Bush is right.  There, I said it.  That was very, very painful. 

Immigration is perhaps the only issue that I think Bush hasn't got completely wrong.  Let's take a look at this hot and emotional issue.

We are a nation of immigrants.  My great grandfather, Emilio, came to the United States on a boat in 1907, exactly 100 years ago.  At the time, he needed work and the US needed labor.  It was a perfect match.  He spent one day in the coal mines of West Virginia and decided to start a grocery store.  It turns out he became a successful business man who employed may US worker and also funded many other local businesses.  It's the classic tale of successful immigration.  This influx of labor, energy and dedication is what drove the growth of the US economy for centuries. So what has happened that immigration has become such a controversy? 

Why do we need immigration?  Let's forget, for a moment, that we are all immigrants in the US and that it is part of the tradition and fabric of our society.  Let's be completely objective.

1. Our country is aging.  This is a well known and well documented impending train wreck.  The ratio of working age persons to retired persons is on its was from 7:1 to 2:1.  As a direct result, social security system is going to go bankrupt.  It is as simple as that. Without dramatically increasing the number of TAX PAYING, YOUNGER people in the US, our senior citizen will be forced to increase their retirement age by up to 10 years AND will see dramatically lower benefits.  Immigration is the answer.
2. We need low cost labor to do the menial jobs nobody else wants to do. Who do you know that wants to pick vegetables in the fields in 100 degree heat?  Nobody I know does.  The truth is, if we didn't have the vast pool of illegal immigrants in this country, many, many jobs would go unfilled.  And many of the goods and services we enjoy would be much more expensive.
3. We have an enormous trade imbalance.  The direct result is that our currency has ALREADY devalued significantly vs the other major world currencies.  Have you been to Europe lately?  For the first time in our generation, traveling the Europe and many other developed nations is almost completely unaffordable for Americans.  And it's only going to get worse. And the reason is simple.  We no longer manufacture good in the united states.  Why?  Because the cost of labor is too high.  Afraid manufacturing jobs are going to be lost?  Too late.  It already happened.  They are gone.  And more are leaving.  So we can pretend that this isn't happening and wait for our economy to implode and the cost of imported goods to skyrocket. Or we can make a huge, strategic choice to bring manufacturing jobs back to the US.  And the way you do that is bring the low cost labor here.  If anyone tells you otherwise, they are just blowing smoke.

There is a mathematical equation that determines how much immigration the US experiences. 

Given 1: The US needs immigrants.

Given 2: Immigrants need the US.

Demand of immigrant labor = supply of immigrants

This equation says the number of immigrants has very little to do with our quotas or policies.  To tell the truth, the current policies are beyond idiotic. We have already established that the US needs low cost labor.  But because our policies limit the number of legal immigrants from low cost areas to an absurdly low number, we wind up with a high number of illegal immigrants.  This is not harms the immigrants, but also dramatically reduces the benefits to the US of immigration.

• Ethical problem 1:  Each year we get hundreds of thousands of immigrants that risk their lives to come into the US illegally.  While getting into the US, many are often subjected to dangererous or deadly crossing, others are forced to pay exhorbitant fees to smugglers, and others are forced into human slavery or the sex trade.
• Ethical problem 2:  These people have no protections if they are taken advantage of since complaining results in deportation.
  
• Practical problem 1: They don't pay taxes.
• Practical problem 2: They don't pay social security.
• Practical problem 3: Rhetoric to the contrary, we NEED their children to become educated and contribute even MORE tax revenue to our economy.
• Practical problem 4: The major manufacturing companies won't hire illegal immigrants because of the legal implications.  Could you imagine GM imploying illegal immigrants?  So they simply ship the jobs overseas where a different set of low wage workers do the job WITHOUT paying taxes and WITHOUT contributing to our economy and WITHOUT consuming other goods made in the US.  

So we're now in a brilliantly stupid position.  We have over 10 MILLION illegal immigrants in the US.  Many or most of them do not pay taxes.  Almost all of them cannot contribute to our imploding manufacturing sector.  Even if we brought in the army, we could never ID or deport even a fraction of them. And if we did, it would be disastrous to our economy.  Smart.  Really smart.

What do we do?

OPEN UP IMMIGRATION!  

1. Figure out how many people we can let into the US without significantly affecting or displacing our existing workforce and set the quota there.
   
2. Create a fast process to check the backgrounds of immigrants and get them on their way to work!  Get them paying taxes?  Get them into both low paying menial jobs and ALSO re-invest in the manufacturing sector. Get them productive! 
   
3. Leverage several classes of visas, also.  Some want to get on the track to permanent citizenship. Great.  Just learn English and get a steady job.  Others want simply to come here for a couple years, save some money, and go home.  Great.  Just learn English and get a steady job. And there is no reason to be bureaucratic.  If someone initially plans to be here for a short period but proves himself to be a productive member of society,let them easily change their visa track

Sorry Lou Dobbs.  

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