THE REAL COST OF IMMIGRATION
A new study by Edwin S. Rubenstein, a Manhattan Institute adjunct fellow,
looks at the myriad ways immigration increases the cost of government and
how government policies increase immigration.
For example:
Rubenstein found that each immigrant costs taxpayers more than $9,000,
while every immigrant household of four costs $36,000 in taxes.
That's far more than the $3,408 in 2007 dollars the National Research
Council's 1997 "New Americans" study of federal, state and local government
expenditures found immigrants to cost.
Looking at education alone, Rubenstein found:
About 3.8 million public school students -- 7.9 percent of total K-12 enrollment
-- are enrolled in classes for English language learners, according to the
Department of Education.
Rand Corp. researchers discovered back in 1981 that added costs for
language assistance instruction ranged from $100 to $500 per pupil.
The total cost of providing English Language Learning instruction to the 3.8
million students enrolled in those programs is about $3.9 billion.
Turning to the Department of Justice, Rubenstein found criminal aliens to be
an increasing burden on U.S. prison systems:
In 1980, federal and state facilities held fewer than 9,000 criminal aliens, but
at the end of 2004, about 267,000 noncitizens were incarcerated in U.S.
correctional facilities.
Of all prisoners in federal prisons, 27 percent are criminal aliens, he found,
with a total cost of $1.5 billion.
According to a 2003 Government Accountability Office (GAO) survey, the
average criminal alien was arrested for 13 prior offenses, 12 percent of which
were cases of murder, robbery, assault and sexually related crimes; only 21
percent were immigration offenses, the rest being felonies.
Source: Editorial, "The Real Cost of Immigration," Investor's Business Daily,
April 4, 2007.
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