Illegal Immigration



Contents

Introduction3

Thesis3

Poverty3

Education4

Incarceration5

Use of Public Welfare5

Solutions6

Conclusion6

References8

Illegal Immigration

Introduction

In approximately 1986, The United States' government began its initiative of restricting illegal immigration. It created the IRCA, Immigration Reform and Control Act. The act has two major purposes. Firstly, it serves to penalize those employers that knowingly and willingly hired illegal, undocumented immigrants. Secondly, it proposed a program that would legalize current illegal immigrants of the time. It succeeded to an extent, but failed to halt the onslaught of illegal immigrants entering the country. People immigrate for a better life. They are either suppressed or unable to improve their standards of living in their home country and thus, as a last resort, migrate illegally. This paper looks at the social problems associated with illegal immigration. These problems include poverty, education, incarceration and the use of public welfare.

Thesis

“Illegal immigrants move to the country in hopes of improving their lifestyle but this rarely happens.”

Poverty

Even though most people migrate to escape poverty, it is rare that they meet anything else as illegal immigrants. Illegal immigrants make a large portion of those people living in, or on the borders of poverty. The economic and humanitarian toll of living undocumented lives is substantial. Furthermore, escaping poverty is extremely hard. As an undocumented individual, it is hard finding employment, obtaining insurance and even harder to avoid discrimination. Studies conducted by the Centre for Immigration show that immigrants and their children account for approximately one fifth of the population that is, unfortunately, living under the poverty line. This figure is nearly two thirds hire than that observed in natives and their children (Espenshade and Calhoun, 1993).

Education

Speaking of economics, no other sector has been impacted by illegal immigration the way the education sector has. All over the nation, immigrants account for the entire increase in public school enrolment over the past two decades. In 2002, one of five school children came from immigrant families. Immigrants have contributed substantially to the rapid increase in school enrolments, mainly because of their high fertility rates and the ripe child bearing age at the time they enter the country. These numbers appear in mostly Border States, such as California, Texas and Arizona (Drachman, 2006).

In 1947, the Supreme Court passed a favourable verdict in the Lau vs. Nichols case. The court said that if the school failed to provide foreign language students with their language of instruction, they are in direct violation of the student's rights. Furthermore, because of the Plyler vs. Doe case (1982), public schools cannot ask for proof of status of a student. They must provide the student with quality education regardless of immigration status, the same education they would provide to their students (Ramanujan, 2009).

Even though the children of immigrants are able to acquire a basic education, if they choose, most are unable to go on to college. Most are unable to afford it. The few that do manage do so while working more than one job which directly affects how they perform. College tuition fees vary with the ...