http://www.humaneventsonline.com/article.p...nt=yes&id=15343

Illegal Alien Amnesty Bill Bloats Welfare

by Robert Rector
Posted Jun 05, 2006

Congress is in the midst of the most dramatic overhaul of our nation’s immigration laws in 80 years. So why is hardly anyone asking the basic question: How might this affect government costs?

In the case of the immigration bill passed in the Senate, a measure sponsored by Senators Mel Martinez (R.-Fla.) and Chuck Hagel (R.-Neb.), we have an answer: It would raise them substantially.

The bill would grant amnesty to about 10 million illegal immigrants and put them on a path to citizenship. Once they become citizens, the net additional cost to the federal government of benefits for these individuals will be around $16 billion per year. The bill would also spur a rapid new flow of low-skill immigrants with its program for “guest workers” (for life, that is) and other provisions.

Income Redistribution

To make matters worse, once an illegal immigrant becomes a citizen, he has the right to bring his parents to live in the U.S. The parents, in turn, may become citizens. The long-term cost of government benefits for the parents of 10 million recipients of amnesty could be $50 billion per year or more. In the long run, the Hagel-Martinez bill, if enacted, would be the largest expansion of the welfare state in 35 years. The guest-worker-for-life program would add even further costs.

Welfare can be defined as means-tested aid programs. These programs provide cash, non-cash, and social service assistance that is limited to low-income households. The major means-tested programs include Food Stamps, Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, public housing, the earned income credit and Medicaid. Historically, recent immigrants were less likely to receive welfare than native-born Americans.

But over the last 30 years, this historic pattern has reversed. As the relative education levels of immigrants fell, their tendency to receive welfare benefits increased. By the late 1990s, immigrant households were 50% more likely to receive means-tested aid than native-born households. Moreover, immigrants appear to assimilate to welfare use. The longer immigrants live in the U.S., the more likely they are to use welfare.

The picture for illegal immigrants, who would receive amnesty under the bill, is even more alarming. Roughly half of current illegal immigrants are high-school dropouts. Use of welfare among legal immigrants who are high-school dropouts is three times the rate for the U.S. native born population as a whole. The rate for low-skill immigrants granted amnesty would be similar. Overall, welfare costs added by this group would be quite high.

Illegal immigration is now a major cause of child poverty. According to the Pew Hispanic Center, 4.7 million children of illegal immigrant parents currently live in the U.S. Some 37% of these children are poor. While children of illegal immigrant parents make up around 6% of all children in the U.S., they are 11.8% of all poor children.

This high level of child poverty among illegal immigrants in the U.S. is in part due to low education levels and low wages. It is also linked to the decline in marriage among Hispanics in the U.S. Within this group, 45% of children are born out of wedlock. Among foreign-born Hispanics the rate is 42.3%. By contrast, the out-of-wedlock birth rate for non-Hispanic whites is 23.4%. The birth rate for Hispanic teens is higher than for black teens. While the out-of-wedlock birth rate for blacks has remained flat for the last decade, it has risen steadily for Hispanics. These figures are important because, as noted, some 80% of illegal aliens come from Mexico and Latin America.

In general, children born and raised outside of marriage are seven times more likely to live in poverty than children born and raised by married couples. Children born out of wedlock are also more likely to be on welfare, to have lower educational achievement, to have emotional problems, to abuse drugs and alcohol, and to become involved in crime.

Federal and state governments currently operate a massive system of income redistribution: The upper-middle class is taxed, and money and services are transferred to the lower-income half of the population. In 2004, some $583 billion was transferred in this way. Current immigration in the U.S. disproportionately brings poorly educated individuals with a high probability of unwed births into the U.S. Over the last 20 years, around 10 million individuals without a high-school diploma have entered the United States. These individuals inevitably end up on the recipient end of the income-redistribution equation, providing an extra tax burden on the already hard-pressed middle-class taxpayers.

There is a remarkably foolish idea now running through the Senate that the key to solving the Social Security crisis is to import into the U.S. tens of millions of low-skilled immigrants, earning perhaps $20,000 per year, along with their families. The folly of this should be apparent. For most of these individuals, receipt of the earned income tax credit and other refundable credits will outweigh Social Security taxes paid. The overall costs such individuals will add to government programs throughout their lifetime (including welfare, Social Security, Medicare, education for children, transportation and law enforcement) will greatly exceed taxes paid.

Immigration to the U.S. is a privilege, not a right. Immigrants should be net contributors to the government and society, not a fiscal burden. To reduce the looming Social Security deficit and to strengthen the nation, the U.S. should encourage immigration of high-skill workers who will be fiscal contributors, not low-skill workers who will be fiscal takers. In this respect, the Senate immigration bill is on the wrong course: It will make the finance books of government worse, not better.

I agree with this. I don't know what the Senate is thinking. Does anyone know the rationale?

Just a tidbit I got in my grants notification email this morning...
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US Dept. of Transportation

Language Assistance Demonstration Projects Grant Program


Document Type: Modification to Previous Grants Notice
Funding Opportunity Number: DOT-FTA-LANG
Posted Date: Jun 02, 2006


Category of Funding Activity: Transportation

Category Explanation:
Expected Number of Awards: 3
Estimated Total Program Funding: $245,000
Award Ceiling: $500,000
Award Floor: $50,000
CFDA Number: 20.514 -- Transit Planning and Research
Cost Sharing or Matching Requirement: No

Eligible Applicants
Others (see text field entitled "Additional Information on Eligibility" for clarification)

Additional Information on Eligibility:
Transit agencies, State Departments of Transportation, Metropolitan Planning Organizations.

Agency Name
DOT/Federal Transit Administration
Description
SUMMARY:This solicitation is for proposals from transit agencies, State Departments of Transportation (State DOTs), or Metropolitan Transportation Organizations (MPOs) for up to three cooperative agreements to demonstrate language assistance programs for limited English proficient (LEP) Persons under the Transportation Equity Research Program (TERP). The major goal of the TERP is for research and demonstration activities that focus on the impacts that transportation planning, investment, and operations have on low-income and minority populations that are transit dependent. These cooperative agreements are a four-year award. The total available funding for the first year is for $245,000. Subsequent funding is authorized at $250,000 per year in the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, and Efficient Transportation Equity Act--A Legacy for Users (SAFETEAU-LU); actual funding will be based on annual appropriations.BACKGROUNDAccording to the 2000 U.S. Census, more than 10 million people reported that they do not speak English at all, or do not speak English well. The number of persons reporting that they do not speak English at all or do not speak English well grew by 65 percent from 1990 to 2000. Among limited English speakers, Spanish is the language most frequently spoken, followed by Chinese (Cantonese or Mandarin), Vietnamese, and Korean. For many LEP persons, public transit is a key means of achieving mobility. According to the 2000 Census, more than 11 percent of LEP persons aged 16 years and over, reported use of public transit as their primary means of transportation to work, compared with about four percent of English speakers.Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 states that “no person in the United States shall, on the ground of race, color, or national origin, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.” (42 U.S.C § 2000d).

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Your tax money at work...