirms that what many of us who have been arguing for controlling the border have long suspected: Mexican immigrants are assimilating to life in the United States less successfully than other immigrants.

Using such factors as intermarriage, English ability, military service, homeownership, citizenship, and earnings, the Vigdor study uses a novel 100-point assimilation index. The closer to 100, the more assimilated an immigrant group:

Overall, the report shows immigrants are weaving into the American fabric at a remarkable clip, despite arriving poorer and knowing less English than immigrants of a century ago. And they are gaining speed, with new arrivals assimilating faster than those who came more than 20 years ago. With a score of 53, Canadians are the most assimilated, followed closely by Filipinos, Cubans, and Vietnamese. The main outlier: Mexicans, with a score of 13—followed by Salvadorans.

According to U.S.News, the root cause of the Mexicans' slower assimilation is that so many of them are illegals:

"There are certain jobs or certain services you just can't get [as an illegal immigrant]," Vigdor says. "There are plenty of indications here that for those Mexican immigrants who are interested in making a more permanent attachment to the United States, their legal status puts very severe barriers in that path."

Since the 1990s, Mexicans' immigrant story has differed from that of their peers. When comparing Mexicans and Asians, "Asians show up with a lot more money, oftentimes," notes Dowell Myers, a demographer at the University of Southern California. "They have a higher education to begin with, and many of them are entrepreneurs." Past decades saw influxes of refugees from countries such as Vietnam and the Philippines. Today's Asian immigrants are some of the best and brightest, which puts them on a faster track to assimilation via economic success.

The Asian experience recalls a general rule of today's immigrants. The farther you have to migrate, the wealthier you probably were in your country of origin. "Poor people can't afford a plane trip across the ocean, but poor people can walk across the border," Myers says. "Poor Africans and poor Chinese can't do it." Because of their proximity to the United States, poor Mexicans can make the trip. Indeed, their poverty impels them to risk the border crossing. But when they arrive, they arrive significantly disadvantaged, and they often qualify for jobs that offer little opportunity for social advancement. Other factors may also contribute but are more difficult to quantify: The leading contender is that the sheer number of Latinos in the United States has created a subculture that slows assimilation.

Other reasons offered for the slow assimilation include segregation and lower education.

In reporting on the Vigdor study Boston Globe poses some important questions that should be answered before we can address what needs to be done about the "anemic progress of Mexican immigrants:"

- Should the goal of our immigration policy be to satisfy industrial demand for low-skilled labor? Or should we place a higher priority on admitting new residents who seek to build a permanent attachment with American society?

- Should our policy toward immigrants place a greater value on cultural or civic assimilation?

All that said, the question remains: are we ready to again try and achieve comprehensive immigration reform? I don't think we are, at least not in the midst of the presidential election. There will be a window of opportunity for the new President to again attempt comprehensive reform after the November election.

Nevertheless, until we reach a consensus -- not just a simple majority, but a consensus substantial enough to overcome a filibuster -- on what to with the 12 million illegal aliens already living here, no comprehensive immigration reform can succeed. To be successful, any proposed reform must convince the skeptics that it will actually discourage future illegal immigration.

Immigration reform should be one of the issues throughly debated during the presidential campaign to move us toward the needed consensus.

Comments

[tyree]

"are we ready to again try and achieve comprehensive immigration reform?"

No

Our border is not secure.
We have no method for denying citizens benefits to illegal aliens.
We haven't modified the 14th Ammendment to keep anchor babies from being used to stop deportation.

In short, until we can keep Americans from being hurt by illegal immigration, we shouldn't have "comprehensive immigration reform". Comprehensive immigration reform would not be "progress". It would lead to the destruction of thousands of other communities like mine. I used to be able to speak English to the people in my neighborhood. I used to be able to get quick service at the hospital emergency room. I used to be able to brag that the local schools were some of the best in the nation, and that serious crime happened elsewhere. Then the illegal aliens changed all that, forever, for the worse. The "experts" say our population is going to go up by 150 million people over the next 50 years or so, yet my generation was told over and over to limit the size of our families. Illegal immigration is great for the illegal immigrant, but it destroys the fabric of the community that is unfortunate enough to be tolerant of outsiders. If we can seal the border and keep them off the public dole, we can talk. We had "immigration reform" in 1987 when my neighborhood was "multicultural". Since then it has become "Mexican". (not my word, that is what they call themselves, they don't call themselves "Hispanic").