A Little Reality on Immigration
Not long ago you could be a movement conservative and be for reasonably open immigration policies. Ronald Reagan, Jack Kemp, Steve Forbes and George W. Bush all took open positions on immigration.
.. The number of illegal immigrants flowing into this country is dropping, not rising. The flow of total immigrants peaked in 2005 and has been dropping since. The share of immigrants coming from Latin America is falling sharply. Since 2008, more immigrants have come from Asia than Latin America, and the disparity is growing.
There are more Mexicans leaving the United States than coming in. According to the Pew Research Center, there was a net outflow of 140,000 from 2009 to 2014. If Trump builds his wall, he’ll lock more Mexican immigrants in than he’ll keep out.
.. Roughly 1.6 percent of immigrant males between ages 18 and 39 wind up incarcerated, compared with 3.3 percent of native-born American men of the same age. Among native-born men without a high school diploma, about 11 percent are incarcerated. Among similarly educated Mexican, Guatemalan and Salvadoran men here, only 2 or 3 percent get incarcerated.
.. The bulk of the evidence shows that immigrants have a hugely positive effect on total American G.D.P. while having little effect on overall wages.
.. The Republican primary base is more and more made up of older people, who have significantly more negative views about immigration. Second, by 2044, America will be a majority-minority country. This is a very different America than the one people who grew up in the 1960s were used to. It’s a historical transformation that is bound to raise very legitimate concerns.