The Impact of Immigration on Twenty-First Century America - California's Role In Immigration
Contribution to U.S. economy by foreign students' dependents, 2002/03
| Spouses' contribution | Children's contribution | ||
| Percent of married students: | 12.4% | Number of couples in the U.S.: | 72,617 |
| Percent of spouses in the U.S.: | 85.0% | Number of children per couple: | 0.6 |
| Number of spouses in the U.S.: | 72,617 | Number of children in the U.S.: | 43,570 |
| Additional expenses for a spouse: (% of student living expenses) | 25.0% | Additional expenses for a child: (% of student living expenses) | 20.0% |
| Spouses' contribution: | $306,000,000 | Children's contribution: | $173,000,000 |
| (No. of spouses × 85% × 25% × student living expenses) | (No. of couples × .6 × 20% × student living expenses) | ||
| Net contribution to U.S. economy by foreign students' dependents: | $479,000,000 |
encouraged illegal immigration. For example, in 1984 and 1985 city councils in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and many other California cities passed resolutions making their cities sanctuaries for illegal aliens from Central American countries regarded as having repressive governments supported by the United States.
Furthermore, many California homeowners and businesses hired illegal aliens to maintain their homes, care for their children, or work in stores, factories, and on farms. Illegal aliens went to California because other refugees from similar areas of the world had established vibrant communities there. Finally, refugees, like many Americans, were attracted to California's pleasant climate. The Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) warned that the word would spread and illegal aliens would flock to California. In Estimates of the Unauthorized Immigrant Population Residing in the United States: 1990 to 2000 (Washington, DC: Office of Policy and Planning, U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, January 2003) the INS calculated that in 2000 about 2.2 million illegal aliens, or 32% of the total number of illegal residents in the United States, lived in California.
Governor Pete Wilson's Role
Former governor Pete Wilson has also been charged with complicity in California's illegal alien problem. When the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 (IRCA) was being debated in the U.S. Senate, Wilson (a senator at the time) supported a special amnesty for illegal aliens who could prove that they worked as farm laborers for at least ninety days between May 1985 and May 1986. The Special Agricultural Worker (SAW) program became part of IRCA. When the INS demanded proof that the applicants for legalization under SAW had indeed fulfilled their employment requirement, Wilson opposed it.
Some experts believe that many undocumented aliens legalized under the SAW program were admitted under fraudulent circumstances. Although the program was supposed to grant amnesty to about 350,000 workers, nearly 1.3 million illegal immigrants gained permanent resident status through the program; most settled in California (Eric Schlosser, "In the Strawberry Fields," Reefer Madness: Sex, Drugs, and Cheap Labor in the American Black Market, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2003). After the workers were legalized, hundreds of thousands of family members entered the United States illegally. Most were women and children—those most likely to use medical and educational services.
Welfare Dependence after Welfare Reform
In How Are Immigrants Faring after Welfare Reform? Preliminary Evidence from Los Angeles and New York City (Randy Capps, et al., Washington, DC: Urban Institute, March 2002), the authors found that by 1999–2000 low-income immigrant families had lower public assistance program participation rates than low-income native families. In Los Angeles, 13% of low-income immigrant families received food stamps, compared with 34% of low-income native families. The study suggested that the percentages might have been higher but for immigrants' fears of being branded "public charges"—that is, dependent on the state—which could lead to the denial of an immigrant's application for legal permanent resident status.
Public Education and California's Immigrant Children
In California, education has been the public service most affected by both legal and illegal immigration. According to data from the California Department of Education, enrollments in California's primary and secondary schools rose significantly from 1950 to 2002. This was primarily a result of the steady influx of school-age immigrants and the growing numbers of American-born children of immigrants. The California Department of Finance projected that Hispanic K–12 enrollment would grow from 45.4% of the total in 2002–03 to 52.4% in 2011–12 (Stephen J. Carroll, et al., California's K–12 Public Schools: How Are They Doing?, Santa Monica, CA: The RAND Corporation, 2005). In The Well-Being of California's Children (San Francisco, CA: Public Policy Institute of California, 2003), Frank F. Furstenberg reported that in 1999, nearly half of all children in California under the age of six had a foreign-born parent. These children were mostly Hispanic, came from the poorest families in California, and had parents with low levels of educational attainment. Such children tended to have limited English proficiency and to experience greater problems in school.
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