The United States Should Charge Immigrants a Fee to Gain Citizenship
It seems our stupid and ineffective War on Drugs has made drug cartels so rich and powerful that they now completely control our borders as well as the illegal traffic flowing across it. Smuggling migrants earns the various cartels billions of a dollars annually. Money the United States could be earning instead. Here's the story:
The Daily Beast, 9 Jul 2014, How Mexico’s Cartels Are Behind the Border Kid Crisis
The entire border, and the routes leading up to it, are controlled by some combination of the Los Zetas, Sinaloa and Knights of Templar cartels, along with a few smaller groups—making it impossible to cross without their permission. And their permission will cost you. Where migrants may have once paid a single person from their hometown $300 to $500 to guide them across, the initial going rate to cross the cartel-occupied border can range between $3,000 and $6,000 per person, the price varying depending on the age, gender, and origin of the migrant. Most people can’t afford that much up front, so family members in the States will often wire money to the smugglers, or pay in installments along the way.
A better deal would be if we charged every person who wants to become an American a $50,000 entrance fee. Those who cannot afford that amount could be given a loan guaranteed the same way student loans are done. Why should drug dealers make all the money?
I know what you're thinking, how will immigrants, especially the uneducated, poor Mexican variety, be able to pay this debt when American-born college graduates have a difficult time? Simple: a Hispanic immigrant can find a job easier and faster than a kid with a useless degree in Latin or Art History. When was the last time you saw an unemployed Johnny College show up at a construction site (in Texas, more than half of construction workers are undocumented immigrants)? Have you ever seen job-hunting Katie Cleansqueak haul watermelons at a California farm (53% of crop laborers in the U.S. are illegals according to the National Agricultural Workers Survey)?
Anyone familiar with Mexican immigrants knows that they will take any job to put food on their table and pay their bills. I would invest in bonds backed by Mexican immigrants' ability to repay but I certainly would not do likewise in American students' ability to repay their loans.
This method of documenting immigrants and allowing them entry into our country would be much safer for them. At least our government wouldn't rape and murder them on their way into our country. Once they are approved, immigrants would be given a travel voucher to pay for their trip. No need for migrants to pay coyotes a fee to guide them across the border. Just get on a bus headed for the border with voucher in hand.
Don't like my idea? It's not my idea. Consider this from Gary Becker, the 1992 winner of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences:
GSB News, Gary Becker Explains the Benefits of Setting a Price for Immigration
The United States should apply price theory to immigration and charge immigrants a fee to gain citizenship, said Gary Becker, University Professor of Economics and of Sociology. “When I mention this to people, they sometimes go hysterical,” Becker told a packed house during the inaugural Becker Brown Bag Series lunch discussion hosted by The Becker Center on Chicago Price Theory at Hyde Park Center on March 1 and sponsored by Vishal Verma.
“They say, ‘Are you selling citizenship?’” Becker continued. “Well, we’re restricting citizenship, but we’re doing that now. Almost any criticism you have of the idea, you’d have to apply to the present system, which is also restricting entry. The real issue is, does it have good attributes and do these dominate any downside?”
If terrorists, criminals, and the unhealthy are eliminated from the pool of immigrants, the fee would provide a long list of benefits, Becker said. For example, a one-time fee of $50,000 would generate $50 billion a year from the current 1 million immigrants admitted to the U.S. each year, he said.
Such revenue would reduce opposition to immigration by blunting the argument that immigrants draw on U.S. resources, such as welfare, Medicaid, and schools, Becker said. “This would lead to a greater willingness to accept immigrants,” he said. “No longer could people say they’re not paying their way. They would be paying their way, not only in income taxes but in the entrance fee, so to speak.”
Such a fee would appeal most to the young, who are healthier and more likely to invest in their own human capital over a longer horizon, and to the skilled, who would likely generate more taxes, commit fewer crimes, and use fewer government entitlements, Becker said. “Think of the advantages: young, skilled people who want to come, who are concerned about their children’s future, who are interested in freedom and family members,” he said. “Those would be people who are more likely, all things the same, to be willing to pay for the opportunity to come.”
In order to prevent limiting immigration to only the wealthy, the government should modify the federal college loan program to help finance entry to the U.S., Becker said. “This is a form of human capital and investment, namely migration to more productive areas,” he said. “It would be natural to extend this program to help finance immigration of people who may only be willing to put up $10,000 or $15,000 of the required amount and finance the rest with a loan.”
The loan could be collected through income tax in absolute amounts or as a function of a person’s earnings, Becker said. “Employers might pay the fee,” he said. “The H1B [visa] program goes through employers entirely. Immigrants don’t have to pay anything for it. Employers might say, ‘Gee, I can get you to work. I’ll pay the $50,000. I’ll work it out with the worker, as long as you’re going to repay me for this later on.’”
The effect a fee would have on illegal immigration is not clear, Becker said. “Some who are coming legally now, for free so to speak, may decide to come illegally,” he said. “On the other hand, some workers now who come in illegally because they can’t get in legally might decide to pay the fee. They could come legally, work above ground, advance, and so on.”
This has to be better than the ridiculous system we have in place now.
