As you prepare to go to the polls on Tuesday, and as Trump ratchets up his racist attacks on immigrants and migrants, please know this, and please repeat it to everyone you know:
Every generation of Americans, at every level of government, consumes more benefits from the local and federal government than they contribute in taxes, with one single exception according to the Federal Reserve:
First generation immigrants.
First generation immigrants contribute more to the federal coffers than they receive in benefits in a year, including their dependents.
The numbers are striking:
First generation immigrants to the United States contributed $963 more than they received in federal benefits last year.
The rest of us run a net deficit of $4,364.
Nearly every economist in the world will tell you that immigration is good for a nation’s economy. Immigrants do not steal jobs. They do the work that others will not. They purchase goods and services. Buy homes. Build business. Hire workers.
Immigrants are the fabled job creators.
In 2017, despite Trump’s anti-immigrant rhetoric, immigrants launched 25% of all new businesses in this country. 216 of the Fortune 500 businesses in America today were founded by immigrants or their children. More than half of all businesses in America today worth one billion dollars or more were founded by immigrants.
Refugees, a subgroup of the foreign-born population, have even higher rates of business creation and entrepreneurship.
If we want a healthy, expanding economy, we should be welcoming immigrants to our nation with open arms.
Trump has already made it clear that his attacks against immigration are not based upon economic theory or any real data. He is simply a racist who wants to prevent people of color from entering the United States. He has referred to the nations of African as “shit hole countries” and has asked why the United States couldn’t attract immigrants from predominately white countries like Norway.
White immigrants? Just fine in Trump’s opinion.
Mexican or Africans? In Trump’s own words, “drug dealers, criminals, and rapists.”
In truth, immigrants also commit fewer crimes than natural born Americans by a wide margin.
Make no mistake: Immigrants are good for our country. They are good for our economy. They are a driving force in business creation and job creation in America today, despite being forced to operate in a country with a President who openly despises them and a base of Republican supporters who refuse to acknowledge the economics behind immigration and instead continue to cast their votes based upon fear, ignorance, party loyalty, and the color of a person’s skin.
When you go to the polls on Tuesday, keep these irrefutable facts in mind, and please share them with whoever will listen. Trump is hoping that the fear and anger conjured from his rhetoric about immigrants, the caravan, and the “horde of invaders at our southern border” will win him votes in the midterms.
We have to do everything we can to stop a racist President from acting against America’s self interests and against people who have made our country great and continue to make our country great every day.
