Consider the heavy economic burden placed on our society by
illegal immigrants
When I was 13, 30-plus years ago, I lived in Fremont, which was in the process of making the transformation from an agricultural economy to a commuter economy, much as Gilroy is doing now.
I made 50 cents an hour babysitting. My best friend, Cheryl, babysat only during the school year. During the summer, she worked a succession of agricultural jobs. For example, in July, she cut ‘cots.
Her description sounded very pleasant. She would hang out with a gaggle of other teenagers for eight hours a day, five days a week, and cut apricots in half, pit them, and spread the fruit on trays for the dehydrator. Her hourly wage was triple what babysitting paid.
Cheryl was not a farm kid. Her father was a high school teacher. Summertime farm work was fairly normal for suburban teens then, a last surviving remnant of the reason summer vacation was originally instituted in America: so that kids could help with farm work during the growing and harvest seasons.
A mere generation later, when my own kids reached the teen years, a summer job of field work was no longer an option. Today practically all farm laborers are Mexican migrant workers, about half of whom, according to the American Farm Bureau Federation, do not have valid Social Security numbers (or, to be precise, are illegal aliens.)
Consequently, American kids, including my teenagers, are not interested in summer jobs doing farm work. What, be the only English-speaking youth in a realm of Spanish-speaking adults? And I, as a parent, am not keen on my kids entering an arena where 50 percent of their co-workers are, by definition, criminals.
The Dispatch’s front-page story published Aug. 15 quotes several groups and individuals who bemoan the probable effect of the federal government’s crackdown on employers who hire 10 or more illegal workers.
Farmers complain that the enforcement will strip them of workers. Marcela Escarero, an agricultural worker who has legal status, worries about friends and relatives who say, “Let’s just go home.” Co-owner of Los Arcos Market, Araceli Garcia, worries about her Mexican customers and about her bottom line.
As recently as 25 years ago, American crops were harvested by Americans. The situation changed. Changing back will not be painless or fast, but it is not impossible, and it could be a good thing.
It could be a good thing for American teens to have summer jobs available that offer fresh air, sunshine, camaraderie – and hard manual labor. Schooling will seem more like a privilege after a summer of cutting ‘cots and picking peppers.
Californians spend approximately $7.7 billion per year on education for illegal immigrant children and their U.S.-born siblings. Almost 15 percent of California’s public school students are children of illegal immigrants. If that percent holds true for Gilroy, then 400 Gilroy High School students are the children of illegal immigrants. Exactly how much does overcrowding at GHS hurt education?
The Aug. 16 front-page story reports that test scores in Gilroy, like test scores statewide, show no overall improvement. Additionally, the achievement gap persists between Hispanic and white kids.
But superintendent of educational services Basha Millholen notes, “We have a lot of established (Hispanic) families that are doing quite well.” English language learners are the factor that drives down a school’s test scores. And ask any teacher how easy it is to educate a child who migrates with the harvest season.
Illegal immigrants account for about $1.4 billion in uncompensated health care costs in California each year. About the same amount is spent on jailing illegal immigrants for various crimes. This amount does not include the cost of police or judicial personnel for prosecuting and defending the criminals, nor the monetary costs to the victims of the crimes.
If the taxes collected from illegal aliens are subtracted from the costs incurred, the net result is an annual expense of $9 billion per year in California alone. That amounts to $1,183 per California household.
But the worst effect on our society of unchecked illegal immigration is the pervasive, profound, and contagious disrespect for law and rule of law that an illegal immigrant brings to this country. We need immigrants who will uphold rule of law, not subvert it.
Cynthia Anne Walker is a homeschooling mother of three and former engineer. She is a published independent author. Her column is published in The Dispatch every week.
