Dispelling some myths about immigrants with facts

Economist Robert Reich

RONALD REICH, former Secretary of Labor under President Clinton and major irritant of the top 1% and Wall Street, has been involved in what sometimes may seem like a hopeless crusade: Saving America's middle class.

He is currently the Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley. (Full disclosure: my alma mater.) He's taking advantage of social media to get his views aired and is a frequent guest on television talk shows.

Not surprisingly, he has been taking on some of the anti-immigrant statements made by Republican candidates for the Presidency.

Self-professed "self-made" man (through a million-dollar loan from his father) Donald Trump has been drawing the most attention for trying to turn immigrants into this campaign season's bogeyman.

From Reich's blog dispelling some myths (and out-and-out lies) surrounding immigrants:

Donald Trump has opened the floodgates to lies about immigration. Here are the myths, and the facts:

MYTH: Immigrants take away American jobs. 

Wrong. Immigrants add to economic demand, and thereby push firms to create more jobs.

MYTH: We don’t need any more immigrants.

Baloney. The U.S. population is aging. Twenty-five years ago, each retiree in America was matched by 5 workers. Now for each retiree there are only 3 workers. Without more immigration, in 15 years the ratio will fall to 2 workers for every retiree, not nearly enough to sustain our retiree population.

MYTH: Immigrants are a drain on public budgets.

Bull. Immigrants pay taxes! The Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy released a report this year showing undocumented immigrants paid $11.8 billion in state and local taxes in 2012 and their combined nationwide state and local tax contributions would increase by $2.2 billion under comprehensive immigration reform. MYTH: Legal and illegal immigration is increasing.

Wrong again. The net rate of illegal immigration into the U.S. is less than zero. The number of undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. has declined from 12.2 million in 2007 to 11.3 million now, according to Pew Research Center.

Don’t listen to the demagogues who want to blame the economic problems of the middle class and poor on new immigrants, whether here legally or illegally. The real problem is the economic game is rigged in favor of a handful at the top, who are doing the rigging.

We need to pass comprehensive immigration reform, giving those who are undocumented a path to citizenship.

Scapegoating them and other immigrants is shameful. And it’s just plain wrong. 

Reich also wrote in a more recent blog musing the difference between leaders and demagogues:

A leader brings out the best in his followers. A demagogue brings out the worst.
Leaders inspire tolerance. Demagogues incite hate.

Leaders empower the powerless; they give them voice and respect.

Demagogues scapegoat the powerless; they use scapegoating as a means to fortify their power.

Leaders calm peoples’ irrational fears. Demagogues exploit them.

There's a lot of hateful speech going on the last few months - a lot of it directed at immigrants, documented and undocumented. 

The fearful thing about hate-talk in the public square is that it acts like a cancer infecting the rest of society. Some people think it makes it OK to start repeating the same kind of ideas and intolerance without the filter of civility and just plain respect. This is what happened with the extremists who claim to speak for Islam. This is what is happening in our own country for those who claim to speak for God and those who want to "take back America," or return us back to the "good old days."

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