Remittances – Inter-American Development Bank — The site is entitled “Sending Money Home” and it is supposedly the first state-by-state analysis of US remittances to Latin America, in 2004 — In other words how much money was estimated to have been pumped out of the USA in 2004 by guest workers, illegal aliens, relatives and others. For example almost $10 billion was pumped out of California, and thus out of the California economy last year. These numbers should be increasing dramatically.
I took a drive down East 14th in Oakland to take a few pictures of the conduit for money removal. Endless money-order and wire transfer companies up and down the street. The dominant player is Mexico Express with its eye-catching logo. Ask them if they’ll send money to your aunt in Italy and see what they say. Essentially it’s a pipeline into Mexico and not much else. But Western Union and all the others are there too. And they are everywhere. If you don’t want to send a wire transfer you can get a money order and mail it or have someone transport it to Mexico. This is a booming business. And you have to ask yourself why grocery stores and video rental stores and pharmacies are all in the business. There must be a lot of money changing hands.
We seem determined to send all of our jobs out of the country. Why not send our money out too!
Removing wealth, huh…it’s important to also remember the wealth that workers from other countries contribute: their hard labor. For their efforts, you get cheap strawberries, a clean office building and a clean Wal-Mart, and a meal at your local fast food joint. Immigrants are not possibly removing more wealth than they are contributing.
Oh, and don’t forget the huge chunk of money that Western Union and MoneyGram are deducting from those wire transfers. That alone is a huge contribution of wealth.
How is this any different than Toyota or DaimlerChrysler or Sony sending their profits back to headquarters in their home country?
The difference is that these intrafamilty remittances relieve poverty back in their home countries.
Perhaps these figures should be noted alongside our foreign aid contributions, so the U.N. will stop bitching.
Whether the workers are legal or not – and I think much more of these remittances are from legal workers than your suggest – they surely earned the money and it’s theirs to do with as they please. Grocery and liquor stores are in the business because banks underserve these communities and/or they are not trusted to maintain the sender’s privacy. Also, both immigrants and corporations repatriate their earnings/profits after tax is taken out.
Man – $1700 a year – those damn immigrants – who do they think they are sending money home to their families? Let’s see – if they make say minimum wage – and work 50 weeks a year they’re making like $11k/year, so about 15% of their wages are leaving the country.
Based on the numbers from your post, even if all the immigrants send home $1700, California sees a $50 billion input into its economy from those immigrants.
I’m just a programmer, but I’d pay you ten bucks for fifty bucks all week long.
New Flash John and Ima – its not your money, its *their* money, earned fair and square doing jobs Americans turn their noses up at.
I fail to see why you feel entitled to their hard work
That is interesting.
http://www.carryingcapacity.org/huddlenr.html
This site explains how illegal immigration cost $69,000,000,000.00
in taxes and 2,000,000 American jobs.
Illegal immigration is going to be a hot issue soon I think.
Lindsay. I’m pretty sure that John knows that it’s their money. The problem is that Bush’s administration seems determined to allow more Mexicans to come to the US to work. He thinks this helps our economy as (allegedly) we’re not willing to do the work.
Thus, businesses get the labor they need, at a price they can afford, and we all prosposer.
But, there is an obvious downside if we let more workers in AND they send their money out.
BTW, the way labor shortages are supposed to work is that wages are supposed to rise to a level where the labor pool is willing to perform the task. That’s a basic equilibrium in economics. But Bush would rather simply export the jobs or import the cheap labor rather than to allow American’s to get the wages they want.
And one last thing, if you’ve had your eyes opened for the last year or so, you’d realize that there ARE US citizens willing to do the work, it’s simply that the employers give the job to foreigners instead.
We are MORE than willing to work in the US. We simply do not want to work for a Mexican’s wages.
OH MY GOD…you guys miss the point. No, it’s not their money, it’s money earned under the table, without paying taxes on it…yes, that is right…guess what the undocumented workers do NOT pay ss, income tax, or anything else for that matter….. have you even TALKED TO ANY OF THESE GUYS? Have you talked to the people employing them?
And what about the people who used to work those jobs who have been displaced by the CHEAP, easy labor pool? Yup, that’s black Americans, hispanic Americans, and other low-labor Americans…that have always worked the janitorial jobs, the cooking jobs, the dish washing jobs…. what do you think? That all our schools turn out high wage earners who all go to college, supported by their rich daddies? NO….unemployment, and those who have fallen OFF unemployment are barely getting by…and they’re pushing shopping carts collecting cans and bottles, working part time at Walmart, trying to eek by, and for the most part….failing miserably.
Yeah, let’s support the illegal, undocumented Mexican nationals..instead of creating jobs, a future, and some means of American CITIZENS to support themselves and their families.
Get your heads out of the sand!!! Don’t be so stoooopid!
John has better access to the figures than I, however, from what I’ve seen and heard, California is being sandbagged by out-of-control hospital costs for tending to illegals in a rate that is disproportionate to the rest of the population.
What’s far worse is the percentage of the prison population of illegals revealing that they are not the “peaceful working fellows who simply want a better life.”
FYI
most of the Illegals pay Taxes with false Tax ID numbers. (IRS do not care your status and any Mexican can get a legal Tax ID) the difernce is that they DO NOT file any return, so they Pay More Taxes tha you and me.
Albert, yeah, but….most employers don’t actually DEDUCT taxes for undocumentos…why should they? If an employer doesn’t have to contribute their share into the sdi/workers comp/etc etc…then why do all that paperwork? So, no in reality, most workers don’t pay MORE taxes, they pay none. They’re invisible on the books.
…And, Hank, these guys live in backyards in my part of the woods, and live crammed into an apartment — you know, like Friends, only four guys share a room for $100.00 a month each, and the guys without places to stay crash on the floor in one big happy slumber party, and pay $10 or 15 bucks a week. They aren’t eating at MacDonalds…but at the roving taco trucks (good deal…a buck for a really good taco). Day laborers can make $50 bucks a day…and can figure on working 3-7 days a week…. so, do the math. The guys who work their way onto a construction crew…can make over 100 a day (if they have some skills), and be pretty sure of working six days a week.
The contractors love these guys….no insurance, no disability, no wages, no overhead…just hire ’em and if the get hurt, drop them off at the emergency room…and walk away. No muss, no fuss. A lot like a hooker…..no involvement.
Don’t go romanticizing it…..
What can I say?
Blame your goverment. If they weren’t so obsessed in the past with screwing up the latin american nations so that they’ll be submissive to the US, things like these wouldn’t happen.
Remember, you reap what you sow.
And BTW how many of you are descendants of immigrants? I know I am.
A Brits impressions. My observations of illegal Mexican workers, and Californian Mexicans in general is that they are polite, punctual, certainly willing and unofficially a big help to both California and the USA. I realise no Nation wants illegals crossing its borders, no nation wants undocumented semi- citizens, but looking back over the last 80 years as it been such a bad thing. In my view it’s not bad, or a burden.
Remember these people live in poor housing, they live in a rent-a-bed for the night atmosphere, and the fact that they send home money home to relatives, money that they themselves could badly do with is cause for pride and in a sense what we all want to promote – family care and responsibilty. I know no Mexicans, pity on me, you see like most Gringos I am aloof, stiff upper-lipped, and maybe we need people like the Latins – to show us how to live and be happy. On this occasion it might be best to sat nothing, and to give credit were it’s due. Mexicans seem nice people, and let them also sit at the table.
BOB, UK, ENGLAND. rw.bcra@ntlworld. com.
Lets be fair … The Chinese do it. … The Russians are doing it .. So are the Filipinos and Koreans. … This is the why the world is flat. :)) … In 5 yrs or so, U.S. is going to be a banana republic. …