Taxes and undocumented people do they pay them?
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Besides them paying sales tax on what they buy, gas tax and property tax that goes to pay education taxes when they pay rent or house payments they also pay other taxes. Oh you mean the supreme court rulling of 1982 saying their kids would get free education is not entirely correct? Yep.... Most likely they don't pay as much as others since many are living more than one family to a household in some cases but they are not getting a free ride either. Don't get me wrong, I do not justify people coming into this country without inspection and doing it the right way although we do have to look at the current situation realistically and reasonably before we take any action that could have unintended consequences. Deporting 11 million people at the current highest rate we have had in years would take over 24 years assuming no one else comes in or back. The figures could be over 50 years if indeed the numbers are higher.
There are only nine ways to get a legal visa and most of these people that are currently undocumented in the USA don't qualify for any of those 9 possibilities. There is no legal line they can get into once they get back to their country.
If you had a magic wand and could make them all leave or disappear at once, financially the country would have major problems. Just think about having 4 million empty houses and apartments. Oh, maybe the Feds could bail the landlords out too right? Print more money that would solve it.
The estimates are, 10.8 million undocumented people living in the USA with about 2.5 million being children that are not working and 1 million being older people that are not working either leaving 7.3 million which about 1/4 are women. Most of those crossing the border are men although they do get families and women as well. Figures show that aproximately 75% of them work using false social security numbers. This leaves about 5.5 million paying taxes through normal channels using false social security numbers. Many people feel the Gov figures are very low so keep this in mind but this will give you an idea of dollars when it comes to how this will affect our economy.
Also keep in mind that most of these undocumented people have higher birth rates than the average US Citizen so the growth of the population in some areas has a very high percentage of children born to undocumented people but these children are recognized as US Citizens at the time of their birth because of the Constitution of the United States. (14th Amendment) Some people are trying to change this although the chances of changing the constitution are not very high. Keeping this in mind those who are in politics study these figures and know that these children will grow up to be legal voters and stand in judgement so to speak at a later date. I don't think any of them expect the US to roll over and not do anything although having a reasonable immigration reform rather than just enforcement bills would be prudent.
The US did purchase the land from Mexico that now includes much of the west and it was a legal purchase although in the treaties we the US stated that all the people currently on their ranches and farms could stay and keep the land and stay in the US but we broke that treaty just like we did with the Native Americans and we forced the people on the ranches and farms down past the new Mexican border. When people have the entire story it helps them understand others even if none of us participated in those treaties we can learn and understand why they come in illegally. They come because US companies pay them, if we did not pay them and hire them they would not be here. We created much of the current immigration problem.
TAXES - How much do they pay?
A large majority of them work more than one job working about 60 to 80 hours a week rather than just 40. Many of them do make more than minimum although many of them are taken advantage of and make less or are denied benefits and overtime. Using an estimation number of 8 dollars per hour and 60 hours a week we can come to some fairly educated guestimate figures. Most likely these figures are a bit low as well. Some people think that the number of undocumented people could be as high as 22 million. The new census figures will shed some light on that as well when the balance of the information comes out. Also keep in mind that 35 to 40% of undocumented people came into this country legally with a visa and let it expire.
When many of them file taxes they do so using higher deductions so they don't pay as much since they know they will not be getting the money back or getting it at retirement. So rather than using a Federal Tax figure of 7% or 15% I included only a 2% figure keeping it low on purpose to be realistic. Many of them know if they don't pay some tax that this is a red flag for the IRS so they try to stay out of trouble and they still end up having to move often to avoid detection. Since the supreme court rulled in 2009 that they will not be charged with Identity theft if they don't use the false socials for anything but work that also sends a strange message.
Maybe that is because they paid over 9 billion dollars into the mismatched social security fund in 2009 alone and the Gov needs that money hence they don't do anything about it. I used the normal 6.2 percent for FICA Social Security and the Employeers also match that as well and that is sent into the fund too. Medicare deductions are 1.45 percent, state taxes will vary but much of the time they are around 5% and this all depends on the size of your family. So this adds up to just over 14.65% of their earnings which would be over 31 billion dollars a year going to the Gov. Ironically using a number of 6 million working with false social security cards you come up with just over 9 billion going into social security funds alone and that is what it was in 2009.
8 dollars an hour working full time at 40 hours a week is $320
8 dollars an hour working full time per month at 160 hours is $1280
8 dollars an hour working full time per year is $16,640 using 2080 hours
Times this by 6 million and you get almost 100 billion
8 dollars an hour working 60 hours a week is $480 (most of the time separate jobs so no overtime or benefits)
8 dollars an hour working 240 hours a month is $1,920
8 dollars an hour working 3120 hours a year which is 60 hours a week is $24,960
Time this by 6 million and you get almost 150 billion dollars
Many say the figure could be four times this and if that is the case the income of these people could also be 600 Billion per year and most of that stays within the country.
Estimates are that they send about 24-28 billion out of the country each year and many people feel this hurts the US economy although if you have studied Macroeconomics you will understand that moving the dollar out of the US can actually increase the value of the dollar in the world market understanding how it is traded. We spend billions in foreign aid each year and most of this actually goes to poor families that could not make it otherwise. I myself send money to Guatemala when I can to help family.
These are simple estimates because the figures show that the income of undocumented people is well over 200 billion, either way the loss of the taxes these people do pay would impact the economy in a negative way. The loss of the 9 billion a year would affect over 100,000 social security recipients. If they did not collect it from undocumented people they would need to raise taxes or up the age when you can retire which already has been done. Right now US Citizens are not having enough children to support the Baby Boomers that are retiring and without the influx of tax paying people this will cause major problems very few years from now.
If we deport US Citizen children with the Parents we will loose more of the tax payer base as well. If the parents leave those children here then foster care will need to pay for these children at a cost of over 19 billion per year causing an even greater problem. Separating families is happening all the time and in the cases where felonies have been committed it may be warranted although do we as a Gov separate families all over a class B misdemeanor or even less of a reason a Civil infraction which is what "Unlawful Presence" is when they were not caught in the act or if their visa expired.
An even greater effect would be the loss of their labor which would cause construction, hotel, fast food and costs of veg to skyrocket without using cheap labor. With these companies having to pay more they will charge more and they will also have to pay overtime and benefits as well so the prices will have to be adjusted for that too. Many small companies will go out of business and many large companies will have to lay off people in order to pay a fair wage with benefits to legal workers. The unemployeed people here in the US will not take the jobs these people are doing. Demographically speaking the percentages of unemployeed people do not match the skill and wage level of the undocumented. People tend to say we have 20 million unemployeed and we have the same number of undocumented taking our jobs so simple solution, deport them and take the jobs back. Not so simple when you do the math and find that many of the unemployeed are overqualified people who will not clean toilets or dig a ditch. You can see I used a low estimate so I could try and keep it very realistic and in line with the current Government estimates although the Government does not want people to think the numbers are higher. People are already upset and I understand them on both sides of the issue because it is not fair for these people to butt in line ahead of others who have applied legally. On the other hand if you have lived here 17 years and half your children were born here and are citizens how hard is it to have your family separated by having either the father, mother or both deported or possibily one or two of the children leaving the others behind.
We should start a federal guest worker program to where people could keep their families together, get their fingerprints taken, photos, ID with a smart chip and have this ID tied to a database that was connected to the IRS, ICE, Social Security, Police Agencies etc.... As long as they did not have a felony record they could pay a fair fine such as $3000 or so and stay. THis would not qualify them to be US Citizens nor put them in line ahead of anyone who applied legally although this program would take them out of the shadows and hold them responsible to be legal. I know they would jump at the chance even with the big fines. If they could not pay them they could be put on payment plans with low interest loans from the Gov. They are here anyway why not get a record of all of them and get a baseline so we know what and who we are dealing with. We need to come down hard as a hammer with the criminals. With this new ID System and fine schedule they could even have a guest worker tax and not qualify for welfare until 5 years after they were US Citizens that would only come at a later date after they qualified. So everyone seems to argue about these things but there are not many reasonable solutions put forth. We have to turn off the tap before we mop up the floor and right now the tap is running and we are trying to mop but it has no real effect. The enforcement laws that are passing in UT and AZ and other states are only causing hate and more problems. This would not be amnesty it would be a program holding them responsbile for what they have done. Amnesty is something for nothing and this is far from it.
Even at the lowest rates they do add to the economy far more than they use. Most people that are anti-illegal immigration won't read or believe the current studies done so I won't site them again but we need to do something that is reasonable and mass deportation is not reasonable. We need to call on the Federal Government to pass a reasonable immigration reform this year.
My legal 17 year old refuses to do anything like this.