By Glen T. Cheney | The Morning Call | JUN. 1, 2023 | Photo by Gregory Bull
The stream of heated rhetoric about an crisis at our southern border is variable in intensity but seems never ending. But exactly what should we fear from these immigrants?
Donald Trump in the announcement of his candidacy in the 2016 presidential campaign did us all a favor by explaining what he thought we should fear from immigration. He told us that Mexican immigration across our southern border was bringing drugs, crime and rapists. It is just one more example of how our national conversations about immigration are driven largely by anecdotes and myths rather than data.
Just a little digging easily uncovers other possible reasons to fear immigration. This space doesn’t permit a comprehensive list but, in addition to crime, it is often claimed that Immigrants lower wages for U.S.-born workers, bring few skills and risk becoming a permanent economic underclass that will require ongoing public assistance.
Recent research results use publicly available data to paint a different picture. “Streets of Gold,” a recent book by Ran Abramitzky and Leah Boustan, tells a radically different economic story of immigrants in America. The Cato Institute sponsors an online pamphlet by Alex Nowrasteh that investigates common myths about immigration. And, a group of researchers from the University of Wisconsin published a paper in the December 2020 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that examined crime statistics for U.S.-born, legal and undocumented immigrant populations in Texas.
It’s important to clarify that merely being an undocumented immigrant in the United States is not a crime in itself, and deportation is not technically a punishment. Of course, some immigration offenses are crimes. But being an undocumented immigrant in the United States is not one of them.
Unlike other states, the Texas Department of Public Safety determines and records the immigration status of every person arrested throughout Texas. With this uniquely comprehensive data, it is possible to compare the arrest and conviction rates of immigrants with those of U.S.-born citizens. Compared with undocumented immigrants, U.S.-born citizens are 2 times more likely to be arrested for violent crimes, 2 ½ times more likely to be arrested for drug crimes, and over 4 times more likely to be arrested for property crimes. Immigrants are more law abiding than the rest of us!
Furthermore, Texas provides an interesting test case with its long border with Mexico and its relatively high population of undocumented immigrants. But, tellingly, crime along the Mexican border is much lower than in the rest of the country.
Turning to economics, the economic data does not support the assumption that immigration harms U.S.-born labor in the long run. That is especially true in an economy like ours in which many entry level jobs, like elder care, are going unfilled.
Increasing the labor supply in an all-other-things-equal economy would indeed be expected to lower wages. But that is not our economy.
Entrepreneurs experiencing a growing labor pool are inclined to increase the size of their business enterprise or start businesses. And new labor both grows the economy and creates jobs as immigrants acquire housing — stimulating construction; need home furnishings — stimulating furniture and appliance manufacture; and require transportation —stimulating public transportation ridership and vehicle purchases. So, immigration grows the economy and increases prosperity.
It is true that a sizeable fraction of immigrants who come to the United States first find employment in low-paid, entry-level jobs. Many Americans believe that these immigrants will never catch up to the U.S.-born. Beliefs like these are the source of legislation that historically excluded immigrants from some countries.
But data extracted from publicly available records reveals that children of immigrants from nearly every country in the world, including poorer countries like Mexico, Guatemala and Laos, are more upwardly mobile than the children of U.S.-born residents. U.S.-born residents are often bound to place and family, which impedes moving to find a better paying job. That is not such a factor for immigrants.
The attitudes and opinions of too many Americans on immigration are driven by anecdotes and myths, and not from a careful review of available data. More of us need to consult the data.
