Thursday, March 1, 2007

Illegal Immigration

This is the definition of a vicious cycle. We need to figure this out quick. Hopefully we can come to some resolve, and soon. For the sake and lives of those crossing, and for those of us here in the U.S. who are forced to support them. I understand why they come. They have nothing. I blame that on the caste system in Mexico. The white rich and mestizo poor. The poor are poor because their jobs just don't pay. And those jobs are the same jobs that support our own middle class in the U.S. In Monterrey, for example, Mexico's Rich Industrial Center, public school teachers get paid on average of $200-$300 dollars a month. That's about $6 to $10 dollars a day. Even with a wall, they will continue to find ways to get into this country because their life depends on it. So what to do?

Below is a paragraph from Wikipedia on illegal immigration which illustrates the cycle well.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illegal_immigration_to_the_United_States

The United States Government Accountability Office estimates that “between 400,000 and 700,000 unauthorized migrants have entered the United States each year since 1992.” A substantial portion did so by crossing either the United States–Mexico border or the United States-Canada border.[4]

According to the Pew Hispanic Center somewhat more than half of the unauthorized migrant population entered the country illegally rather than overstay their visas, where "Some evaded customs and immigration inspectors at ports of entry by hiding in vehicles such as cargo trucks. Others tracked through the Arizona desert, waded or swam across the Rio Grande or American Canal in California or otherwise eluded the U.S. Border patrol which has jurisdiction over all the land areas away from the ports of entry on the borders with Mexico and Canada." [5]

Stricter enforcement of the border has failed to significantly curb illegal immigration, instead pushing the flow into more remote regions, slightly reducing the rate of apprehensions and increasing the cost to taxpayers of each arrest from $300 in 1992 to $1700 in 2002. [6] Border Patrol activity is concentrated around big border cities such as San Diego and El Paso, which do have extensive border fencing, diverting illegal immigrants into rural mountainous and desert areas. The border between Arizona and Mexico has become a major entrance area for illegal immigration to the United States, due in part to the increased difficulty of crossing illegally in California.[7] Each year there are several hundred immigrant deaths along the U.S.-Mexico border. The number of deaths has been steadily increasing since the middle 1990s with exposure (including heat stroke, dehydration, and hypothermia) a leading cause.[8]

The tightening of border enforcement has disrupted the "traditional" circular movement of migrant workers from Mexico by increasing the costs and risks of crossing the border, thereby reducing their rate of return migration to Mexico. The difficulty of the journey has prompted many migrant workers to stay in the United States longer or indefinitely.[9]