Illegal Immigration, the Drain on the U.S. Economy

“Wal-Mart had an outside cleaning company that had hired illegal immigrants that would sweep their stores and perform other cleaning activities for the night shift” ("Illegal Immigration Facts & Statistics”). Since legal immigrants are taking citizens’ jobs, the unemployment rate is higher for U.S. born citizens rather than immigrants. "There are approximately 7.7 million illegal aliens employed in U.S. jobs in 2008" ("Illegal Immigration Facts & Statistics”). One reason why non-citizens of the U.S. are working is because many employers consider them to be cheap labor which saves the employers money. An example of cheap labor I experienced was while working at a pizza restaurant. The owner of the restaurant liked to hire sixteen or seventeen-year old Mexicans that he would make work every day except Sunday from ten in the morning until nine at night. I know that the Mexicans were being paid only one-hundred dollars a week for working sixty-six hours. When I quit the restaurant, he only had one Mexican and one Venezuelan working for him as cheap laborers. Like him, self-owned managers prefer immigrants over American citizens because that saves them money. Having an effective border patrol not only gives more jobs to American citizens, but it also helps to keep illegal immigrants out of the country.

But for the rest of the population substantial disparities still exist. This problem not only affects the uninsured population and the communities they live in, but the entire nation's economy. Dozens of hospitals in Texas, New Mexico Arizona, and California, have been forced to close or face bankruptcy because of federally mandated programs requiring hospitals to provide free emergency room services to illegal aliens. Safety net hospitals continue to operate under a heavy burden of providing care to this largely uninsured population (Torres, Steven, & Wallace, 2013). Having access to healthcare is a necessity in maintaining the good health of these undocumented immigrants. Several solutions have been proposed to overcome the barriers affecting undocumented immigrants. One solution would be to expand the coverage of the Affordable Health Care Act for this population. Another solution would be to approve an amnesty bill to alleviate the undocumented immigrants' situation in the United Sates, which would allow them to access public health

One of the most significant issues to issues to affect healthcare in today’s society is the impact that illegal aliens have on the already broken healthcare system. This paper will explore the impact of undocumented Hispanics and their impact on the services available and used in California. Included will be the numbers of those that are affected as well as what is being done to decrease the impact of this population on the current healthcare system.

The second concern is undocumented immigrants and the financial burden it has placed on taxpayers. According to Elizabeth Lee Vliet, MD, “estimates are that 20-40% of uncompensated (“free”) medical services are provided to people in the US illegally” (Vliet, 2010). These figures are only an approximation with a possibility of being much greater. Dr. Vliet addresses compelling evidence that points out the massive undocumented immigrants in the state of Arizona with “more than half of Arizona’s $4 billion budget deficit was the result of paying for three areas of illegal immigrants, education, healthcare, and incarceration” (Vliet, 2010). Given these

Federal and state legislations can deny undocumented individuals access to public benefits such as healthcare services, public assistance programs, and public housing. Policy research details how approximately fifty-one percent of undocumented individuals in California are uninsured and are excluded from private insurance plans that would allow them to access valuable health services (Wallace, Torres, Nobari, & Pourat, 2010). Undocumented women are disproportionally affected in accessing services related to reproductive health care as well as prenatal care, which can negatively impact their health. In her research, Marrows (2012) describes how uninsured rates remain high among undocumented individuals even in sanctuary cities such as San Francisco that practice “right-to-care” strategies, aiming to produce inclusivity, and that create public funds for immigrants. This is primarily due to a shortage of

There have been legislative bills that have limited the access that illegal immigrants have to medical care, whether it be private insurance or with federal help such as state funded resources like Medical. For example the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 restricts medical care for illegal immigrants. Jeffrey Kullgren a medical student at the Michigan State University College of Human Medicine, argues that having severe limitations on health care services threatens the public’s health. He argues that the original purposes of the act were to reduce illegal immigration and preserve resources yet the act burdens health care providers and endangers the public’s health. The act stated that it was made in order to “remove the incentive for illegal immigration” and so that “individual aliens not burden the public benefits system”. These were the argument made in order to place eligibility restrictions for service made available by the local, state and federal governments. Although there were exceptions to the act, such as being able to get emergency care and immunizations, it still made getting proper health care very difficult. Placing these kinds of restrictions on people Kullgren argues has consequences on health. One is that it leads to greater waiting times and increase cost which reduces the efficiency of medical facilities. Another is that it can affect the lives of the American born children of immigrants. Although they are able to receive medical services, their parents are afraid to seek health care because they believe that they can get deported. Or they are not sure of whether their children are able to get medical coverage. Another negative result due to the act, Kullgren states, is that public resources are not being effectively used. It costs more to treat emergency situations that could have been easily prevented or that could have

Today, the United States faces budget problems at local, state, and national levels. Soon, Congress will vote whether or not to raise the national debt ceiling, hoping to avoid defaults on loans and causing further harm to a slumping economy. While federal budget cuts will have to be made should the ceiling be lifted or not, cuts are also being felt on a local level, even in places like education. While not completely responsible for these problems, there are over 12 million illegal immigrants living in the United States. Unfortunately, about 59% of them do not have health insurance. With 25% of legal immigrants uninsured, that creates a large population that cannot seek or receive proper medical treatment (Wolf, 2008). Fixing this

Undocumented immigrants should not be included in the ACA because it will lead to an increase of overcrowding in healthcare facilities. Admittance availability at healthcare facilities is limited due to the closure of hospitals and insufficient amounts of available beds. According to Maurio & Corzine (2013), the number of hospitals in California has decreased by 5%, while state population has expanded by 8%. A patient’s waiting period to see a physician in healthcare facilities care can take hours. The average waiting period in most emergency departments is eight hours and 17 minutes per person (Lin, 2010). With the current average

With the economy of the United States in shambles, illegal immigration and the effects it has on health care can no longer be ignored. America has a whole needs to be concerned and well informed of the issues rather than collecting information piecemeal by way of media or other biased groups. If illegal immigration stays its present course the American tax-payer will continue to fund the well being of individuals who have broken federal rules and regulations and are being supported by law abiding citizens. This argument is not about individual rights to live and prosper. It is not about race or discrimination of any sort. It is only about the effects on health care that I am addressing.

     Illegal immigrants usually hold jobs that have bad conditions and worse pay.  Oftentimes, these jobs are found in sectors such as agriculture, construction, food-handling and manufacturing (Dwyer).  Unfortunately for the illegal individuals who acquire these jobs, they have no access to comprehensive health care, though their line of work tends to demand it.  Although illegal immigrants are consequently strapped for cash, many of them will not visit primary care physicians for fear of being deported.  This sets up a vicious cycle: individuals get sick yet ignore the signs.  When illnesses get remarkably worse and are too severe to treat at doctors' offices, the individuals then go to emergency rooms, where the cost is considerably greater.  More often than not, the immigrants cannot afford to pay their hospital bills.  The cost is then covered by the medical institutions and tax-payer dollars (Wolf).  While some argue that illegal migrants do not

A key goal of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) was to decrease the number of uninsured individuals, many of whom are in low-income families and are minorities (Kaiser Family Foundation 2016). Under the ACA, immigrants who are in the U.S. legally are eligible for coverage through the health insurance marketplace but undocumented immigrants are not (HealthCare.gov) even when using their own money to purchase. There are estimates of 11.1 million undocumented immigrants in the country as of 2014 (Krogstad, Passel, & Cohn 2016). It is estimated that California was home to more than two million undocumented immigrants in 2013. In 2016, California passed SB 10, a bill that would require the California Health Benefit Exchange, which facilitates the enrollment of qualified individuals into health plans, to apply to the United States Department of Health and Human Services for a waiver to allow individuals who are not eligible to obtain health coverage through the Exchange because of their immigration status to obtain coverage from the Exchange (California Legislative Information). This paper will explore California’s SB 10 legislation, its purpose, and how it will seek to serve its undocumented immigrant population and their health needs.

Illegal immigration has caused a lot of controversy within the United States. The media has influenced our society to make us believe that illegal immigrants are horrible people. One thing that I have learned throughout life is, “Man is born free; and everywhere he is in chains (Rousseau 4).” This sums up how society dictates our lives and limits us to what the media wants to us to believe. Whether it is legal or illegal, everybody should be treated equally. Illegal immigrants might always end up with the short end of the stick, but they heavily support the US economy. They contribute by paying taxes every year. In addition, they adopt difficult low wage jobs that are not of interest to the average American.

There are several arguments spotlighting the effect of illegal immigration on current rising health care cost. To this point, illegal immigrants and elected representatives across the country are unable to deny the increased costs placed upon the backs of American taxpayers due to the rise in health care and health care insurance cost. A bill initiated in Indiana will demand local hospitals create a report regarding the costs associated with treating illegal immigrants. Additionally, on a countrywide level, there is an ongoing endeavor to push illegal immigrant children toward federally funded Children’s Health Insurance by the governing body which in turn will effectively raise the current tax rates for all Americans. As an alternative, some policymakers are trying to use creative language in order to guarantee that illegal immigrants were blocked from obtaining health care services (Maxwell & Adolfo 324). For undocumented immigrants within the United States, acquiring health related services or care systematically increases the cost for American taxpayers across the board. Health care providers, Health care insurance companies and both the state and federally supplemented health care funds ( i.e. Medicaid) are forced to close the gap on the negative revenue return by increasing cost of services due to the excessive use and write off of public health care funds and services by illegal immigrants.

A specific debate regarding the impacts illegal immigration has on the U.S. is whether illegal immigrants take American jobs, or not. One would argue that they do not take American jobs with the reasoning that they occupy jobs that do not require skill, and has a low pay making them jobs that Americans do not want, therefore it does not increase the labor market competition, but actually complements it. Businesses have shown to be more exceeding when there are multiple employees

Every year hundreds of thousands legal illegal immigrants flock to America. They hope to start a new life or escape civil wars in their countries. There are approximately 12.5 million illegal immigrants residing in the U.S. This number has grown significantly in the past years. This puts a major strain on the economy costing taxpayers three billion dollars each year. Immigrants are also taking the jobs from