1. Myth: Immigrants don’t pay taxes
Fact:All immigrants pay taxes, whether income, property, sales, or
other. As far as income tax payments go, sources vary in their accounts, but a range of studies find that immigrants pay between $90 and $140 billion a year in federal, state, and local taxes. Even undocumented immigrants pay income taxes, as evidenced by the Social Security administration’s “suspense file” (taxes that cannot be matched to workers’ names and social
security numbers), which grew $20 billion between 1990 and 1998.
Source: National Academy of Sciences, Cato Institute, Urban Institute, Social Security Administration

2. Myth: Immigrants come here to take welfare
Fact: Immigrants come to work and reunite with family members. Immigrant labor force participation is consistently higher than native-born, and immigrant workers make up a larger share of the U.S. labor force (12.4%) than they do the U.S. population (11.5%). Moreover, the ratio between immigrant use of public benefits and the amount of taxes they pay is consistently favorable to the U.S., unless the “study” was undertaken by an anti-immigrant group. In one estimate, immigrants earn about
$240 billion a year, pay about $90 billion a year in taxes, and use about $5 billion in public benefits. In another cut of the data, immigrant tax payments total $20 to $30 billion more than the amount of government services they use.
source: American Immigration Lawyers Association, Urban Institute

3. Myth: Immigrants send all their money back to their ome countries
Fact: In addition to the consumer spending of immigrant households, immigrants and their businesses contribute $162 billion in tax revenue to U.S. federal, state, and local governments. While it is true that immigrants remit billions of dollars a year to their home countries, this is one of the most targeted and effective forms of direct foreign investment.
source: Cato Institute, Inter-American Development Bank

4. Myth: Immigrants take jobs and opportunity away from Americans
Fact: The largest wave of immigration to the U.S. since the early 1900s coincided with our lowest national unemployment rate and fastest economic growth. Immigrant entrepreneurs create jobs for U.S. and foreign workers, and foreign-born students allow many U.S. graduate programs to keep their doors open. While there has been no comprehensive study done of immigrant-owned businesses, we have countless examples: in Silicon Valley, companies begun by Chinese and Indian immigrants generated more than $19.5 billion in sales and nearly 73,000 jobs in 2000.
source: Brookings Institution

5. Myth: Immigrants are a drain on the U.S. economy
Fact: During the 1990s, half of all new workers were foreign-born, filling gaps left by native-born workers in both the high- and low-skill ends of the spectrum. Immigrants fill jobs in key sectors, start their own businesses, and contribute to a thriving economy. The net benefit of immigration to the U.S. is nearly $10 billion annually. As Alan Greenspan points out, 70% of immigrants arrive in prime working age. That means we haven’t spent a penny on their education, yet they are transplanted into our workforce and will contribute $500 billion toward our social security system over the next 20 years.
source: National Academy of Sciences, Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University, Federal Reserve
**NOTE**:Due to welfare reform, legal immigrants are severely restricted from accessing public benefits, and undocumented immigrants are even further precluded from anything other than emergency services. Anti-immigrant groups skew these figures by including programs used by U.S. citizen children of immigrants in their definition of immigrant welfare use, among other tactics.

6. Myth: Immigrants don’t want to learn English or become Americans
Fact: Within ten years of arrival, more than 75% of immigrants speak English well; moreover, demand for English classes at the adult level far exceeds supply. Greater than 33% of immigrants are naturalized citizens; given increased immigration in the 1990s, this figure will rise as more legal permanent residents become eligible for naturalization in the coming years. The number of immigrants naturalizing spiked sharply after two events: enactment of immigration and welfare reform laws in 1996, and the terrorist attacks in 2001.
source: U.S. Census Bureau, U.S. Department of Homeland Security (Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services)

7. Myth: Today’s immigrants are different than those of 100 years ago
Fact:The percentage of the U.S. population that is foreign-born now stands at 11.5%; in the early 20th century it was approximately 15%. Similar to accusations about today’s immigrants, those of 100 years ago initially often settled in mono-ethnic neighborhoods, spoke their native languages, and built up
newspapers and businesses that catered to their fellow émigrés. They also experienced the same types of discrimination that today’s immigrants face, and integrated within American culture at a similar rate. If we view history objectively, we remember that every new wave of immigrants has been met with suspicion and doubt and yet, ultimately, every past wave of immigrants has been vindicated and saluted.
source: U.S. Census Bureau

8. Myth: Most immigrants cross the border illegally
Fact: Around 75% have legal permanent (immigrant) visas; of the 25% that are undocumented, 40% overstayed temporary (nonimmigrant) visas.
source: INS StatisticalYearbook

9. Myth: Weak U.S. border enforcement has lead to high undocumented immigration
Fact: From 1986 to 1998, the Border Patrol’s budget increased sixfold and the number of agents stationed on our southwest border doubled to 8,500. The Border Patrol also toughened its enforcement strategy, heavily fortifying typical urban entry points and pushing migrants into dangerous desert areas, in
hopes of deterring crossings. Instead, the undocumented immigrant population doubled in that timeframe, to 8 million— despite the legalization of nearly 3 million immigrants after the enactment of the Immigration Reform and Control Act in 1986. Insufficient legal avenues for immigrants to enter the U.S.,
compared with the number of jobs available to them, have created this current conundrum.
source: Cato Institute

10. Myth: The war on terrorism can be won through immigration restrictions
Fact: No security expert since September 11th, 2001 has said that restrictive immigration measures would have prevented the terrorist attacks—instead, they key is good use of good intelligence. Most of the 9/11 hijackers were here on legal visas. Since 9/11, the myriad of measures targeting immigrants in the name of national security have netted no terrorism prosecutions. In fact, several of these measures could have the opposite effect and actually make us less safe, as targeted communities of immigrants are afraid to come forward with information.
source: Newspaper articles, various security experts, and think tanks


Prepared by the National Immigration Forum, June 2003

bro, dont try to justify that since your illegal - you are also a citizen

what would you tell to a bihari bhaiya who comes and lives in nepal -  that he is a nepali citizen too?

I would support above mentioned info with respect to the legal immigrants. However, I would not support 'illegal'. I believe there are many legal immigrnats from Nepal who are suffered badly because of illegal immigrants. Illegal is simply illegal.....

Jneutron, we don't deport beharis. They are free to come , work , live , have families and go where ever and whenever they want. we don't racially profile everyone who look like certain race and ask for any one who don't look like pahadis for their nagariktas when they are walking on the street. you're logic is messed up. But again, we don't claim to be the smartest and richest people in the world either. we don't preach about libery and all humans are equal either. America is an example in the world how people from different origin and race can come together and live like one family. It's sad being an immigrant you can't understand that logic.

Also don't forget the history. if we hold onto your logic then white people came to America without visas, killed the natives, shoved the rest into reservations, and took their land. they got citizenshp , did't they?based on that, these immigrants are far better than the immigrants who came here few hundred years ago.

that does not mean America should be flooed with immigrants. there should be a solid and fair immigration system. which this country lacks right now. For these immigrants there is no line to get into to become legal. They are often blamed for using benefits and not paying taxes which is a total lie.

The thing is there already exist  laws that prohibit illegal immigration. There is a special Federal Agency that deals with illegal immigration, the ICE. This law does nothing but violate the civil rights of the people. This law requires law enforcement officials to ask papers for the people who look "illegal". Now how does a person look illegal. Is it their dress-up, their hairstyle, the kind of shoes they wear and the list goes on. But these are all personal life choices. I do not want to carry all my papers with me when I walk to the nearby corner store to get a pack of cigarettes.

We need to understand that those who are against this bill are not in favor of illegally immigrating people. But rather worried that this law could (and I believe) will lead to racial profiling. This law increases the chances of abuse of power by law enforcement officials. They see a brown guy, don't like him (for no apparent reason), then decide to harass him by asking papers, just for fun. And their are some deadly consequences too. Say if an illegal immigrant sees somebody being murdered, he thinks of dialing 911. Then it occurs to him: Oh Wait! The police will ask for my papers.

I live in California, so I might be thinking completely one-sided. But let me share my story with the sajha users. When I went to Office of law standards and enforcement and told them that I had worked under the table but haven't been paid, the investigator told me employees are entitled to protection by labor laws irrespective of their immigration status. May I also add that not once did he ask for my ID, or about my status but filed a case right away.

 

 

pshestha
We don't kick out the Biharis cause they control our system, our government has no balls, that does not mean we love them and say "Hello Welcome to Nepal" evertime we see them on the street. There's no law in Nepal, so leave it aside. The logic is there, no enforcement, that's about it.
What about the Tibetans...we deport them. Why? Tibetans are the Mexican of Nepal. So you think we are the saints? When it happens in Nepal, then it is fine, but when it happens in America, they are all RACIST. Talk about hypocrisy.

Examples of Tibetans don't fit here. Generally, Nepalese don't have any ill feelings towards Tibetans. Government of Nepal deports them on the pressure of chinese government and give the refugee status to them on the pressure from indian and US governments or UN. So Nepalese government does what other governments tell them to do. I think, by default Nepalese government turns blind eye to tibetans crossing the border; but returns them when chinese pressure them.