Click here to download the entire The Economic Impact of the Hispanic Population on Long Island as a printable PDF
A new study from a conservative think tank shows what a lot of us have known all along: States with large immigrant populations do better than states without the so-called "problem of immigration."
As Republican commentator Linda Chavez summarizes it:
States with the highest percentage of immigrants or the largest recent influx of immigrants - 19 "high immigrant jurisdictions" in all - are wealthier and have better employment numbers, and most boast better crime figures than those with fewer immigrants.
You can read the full report here, in pdf.
The report contrasted a variety of economic and social trends in the 19 states with the highest influx of immigrants with "low-immigrant" states. For example, the study found that the crime rate in the high-immigrant states was not only lower than in the low-immigrant states, but that the crime rates in immigrant dense states is declining more quickly as immigrants move in.
Politicians like to tag immigrants with the label of criminality, but they ignore the reality. I remember the contradiction a few years ago when Suffolk's Steve Levy bragged about Suffolk's diminishing crime rate within a week of warning of a coming immigrant crime wave. Let's not let the facts interfere with good rhetoric.
Immigrant haters also like to charge that immigrants are taking jobs from Americans. So naturally you'd expect unemployment to have increased in high-immigrant states. The opposite has been the case. From 1999 to 2006 unemployment declined by .1% in the high-immigrant states while increasing by a full one percent in the rest of the country. And poverty in low-immigrant states grew at a rate three times the growth in high-immigrant states.
You could still argue that immigrants are keeping wages down, as long as you don't look at the stats. From 1999 to 2006 median household incomes grew an average of $7,458 in immigrant rich states, and only $4,863 among the immigrant deprived remainder. Of course some pols claim that those in immigrant dense states may earn more, but their earnings are eaten up in taxes to pay for services to 'illegals.' I already dealt with the ignorance of the law behind this misconception, but the report is fairly conclusive on the point. After-tax income in the immigrant dense states is almost $2,000 higher than in those states immigrants choose to avoid.
Next time you hear about a politician railing against immigrants, ask yourself if low-immigration states like Mississippi, Michigan, and Idaho are really safer and more vibrant than high-immigration states like New York, California, and Washington state.