This is another in a series of positional diatribes on key issues facing America, and especially those that frame the candidates in the upcoming Presidential elections. This discussion highlights the position the we should take firm measures to drastically curtail immigration due to its economic impact on our country and its resources.
Position Overview:
There is no ignoring the fact that immigrants to the United States bring tremendous cultural value to our society, but what about the corresponding costs? The massive influx of immigrants coming in, both legal and illegal, takes its toll in public, private and governmental subsidies. Public and private colleges, for instance, give millions of dollars in scholarships to immigrants, depriving natural-born citizens of the money they need to get this vital education. Private organizations who collect donations from a wide variety of sources, spend this money in helping illegal aliens pay for basic essentials, rather than channeling that money to our own citizens. Welfare and governmental services offer up hundreds of millions of dollars each year to fund education and health care services for immigrants. The worst of it, is that these funds are not evenly spread. Most immigrants settle in large metropolitan areas or Sun-Belt States whose community budgets are already strained. The U.S. should take a priority direction to drastically curtail immigration quotas along economic realities, and even those immigrants entering should be able to show that they already have secured basic services are paid by their committed employers. The overall welfare of the people of the United States needs to be put first, and funds being used to pay for services to illegal immigrants should be stopped and re-directed to bona fide US citizens.
Proposed Course of Action:
1. Create a national registry or public, private and governmental agencies that have programs targets toward immigration subsidy and propose new guidelines, initiatives and motivations for reducing these and channeling them towards U.S. citizens.
2. In line with (1) above, drastically reduce immigration quotas, and restricts these new allotments to people with secured employment, and guaranteed employer-based benefits to reduce government and private-sector funding. Emphasis for admission should shift toward immigrants who have extraordinary skills and/or are willing to take jobs that Americans do not want.
3. Crack down on immigration asylum, admitting only those that can truly provide tangible proof of persecution or hardship.
4. All new immigrants passing new restrictions must complete citizenship requirements within a certain alloted period of time, or face deportation.
5. Drastically reduce governmental funding of welfare-based subsidies to illegal aliens. This would push basic need subsidies back to the private sector, where they would benefit from governmental incentives to help illegal aliens become citizens and obtain useful employment and employer-based benefits.
Reasons to Support This Approach:
1. By forcing drastic reductions in quotas, the number of new immigrants to the US will decreased immediately, and with the newer restrictions in place, there will be a disincentive for immigrants in the future to try to apply unless they qualify in areas truly valuable, economically to the US.
2. Creating immigration alliances allow all funding organizations to leverage services to all Americans as well as just immigrants. The national registry would allow better communication, reduced overhead costs, and allow for more equitable distribution of services on a “need” basis.
3. Forcing citizenship requirements serves the dual purpose of providing incentives for immigrants (and illegal immigrants) to becoming citizens and receiving those services that will be discontinued under the approach. The idea is if an immigrant wants a better life in the US, then its ok to move here, but become a citizen.
4. Reduction of governmental subsidies would allow billions of dollars annually to be re-directed to more pressing issues that benefit all Americans, including health-care, education, and national debt reduction.
Reasons to Reject This Approach:
1. Current immigration and naturalization personnel are already at a breaking point, hopelessly buried with a load that is beyond their current capacity. Adding new restrictions to reduce quotas based on need, would tax the system even more, or worse, require government funding to hire more workers, countering the economic benefit.
2. Creating a National Registry of Organizations that fund immigrant services, would add a new level bureaucracy to the system, and would lend a foundational framework for discrimination and corruption.
3. Drastic reductions on immigrants to only those “necessary” to benefit the national economy, is arbitratry and biased. Such an approach would undermine the diversity of culture that has been the historical hallmark in the history of the United States.
4. Enforcement of a “citizenship” requirement would again, require huge increases in governmental oversight and law enforcement, that there really could be no economic benefit. Monies spent here would far counterbalance any national economic benefit.
