im just glad china and india arent closer/accessible by land cause we'd have 500,000,000 illegals because they just want a better life, awww

6/27/2007 12:11:54 PM

this has nothing to do with race...it has to do with breaking laws and hurting tax payers. It just so happens that its mexicans. the race card doesnt apply you fucking idiot

[Edited on June 27, 2007 at 12:18 PM. Reason : 7]

6/27/2007 12:18:03 PM

Did I say everyone that opposed Mexicans being here was a racist? No.

6/27/2007 12:27:19 PM

Quote :

"But in this case it's absolutely right to secure your borders and control immigration."

I agree that both of those are basic purposes of the Federal government. But that doesn't give them a free hand to do anything and everything in the name of those goals. The only justifiable form of immigration control is the prevention of terrorists and (real) criminals from crossing the border. Anything more than that is, at the end of the day,

1) Opposed to the American ideal of a free market.
2) Opposed to the American ideals of fundamental liberty
3) Thinly-veiled manifestations of reactionary, xenophobic, and/or racist fears

The laws, as they exist now, are anathema to what America is all about, and are harmful besides.

Quote :

"All the other illegals are out there working hard and paying their taxes."

Jesus, EarthDogg, I know you're not a downe's syndrome kid. Nobody's saying they pay their taxes. They can't pay their taxes because you people won't let them.

Quote :

" I get to see that 1 out of 10 defrauds the US government and my company."

So what exactly do you think this is a function of? You don't strike me as the type to think that Hispanics are genetically or culturally predisposed to sneakiness. So what, then, could it be?

Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that our immigration structure creates huge incentives to work outside the system and off the radar, and generally punish these people harshly for trying to obey the (real) law and act in accordance with society.

Quote :

"What I don't understand is why we have to just say "ohhh well, we can't fix this problem any other way so we will just give them a visa and let them get on the path for citizenship"."

Well, long story short is that we could draft the entire legal population of this country into the border patrol and INS and work for the next bajillion years and still not get/keep the illegals out.

Quote :

"wanting to legalize them so they can vote for them and stay in office"

Nobody is this stupid. Well, not any politicians, anyway. Although apparently you are.

The Hispanic population might be large, but the voting block would be small -- remember, not all of these people want citizenship, many (most?) just want residency. Of the rest, I'm predicting an appreciable level of apathy, about what you normally find among poorer populations here. Any benefit to be gained from the immigrant vote would be vastly outweighed, on the whole (though maybe not in specific communities) by the backlash of current citizens.

Quote :

"it has to do with breaking laws and hurting tax payers"

They're breaking an unjust law and by most accounts contribute more to the economy than they take out.

[Edited on June 27, 2007 at 12:28 PM. Reason : ]

6/27/2007 12:27:36 PM

Quote :

"They can't pay their taxes because you people won't let them"

i'm sure they're just itching to pay taxes, when currently they dont have to...why wouldnt they want to give away their money? im sure they are honest folks

Quote :

"not all of these people want citizenship, many (most?) just want residency"

so how are the residents going to be forced to pay taxes? oh yeah, they're not

Quote :

"by most accounts contribute more to the economy than they take out"

thats just a flatout lie...cant really argue with someone who is just lying

6/27/2007 12:30:36 PM

Quote :

"so how are the residents going to be forced to pay taxes?"

The same way we currently force residents and citizens to pay taxes, through the good ol' IRS. Right now the system means there is a much higher penalty for paying taxes -- exposure and possible deportation -- than there is for not paying them. That is a function of them being illegal.

Quote :

"i'm sure they're just itching to pay taxes, when currently they dont have to...why wouldnt they want to give away their money?"

First of all, it's not my side's fault that right now they're not paying taxes. We didn't set up a system of perverse incentives that makes it so easy and desirable to avoid. Second of all, paying a little bit in taxes (and for most of them, it would be a little, we're not talking about a horde of taco-eating Bill Gates' here) would shortly become as natural to them as it is to us, because instead of getting punished for paying them they'd get punished for not paying them.

Quote :

" thats just a flatout lie...cant really argue with someone who is just lying"

Sigh...

http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=881584

Quote :

"The widespread belief is that illegal aliens cost more in government services than they contribute to the economy. This belief is undeniably false. [E]very empirical study of illegals' economic impact demonstrates the opposite . . .: undocumenteds actually contribute more to public coffers in taxes than they cost in social services."

Quote :

"Nevertheless, each year undocumented immigrants add billions of dollars in sales, excise, property, income and payroll taxes, including Social Security, Medicare and unemployment taxes, to federal, state and local coffers. Hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants go out of their way to file annual federal and state income tax returns. Yet undocumented immigrants are barred from almost all government benefits, including food stamps, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, Medicaid, federal housing programs, Supplemental Security Income, Unemployment Insurance, Social Security, Medicare, and the earned income tax credit (EITC). Generally, the only benefits federally required for undocumented immigrants are emergency medical care, subject to financial and category eligibility, and elementary and secondary public education. Many undocumented immigrants will not even access these few critical government services because of their ever-present fear of government officials and deportation."

Quote :

"In fact, the New York Times reported that undocumented workers who are not eligible to receive Social Security are shoring up the Social Security system with up to $7 billion a year."

6/27/2007 12:41:00 PM

Quote :

"by most accounts contribute more to the economy than they take out"

so your one source is now "most accounts"

6/27/2007 12:45:14 PM

No, it's the first fucking thing I found on Google. How many sources will you be requiring today, TreeTwista?

Never mind the fact that I only quoted from the abstract; the whole document is obviously much more detailed and refers to a large number of other studies.

6/27/2007 12:49:28 PM

well when you say most studies say they give more than they take out, that implies some type of consensus when the issue is clearly more of a 50/50 split of opinions...which is why i pointed out the flat out lie that you told of implying something controversial and split as being essentially onesided

let alone that the reason they are working "jobs that americans dont want" is because the illegal labor has driven those wages way down to the point that americans dont want those jobs...because the hiring of illegals made them finanancially undesirable...even the high school and college kids who used to work in those fields as summer jobs dont want them, because the hiring of illegals has significantly lowered those wages

6/27/2007 12:55:37 PM

There is a consensus among actual empirical studies. I'll refer you to that first quote again:

Quote :

"The widespread belief is that illegal aliens cost more in government services than they contribute to the economy. This belief is undeniably false. [E]very empirical study of illegals' economic impact demonstrates the opposite . . .: undocumenteds actually contribute more to public coffers in taxes than they cost in social services."

The footnote to that has a list of citations as long as your arm. Listen, man, the general population might be split down the middle (or worse) on this question, but for people with the information in front of them there really isn't much of a question to be split on. The numbers are pretty simple.

What's hillarious is that there is a much easier tack you could be taking to fight me here, but instead you are railing against my use of one source when you have used approximately...zero.

6/27/2007 1:00:26 PM

Quote :

"The numbers are pretty simple."

once again thats false...how are the numbers simple when there arent records of their finances due to the fact that they're undocumented! yes we know they put a certain amount into the economy through social security, etc that they might not ever get back...course short term when they use taxpayer services or public transport or health care services, which we cant quantify, they may or may not "break even" on what they put in versus what they get out

the fact that there are 10 million + people who arent documented seems like it would make things pretty difficult to...document their financial activities, doesnt it

6/27/2007 1:02:59 PM

Quote :

"the fact that there are 10 million + people who arent documented seems like it would make things pretty difficult to...document their financial activities, doesnt it"

Not really, no. We have reasonably intelligent people who can come up with excellent means of tracking things, especially taxes. We can get a pretty good estimate. If anything, it's actually easier to keep track the public services they use. Public transportation was a silly example on your part; it typically comes with a fee and for all intents and purposes there is no increase in cost if a bus takes on a few more passengers. But we know who's in school, and emergency room care (the only kind we'd have to pick up the bill for as taxpayers, since they straight up CAN'T GET medicare, etc) is easy to monitor, too.

Another study from JSTOR:

Quote :

"The net balance of these two forces is positive in every year with respect to natives' incomes. IN short, immigrants contribute more to the public coffers than they take from them. -Immigrants, Taxes, and Welfare in the United States, by Julian L. Simon Population and Development Review © 1984 Population Council "

6/27/2007 1:17:02 PM

I just don't know how we have some expansive understanding of all the net economic benefits or burdens considering we don't know how much most of these people earn or spend

6/27/2007 1:18:37 PM

We don't really have to know much about what they earn, although, again, we have a fair idea. For purposes of this conversation we need to know how much they pay in taxes (pretty easy to figure out an estimate) and how much they cost (even easier to figure out).

6/27/2007 1:22:28 PM

lets look at a few facts

- millions and millions of illegal workers (numbers are estimated)
- paid under the table (wages not documented)
- dont pay income taxes (net tax payment by illegals not documented)
- no documentation on amount of money spent in US vs sent back to country of origin

forgive me for not trusting a study based on estimates and approximations as being definitely true

6/27/2007 1:25:58 PM

So then you must not ever trust any studies, ever.

When I have more time I will try to get the details on how they get their numbers, right now my head hurts. I'll just point out that you have not put forward any study that counters these so far.

6/27/2007 1:30:59 PM

how can you realize that there are over 10 million undocumented people earning undocumented amounts of money and spending undocumented amounts of money

yet you think we somehow know all about net economic impacts?

6/27/2007 1:34:47 PM

Quote :

"^NO. The US is not Rome. You can't make predictions like THAT. But don't worry, I predict your mildly attractive wife won't leave your ugly ass."

Why don't you go and study Roman history, Mr. "ad hominem". The parallel's can be very eye opening. I challenge you to study it out. The only difference between Rome and the US is that Romans were very proud of thier "empire" and we as Americans aren't.

We'll have to wait and see where the US goes from here. Maybe tdub will still be around and we can bring this thread back up for discussion.

6/27/2007 1:38:47 PM

Quote :

"yet you think we somehow know all about net economic impacts?"

We don't know "all" about them, but we can come up with a pretty serviceable idea. If you're going to start demanding certainty for everything, people are going to have an even more difficult time talking to you than they already do.

I have really enjoyed the backtracking though..."Studies don't say that! Er...Well...most studies don't say that! Yeah, well, those studies are all wrong!"

I'm sure you know much better about it than the professors, tax lawyers, etc. who write these pieces.

6/27/2007 1:41:21 PM

apparently you dont have the COMMON sense to realize that an unknown X plus an unknown Y plus an unknown Z does not yield a known answer! yet there are some magical all knowing govt officials who somehow do know this

we cant find them and we dont know where they live or work or how much they make...but somehow we know all about their finances

6/27/2007 1:44:55 PM

No, dude, like I said, I'm sure you know waaaay more about the situation than people who do research like this for a living. I don't know how many times I saw in those articles, "Of course, all of this is conjecture, I mean we tried to track down TreeTwista for some insight but we couldn't get ahold of him."

1) Demand study.
2) Demand more studies.
3) Dismiss all studies as wrong.
...
5) Profit

6/27/2007 1:47:36 PM

we dont know how many of them there are
we dont know how much money they make
we dont know how much money they spend
+
______________________________________

we know their economic impact


so you dont have a problem with that? thats sad

6/27/2007 1:49:06 PM

Why don't you just say "I don't know what kind of impact they are having... I just know it is BAD " and call it a day.

6/27/2007 2:07:00 PM

grumpygop is yet another senseless troll trying to stir shit in the hot sun

6/27/2007 2:38:06 PM

I think its pretty easy to understand that not paying your income taxes is a bad thing ^^

6/27/2007 2:47:53 PM

Yeah, if you are only going to look at it in the most simplistic of terms.

6/27/2007 2:55:00 PM

and isnt that one of the simplist thing that it boils down to....

people not abiding by our laws and not paying the correct amount of taxes for the benefits they receive?

6/27/2007 3:02:57 PM

THEY CAN'T PAY THEIR FUCKING INCOME TAXES

BECAUSE YOU PEOPLE

WON'T LET THEM

IT ISN'T HARD TO UNDERSTAND

If paying taxes meant I'd get thrown out of the country, I wouldn't pay the damn things either.

6/27/2007 3:04:32 PM

Aren't most illegal aliens poor?

As income taxes are structured, the poor illegal immigrants are actually missing out on the Earned Income Tax Credit by not filling tax returns.

That said, I don't want to pay nearly as much taxes as I currently do; so I cannot begrudge someone else for getting away with what I wish I could do. If the money was collected in taxes it would just be wasted by Congress anyway. At least this way someone gets some good out of the money, even if it is illegal immigrants.

6/27/2007 3:18:50 PM

how about, if you are illegal, you can become legal by serving in iraq for 5 years

that'll make everyone happy

6/27/2007 3:25:54 PM

Quote :

"As income taxes are structured, the poor illegal immigrants are actually missing out on the Earned Income Tax Credit by not filling tax returns."

They feel -- probably correctly -- that any communication with the IRS or any government agency drastically increases their chances of being discovered and deported. They don't avoid paying taxes to save money, they do it because we have created a subculture that feels it must stay off the grid in order to survive.

6/27/2007 6:56:17 PM

the real way you punish illegal immigration is to go after the companies that hire them illegally.

6/27/2007 7:05:16 PM

LoneSnark, the perpetual winner of threads

6/27/2007 7:08:29 PM

^^^all you're really doing is explaining the perspective of a criminal who doesn't want to get caught...not a very convincing argument

6/27/2007 7:22:37 PM

If what we're talking about is the legality of their immigration, I agree, and I'd use a wholly different argument there -- namely, the inherent incompatibility of current U.S. immigration policy with the fundamental dictates of the Constitution, the free market, and good sense.

But we were talking specifically about your side's argument that "they don't pay taxes." As I've said ten thousand times in this and other threads, the reason they don't do so is because we've set up perverse incentives.

Let's face it -- there's a lot of laws that most people only follow consistently because they will be punished if they don't do so. As LoneSnark has already more or less said, he wishes he could get away with paying less taxes, but doing so brings the IRS down on his head. That's the point of many laws -- making people do what they otherwise would not do, presumably for the common good. If you're going to sit here and tell me that you'd pay your taxes in full if there was no consequence for failing to do so, I'm going to call you a liar to your face.

With illegals, however, we've set up a system wherein their direct punishment for not paying taxes is nil -- all it really does is give you people something to shout about, which doesn't affect them much directly. At the same time, we've give them everything to lose -- or at least good reason for thinking that they have everything to lose -- by paying those taxes. So the law-abiding, bona fide American citizens that you have such a boner for are coerced into contributing, and the illegals are coerced into not contributing. That alone should be enough to outrage you into more sensible reforms, but perhaps that is expecting too much.

All I'm trying to do -- all I've ever been trying to do -- with this line of argument is debunk the "but they don't pay taxes!" line.

I'm going to go ahead and tell you what you should have been arguing all this time, which is that by allowing the illegals citizenship (one route by which they could pay taxes without fear) we would in fact be losing money, because in that situation they would be paying taxes -- though, as many have said, not much of them, as they tend to not make much money -- but they would also become eligible for all of the programs which are currently denied them -- medicare, social security, etc., which are not cheap.

The hillarious thing is that this argument, which is perfectly valid, is only a step or two away from the ones you have been using, which have consistently been disproven. And yet, you couldn't make the jump. I can't wait to see how long it takes you to jump all over it, and, especially, to claim that this is what you've been saying the whole time.

[Edited on June 27, 2007 at 7:58 PM. Reason : There is also a severe limitation built into that, but I'll bet $texas you don't get it.]

6/27/2007 7:58:03 PM

so explain to me why the people in favor of amnesty arent doing this to get votes from the soon-to-be legals to stay in office

seems like you quickly dismissed that suggestion earlier although increasing the size of the country's population by 5% seems like it could have a HUGE impact on elections

6/27/2007 8:12:54 PM

I dismissed it with good reason. I think it's perfectly reasonable to suggest that a majority of illegals are seeking legal residency rather than citizenship, so already we're reducing the number of formerly illegal voters by half. Of those, I think it is once again perfectly reasonable to think that out of those that did become citizens, only a slightly higher percentage of them would vote than out of the general population -- and, since we all know how dismal those numbers are, we've reduced the number even further. Of those, their votes would likely not heavily favor either party.

As it stands right now, about 2/3 of the Hispanic vote goes to Democrats, the other third to Republicans. A reversal of that would in and of itself be a dramatic shift, but still not one that would mean all that much, especially considering that the majority of illegal immigrants live in states whose overall political leanings would not change as a result (ie, California votes so hugely democratic, and Texas, so hugely Republican, that even opposite introductions of illegals into the voting pool would not sway Senate or Electoral votes).

Of course, for certain Congressmen in certain districts, it might well result in a change of the prevailing vote, but incumbents (the ones who would be able to vote on this issue currently) would stand mainly to lose as a result, since any change would, by definition, be in favor of their opponent. There are certainly exceptions even to this, but far to few to account for the current push for amnesty. John McCain is not going to keep or lose his seat based on the influx of Hispanic voters.

6/27/2007 8:58:47 PM

Lets say there are 12 million illegal immigrants in the country

Lets assume half want citizenship (6 million)

Lets assume half of those would vote (3 million)

Bush beat Kerry in 2004 ~ 62 million to 59 million

yet you dont think those votes could matter?

6/27/2007 9:18:18 PM

Quote :

"The laws, as they exist now, are anathema to what America is all about, and are harmful besides."

Agreed. We do need to revamp the laws to loosen up legal immigration. But we can only do that with control of the border. We have to be able to check the people coming in.
We have people sneaking in by the thousands and then the gov't turns away college grads, scientists, engineers and other just-as-useful immigrants because of some dumb quota system.

Quote :

"They can't pay their taxes because you people won't let them."

I do have to mention again (at the risk of groans from everyone) that this problem would be solved with the National Sales Tax. Illegals would now be paying their taxes.

Quote :

"grumpygop is yet another senseless troll trying to stir shit in the hot sun"

Grumpy is a pretty sharp guy. I think if he really wanted to Troll you..there wouldn't be much skin left on the bone

[Edited on June 27, 2007 at 10:40 PM. Reason : .]

6/27/2007 10:40:11 PM

Quote :

"Bush beat Kerry in 2004 ~ 62 million to 59 million"

Bush beat Kerry by a certain amount of electoral votes, primarily concentrated in Ohio, which has a relatively low population of illegal immigrants. The states in which illegals are most concentrated are, like I said, typically heavily swayed to one side or the other. Three million votes split largely between the states with large illegal populations might, might switch New Mexico or Arizona, which, if I recall correctly, do not together have enough electoral votes to sway any presidential election in recent history.

Well, I'll even say I may be wrong on that last point, but even if I am, you're assuming that all of the illegals vote one way, which is preposterous at best.

Quote :

"We do need to revamp the laws to loosen up legal immigration. But we can only do that with control of the border."

I'm 100% behind that, but I think you'll find it a lot easier to do when we aren't spreading our resources trying to track down or stop immigrants that have no business being turned away. If we've got to build a big-assed electric fence a la Jurassic Park, fine. But that's only part of the solution.

As far as this discussion goes I agree with you about the National Sales Tax. In general, I still think it is impractical to the extent of being catastrophic, but yes, it would present a solution to the tax issue with illegals (if there was one).

Quote :

"Grumpy is a pretty sharp guy. I think if he really wanted to Troll you..there wouldn't be much skin left on the bone"

Why thank you. I was frankly amazed that the only guy to present any sources at all recently was labeled as a troll, but then again, the label came from -- if I may use a favored but still apt expression of mine -- a semi-sentient mongoloid chromosomal retard.

6/28/2007 3:57:23 AM

SHOT DOWN....i like to think my emails to Senators helped

6/28/2007 11:49:57 AM

yep

another win for the good guys

http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/06/28/immigration.congress/index.html

6/28/2007 11:59:24 AM

TEAM AMERICA>>>FUCK YEA

6/28/2007 12:00:23 PM

Also another one of the things included in this bill was national ID cards...and not just for immigrants, but for everybody

6/28/2007 12:05:32 PM

It's kinda cool to read a headline like this

Quote :

" Senate immigration bill suffers crushing defeat"

I dunno why. And you gotta love this part too

Quote :

"Bill was centerpiece of Bush's 2nd term; aimed at legalizing 12 million"

I mean, everything about that quote just reads of a failure to the conservative agenda the GOP is supposed to have. Here's to hoping a proper conservative value candidate gets the presidency in '08, but I fear Bush has royally fucked his own party. We'll find out in Sept when they start having the "lessons learned" discussion's in regards to the troop buildup/surge/increase/wajkahstkjsher.

6/28/2007 12:06:02 PM

except it was the true conservatives (not Bush in this case) that were AGAINST the bill

6/28/2007 12:08:14 PM

why "except"? Did you read what I read? I fucking agree with you dipshit.

6/28/2007 12:11:10 PM

well i dont read anything about a "failure to the conservative agenda" considering the conservative agenda was to shoot this bill down...so it seems the conservative agenda succeeded

6/28/2007 12:14:24 PM

Do you think at all or do you just react to certain posters and assume you know what they are talking about?

Look at the part I quoted, talking about Bush. President Bush. Do you think, when I talk about the failure of the conservative agenda the GOP (the Grand Ole Party, the Republicans, the conservatives) is supposed to have (ie, historically), then go on to talk about hoping a candidate for 08 has proper conservative values, and hoping that Bush hasn't royally fucked his party, the failure I just might be talking about, is not that of good conservatives that shot the bill down, but perhaps maybe the failure of Bush and Co, ie, the neocon agenda?

Essentially, your reading comprehension skills are terrible on their good days. Which is why these threads get shit on. Because while most other posters tolerate this sort of latent stupidity, and will take yet another post to explain to you, often in much simpler terms that your child-like mind can wrap itself around, I'm not going to that extent when it is obvious you are out of your league on most topics here.

[Edited on June 28, 2007 at 12:21 PM. Reason : think dude, for fucks sake, just use your damn brain for a split second before posting]

6/28/2007 12:20:17 PM

big win today. Now enforce the border, like we were supposed to do in 84.

6/28/2007 12:25:08 PM