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the vast majority of my life from Texas to California and points in between. Only the most dramatic of changes could even hope to make a small dint in the flood that is U.S. immigration on the Mexican border. Unless you have lived there you don't, and could not understand the magnitude of the problem.

An study of the border region (to be published this year by Economist from The University of California Berkely, Stanford and Texas) and how immigration from the south has affected the social, economic and environmental welfare of the southwest states should shine some light on just what the real economic impacts are.

As far as the ease of access to the U.S. through Mexico is concerned, an average American will go through 100 times the security just taking an airline flight than anyone coming across the border is going to go through. Crossing the border is literally as easy as walking into a mall today in cities like Loredo, El Paso and to some extent San Diego.

Since this bill seems to do nothing to address this problem what is it's real intentions? Perhaps a quick check to see if it has a provision that makes it illegal for American's to do "minutemen" operations as is going on today would reveal something.

Amnesty only rewards lawbreakers who entered our country illegally. Yes. True. But what are we going to do about those who entered our country illegally? Nothing. It has been and continues to be our "policy" because of inaction.

IF (and this maybe a big if) we get legislation that truly secures our borders from now on, amnesty would be a small price to pay.

So why have our leaders failed to act if the long term economic impact of immigration is negative? (which may or may not be true)

They are afraid to stop the illegal inflow of people because they do not know the short-term economic impact of such a move, politics is all about getting re-elected, and a bad economy is a sure way to be booted out of office.

So best available solution possible politically is:

1. Prevent new illegal border crossings.
   
   
2. Allow legal immigration of such a magnitude as to match illegal immigration. Maybe as much as 2 mil per year.

The point here is once the borders are secure it does not matter how high the number starts out to be as long as it is less than or equal to the amount of illegal immigration and illegal immigration is stopped.

The number of legal immigrants can be reduced slightly each year without fear of causing wild economic fluctuations. In other words, congress is much more likely to make small changes to immigration than large ones.

Call it a second best solution, but some solution is better than no solution.

...is that securing 2,100 miles of border is manpower intensive. I ran some numbers. Assuming we put 20 posts (2 agents apiece) per mile as a cavalry screen, and 20 agents per mile in an airmobile reaction force, that works out to 126,000 agents on post at any one time. That's 630,000 to man the border 24/7. Note that I do not include logistics or supervisory positions--these are just the grunts who do nothing but patrol the border and react to incursions. Supervisors should be about 1 per 15 line agents. Add 42,000 to that figure, for 672,000 total. (We'll just outsource the logistics support and "assume" that it's being paid for from some other pot of money.)

672,000 personnel, at $120K/year (average loaded rate for a federal employee), comes out to about $806 billion dollars a year in direct personnel costs, just for the border control mission.

But Michelle Malkin and Tom Tancredo are going to demagouge this bill as amnesty, and it will go nowhere.  Count on it, folks.

Why would Islamic terrorists go to Mexico when Canada not only has a generous asylum policy, it also gives them welfare checks and eventually, Canadian passports.

I am not an illegal immigrant and I suspect neither are you.  The idea that an amnesty would add very much marginal utility to the idea of illegally immigranting sounds plausible but unlikely to me.  The major reason immigrants (legal and illegal) come to America is for economic and/or political opportunities.  Most Mexicans come for economic opportunities regardless of if they are legal or not.  The 8-12 million illegal immigrants that have crossed the border since the 1986 reform have done so overwhelmingly because of economic reasons, not in response to an amnesty.  Mainly because that reform did nothing to lower demand or supply of coming to America.  I doubt it is popular, but the best way to lower illegal immigration is to raise legal immigration.

If we allowed 3 million immigrants a year (instead of 1 million) while adding more border patrols and even encouraging or working with "minutemen" projects, we would stem the supply (or ease) of coming to America while absorbing most of the demand through legal immigration.  My guess is when someone decides to emigrate to America, a past amnesty is not weighing heavily on the decision.  The one exception is that when an amnesty is imminent, there is a strong incentive to cross the border before it happens to get the benefits of it (which is why the 1986 reform only applied to those in country before 1984).

We can demagogue all we want, but if stopping illegal immigration is the goal, we need to see this as an economic issue and look for an economic solution.

The problem is, Malkin and Tancredo will be demagouging.  How do we defeat those demagouges?

I was amused by the very clunky causal relationship this diary tried to draw between the granting of amnesty and current immigration problems.  I wholeheartedly agree we need to increase the amount of legal immigration.  The reason for the immigration in the first place is economic, so logically the optimal solution would also be economic.

I realize that immigrants are an extremely vital element of our economy. Nevertheless, the only way I can see to stem the increasing flood of illegal aliens is to establish a guest worker program that doesn't reward those who came into the U.S. illegally, punish those that hire illegal aliens, and make a serious effort to control the border.

Theoretics aside, how does this work in practice?  It seems that you're suggesting that illegals who are currently working in the U.S. (and their employers) should either (1) continue the arrangement or (2) have the illegal try to sneak back across the border, apply for the VISA, and then return to the U.S. -- thus creating a huge disruption for both the employer, the illegal worker, and (most importantly) our economy -- i.e., us.  

The goal of any immigration reform must be to get illegal workers "on the grid" and issued new, nontamperable Visas.*  In so doing, we will increase national security, level the playing field between US and foreign workers, prevent abuses, and reduce the power of the street gangs who make most of their coin smuggling illegals, and reduce the violence along the US-Mexico border (see the current issue of Foreign Affairs for more details on this last issue.)  The only practical way for that to happen is to allow illegal workers currently in the U.S. to become legal.  

von

*Contrary to the suggestion in your post, the new Visa is a key security improvement and will plug the holes in the system far better than pouring millions or billions more dollars into border patrols.

States sometimes offer amnesty to tax cheats within a specified period (six months or so) in order to raise revenue, because the costs of catching those cheats frequently far outweighs the benefits.  The result is a bump up in state revenue and a correction of past illegal behavior -- both at no or little cost to the taxpayer.  The same calculation is present in the context of illegal immigration.

In essence, they offer a generous plea bargain in cases where it is far too expensive to track all the violators down.  In essence, it's a form of clearing out a bunch of decent folks from being under the gun of the law.

This is pretty logical, but logic won't stop some folks from trying to scuttle this.

... Haven't mixed for a long time.  But the McCain-Kennedy bill is an excellent start.

The problem will be that we are going to get demagougery like never before from the usual suspects: Michelle Malkin and Tom Tacredo leap to mind, but there will be others.

for the avalanche of anti-immigration folks to descend upon this thread and bury you and Doverspa.  Maybe they work the afternoon shift at RedState.  But we are of kindred spirit here for sure.

Erm, "bring it on?"

[I kid, I kid.]

A sensible immigration policy that protects both American security and the American economy is part of the core Republican commitment to economic growth and free trade.  You will also note that those on the other side of the debate can offer no solutions of their own, save to argue for ever increasing expenditures on an unwinnable war against immigration, which will have American business and American taxpayers as its primary casualties.

See, I think you're whistling past the graveyard on that one, any more than if I said core Democratic.  You've got Paul politely donking you over on RedHot right now.  I'm not sure that I agree that the party that gets it "right" on immigration, usually meant to imply restricting, will win elections for years to come, but I do think it's a weird, multifaceted issue that cuts across party lines.  

I think increasing legal immigration will do little to stem the influx of illegal immigrants who are viewed as a problem.  There will likely be preference given to immigrants with special skills and education.  So increasing legal immigration will, I think, actually increase immigration from places like Europe, India, China,...  

I don't have a problem with people from these places per se, but we already have too few Americans pursuing advanced degrees in mathematics, economics, the sciences, engineering,...  And increasingly these professions are forced to compete in a global workforce.  It troubles me to think of opening the doors so that even more competition for positions in these professions will be open to people from outside the US.

"The proposal would allow illegal immigrants to apply for temporary work permits that could last for six years. They would have to clear criminal background checks, pass an English language test and pay a $2,000 fee to qualify."

Sounds like it would be very easy for someone to come here, earn a college degree and/or advanced degrees easily pass the language and background requirements, shell out $2000 and become a US citizen.  This will increase competition for jobs that require advanced degrees, and further reduce pay for these positions.  Resulting in fewer and fewer (natural??) Americans who pursue advanced degrees.

Yes, these may be the very immigrants that would benefit the economy the most but what effect will it have on (natural?) Americans?

Forgive me if I sound Xenophobic, but I already "see this as an economic issue".

First, I hope it goes without saying that, though I disagree with Paul on all manner of topics, I respect him as much as nearly anyone else in the blogosphere.  He's brilliant and friendly, even in disagreement.  And I'd request in advance that he excuse any (inadvertent) sharp elbows from me on this subject.

But I come not to praise Caesar .....

First, if you believe that mass deportations are the way to go, it makes little sense to try to deport only 10,000; knowing that about 10 million illegal immigrants are in country, deporting 10,000 (who will immediately attempt to return) hardly does justice to the rule of law or serves notice that we're "getting tough" on immigration.  No, the only way to do those things is to radically increase our expenditures or to start levying heavy fines against businesses who hire illegals.  Alternatively, you could start throwing HR directors in jail.

Second, my objection to the use of the term "Open Borders Lobby" (and the like) is that, much like the term "Constitution in Exile," it describes a group that doesn't exist.  Yes, the WSJ (and I, and President Bush) favor immigration reform that allows illegal migrants to earn legal status while working in-country, and for greater numbers of migrants to work in the U.S. under strictly-controlled Visas (which will require background and medical checks, among other things).  This does not imply, however, that we favor "opening" the borders.  A new Visa program and a work-to-make-legal policy is not the same as eliminating the customs service or merging with Mexico.  It's sheer demagogory and double-talk to suggest otherwise.

Laws passed by the Senate and House of Reps are so long and confusing, they are a waste of time.

To really reform immigration a Mexican consular official has to sue President Bush in Federal Court.  

Then someone who is more qualified than any mere Senator, and who knows more about immigration than any day-laborer or social scientist or any common citizen of the country could summarily dictate the must just policy and tell us all who should enforce it and where the money will be coming from-- a judge.  

Just think what a mess we would have if the judiciary weren't truly independent.

Like hawks, they are circling.  Or maybe they are busy on the other more happenin' threads including the gay marriage one, the DeLay one, the Base Closing one, etc.  

I don't have a problem with people from these places per se, but we already have too few Americans pursuing advanced degrees in mathematics, economics, the sciences, engineering,...  And increasingly these professions are forced to compete in a global workforce.  It troubles me to think of opening the doors so that even more competition for positions in these professions will be open to people from outside the US.

Well, you touch on the problem right there: With regard to people with advanced degrees, it isn't a problem of demand, it's a problem of supply.  There aren't enough current citizens (and legal residents) studying the advanced technologies that are required for all the companies that want to do cutting edge research and development.

If there are only, say, five people who can do a particular thing, maybe those five people work for a company in the U.S. (and get paid a lot), then another company opens a branch in India/China to find the five people that it needs.

But if those other five people immigrate to the U.S., well, maybe the five people who were here already get slightly lower salaries, but at least the new five people contribute to the U.S. economy, because they live here, and pay taxes here, and spend their money here.  And their work benefits a U.S. company instead of, perhaps, a company in India/China.

Overall, a net economic benefit to the country, and a slight decrease in wages for the five people who were already here.  But the five people who were already here get paid a lot and, in general, are not having much trouble finding employment.

(FYI, I guess I qualify as one of those "already here" people, and I'd sacrifice a bit of my salary for a better economy for the country).

Of course, much of the labor needed in the U.S. is of the low-cost variety, so higher rates of legal immigration would increase legal immigration from poorer countries.  But those people would, at least in part, take jobs that are going to illegal immigrants right now.

...though I'm otherwise in agreement with you that cost is a primary obstacle to true border security. The actual sum, based on your calculations, would be $80.6 billion, not $806 billion. Still, one aspect you've left out is the Canadian border. Although there's not nearly as large a flood of people coming south as heading north, our northern border is even longer (especially when the Alaska/Canada border in considered), and needs to be guarded against our enemies.

I forget one decimal place... (c8

Still, $80.6 billion in personnel costs alone is pretty impressive.

And the only way that kind of money can be appropriated is to make it a counterterroism mission.

But securing ONLY the Mexican border as a "counterrorism measure" is akin to spending $50,000 on a Chubb security system for your home--and not even locking the remaining doors or the windows...

Back during a wonderfully misspent youth in my past, I called outcomes like these the 00 outcome:

Then someone who is more qualified than any mere Senator, and who knows more about immigration than any day-laborer or social scientist or any common citizen of the country could summarily dictate the must just policy and tell us all who should enforce it and where the money will be coming from-- a judge.

Why 00?  There were a number of tables in the ol' Dungeon Masters Guide that you rolled percentile dice on, and you got one of a hundred possibilities, from 01 (worst) to 00 (best).  Usually you had to roll exactly a 00 to get the best possible outcome, and it was of course damn rare.

Now, I grant you, this could happen and some judge might receive a case like that and happen to hit upon exactly the right solution and impose it by judicial fiat.  Like the ol' 00 outcome, I'd give it about a 1 in 100 chance of happening.

What about the other 99 percent of the time, where we'd get some misguided court ordering some half-assed solution, and since it's a judicial order it takes a lot more work and time to get that changed than just a majority of two halves of the legislature and approval from the executive, the way the Founding Fathers intended?

I understand everything you said.  What I worry about (other than my own personal economic interests) is that you have this sort of cascade effect on higher education in the US.  If wages for advanced degrees drop, this will decrease the number of American students who see an advantage to earning an advanced degree.  So fewer US citizens earn advanced degrees and we need to further "import" intellectual capital or export the jobs to other countries.  In the long run I view this as a very negative situation for the US.  It is the sort of situation where the free market may not produce the best outcome for the interests of the country.  I would prefer to see greater incentives for student in the US to earn advanced degrees rather than import the brains or export these important jobs to other countries as a completely free market approach will "dictate".

"Of course, much of the labor needed in the U.S. is of the low-cost variety, so higher rates of legal immigration would increase legal immigration from poorer countries.  But those people would, at least in part, take jobs that are going to illegal immigrants right now."

As I said before, I think that if we increase legal immigration, we will offer preference to those with education and skills.  So we will bring in more highly educated workers who are suffering lower wages in their own countries.  Leading to the discouragement of US students from pursuing advanced degrees.

we already have too few Americans pursuing advanced degrees in mathematics, economics, the sciences, engineering

That is true, but it is a policy choice. We have decided as a society, or at least Congress and the courts have decided as a society, that boys and girls shall be equal in all things, biology be damned.

This has been accomplished. We have produced the result that boys and girls in the United States now score equally on tests involving mathematics and science. That's the good news.

The bad news is that this result has been produced not by increasing girls' scores on these tests, but by flattening the curve, i.e. reducing the scores of both sexes until the age-old male superiority in these endeavors disappeared.

Let's be clear that this is a tradeoff we made on purpose. We gave up the right to have at least some of our young join the world's best and brightest in certain fields, in return for being able to say that we have achieved sexual equality in math and the quantitative sciences.

I hope no one here will assault me with the anecdotal female with the 160 IQ who is a math whiz. I know about those women; I collect them as friends. But they are rare.

In any case, we can not now complain that the graduate students in engineering are still 95% male, except now they have names like Paranjay Chandrasekhar instead of Jimmy Smith. We did this on purpose. Our actions had consequences, and we get to live with them. So let's not crab about it.

Think of the many benefits that accrue to our society because children of both sexes are now equally incompetent. Things can only get better from here.

to back up these statements?

Which statement(s) in particular do you doubt? And when it turns out that I do have statistics — from reliable sources — to back all this stuff up, are you going to Kneel Before Zod, or blow them off and tell me I'm wrong anyway? Because if all you're doing is trying to throw The Spear Of Doubt at my note as an exercise in ideological curmudgeonry, I don't wanna play.

it is the responsible way to evaluate a statement.  I am interested in any statistics to support what you have said here.  

If you have them I am very interested to see stats supporting:

" boys and girls in the United States now score equally on tests involving mathematics and science"

"this result has been produced not by increasing girls' scores on these tests, but by flattening the curve, i.e. reducing the scores of both sexes until the age-old male superiority in these endeavors disappeared."

"we can not now complain that the graduate students in engineering are still 95% male"

Thanks.

Oh, and the answer is that I am not going to bow or kneel before anyone/thing.  But if your stats are good and from verifiable sources I will reevaluate my ideas about gender and education.

You attribute what you claim is a decrease in male math and science test scores in the U.S. to the demand for gender equality. Even assuming that male test scores have been declining, which I certainly have no reason to do based just on your say so, it in no way follows that this is due to demands for gender equity. Our public schools have gotten worse over the past years. So if male scores are declining, that could just as easily be a consequence of the declining quality of education, generally. If girls scores were lower to begin with, they wouldn't have as far to fall as the boys scores.

And it's a pity you consider debate and backing up strong statements a "game".

And it's a pity you consider debate and backing up strong statements a "game".

I am a product of my experiences. I have been doing this for 25 years. In all that time, only about 10% of the requests for more information were sincere. All the rest were drive-by snarkshots from people who just wanted me to do a bunch of work which they would then ignore or blow off. Perhaps RedState is such a rarified atmosphere that that doesn't happen here. Perhaps there is an Easter bunny.

Why assume that any request for information is part of the 90% instead of part of the 10%? Why not assume the best instead of the worst? No one would be harmed by your giving information to back up your claims. You made a fairly bold statement, which is by no means obvious. Someone expressed doubt and asked you to back up that claim. This isn't the MSM where we should be expected to take your claim at face value or because you have 25 years of political experience. This is the blogoshpere, where you should be prepared to back up your factual claims with links to the facts upon which you rely. If you don't like debate or responding to questions, what are you doing here?

if your stats are good and from verifiable sources I will reevaluate my ideas about gender and education

Well good. That's all I can hope for.

boys and girls in the United States now score equally on tests involving mathematics and science

The apparent difference between males' and females' average mathematics scores in 1999 was not statistically significant at any age.

In science, the score gaps at each age favor male students, although in 1999, the apparent difference between male and female students' average science scores was not statistically significant at age 9. For 9- and 13-year-olds, there has been little variation in the gaps across the years. Among 17-year-olds, the score gap narrowed so that the gaps in the 1990s were smaller than those in the 1970s and early 1980s.

That is from a 1 megabyte pdf called Trends in Academic Performance that you can download from NCES. It is just full of fun facts to know and tell.

this result has been produced not by increasing girls' scores on these tests, but by flattening the curve, i.e. reducing the scores of both sexes until the age-old male superiority in these endeavors disappeared

From the Department of Read It and Weep, take a look at Figure 2.8 in that report. This one concerns science scores among 17-year-olds. In 1970, the average male score was 314; now it is 300. So it is fair to say the boys' scores have declined over the period.

In 1970, the average female score was 297; now it is 291. So it is fair to say that the girls' scores have declined over the period. But not as much; the curve is flattening. What was a 16-point gap between the sexes in 1970 is now 9 points. Isn't that special?

In math (Fig. 2.7) the trends are much flatter. Both sexes declined during the 70's, but things have been essentially flat for the last ten years or so.

Note that these are domestic numbers. The NCES does not do international comparisons, so they get to operate in this closed universe where no one can tell what their scores mean. For an international comparison, look here where you can see that our children are right up there with Italy and Lithuania in the "significantly below average" block. Note that this was not always the case; the US used to be in the top tier in these tests. Let's just say we aren't anymore.

The usual excuse for this is that we test a larger fraction of our children, so we have more dumb ones in our mix than the other guys do. If you let the educrats get away with that, you have been tricked. For there are also comparisons confined to the best students, the 'advanced' students, from each country. We suck. Our best are no better than the world's average. According to the NCES here...

The advanced mathematics and the physics  assessments  were administered to a  sample  of the  top  10-20 percent of students in each of the 16 nations  participating  in  these  portions  of TIMSS. In the  advanced mathematics  assessment, U.S. students who had taken or were taking pre-calculus, calculus, or AP calculus were compared to advanced mathematics students in other countries. In the physics assessment, U.S.students who had taken or were taking physics or AP  physics  were compared  to advanced science students in other countries. The average scores of U.S.physics and advanced mathematics students were below the international average and among the lowest of the 16 countries that administered the physics and the advanced  mathematics  assessments (Figures 8 and 9). The U.S. outperformed no other country on either assessment.

we can not now complain that the graduate students in engineering are still 95% male

Ah, ya got me. It's down to 83% male now. That's here.

Why assume that any request for information is part of the 90% instead of part of the 10%?

Remind me never to go gambling with you.

Once again you seem to consider politics a game, not a matter for treating others with respect and consideration. If you assume the worst in others, that is what you will get. If you assume the best, you will get that much more often.

I was not thinking in terms of mathematics but of morality... "But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return; and your reward will be great." And of course: "There will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance."

But you claimed that efforts at reducing the gender disparities in math and science were a cause of falling test scores. Specifically, you said:

"We gave up the right to have at least some of our young join the world's best and brightest in certain fields, in return for being able to say that we have achieved sexual equality in math and the quantitative sciences."

In the first place, I would note that the actual data from the report you cite do not at all support your thesis for mathematics. For 17 year olds, male math scores have risen 1 point between 1970 and 1999, while female math scores have risen 6 points.

As for science, your selected stat merely shows that over the 29-year period from 1970 to 1999, science scores for 17 year old males fell 4%, while science scores for 17 year old girls fell only 2%. The science scores for both genders have fluctuated significantly since 1970. If we were having this discussion in 1982, we would see that at that time boys had fallen by 7.5% while girls had fallen by 8%, widening the gender gap. Conversely, if we pick 1982 (the year of birth for those who were 17 in 1999) as our start date, we see that male scores (at age 17) have gone up by 8 points while female scores increased 26 points. Much better improvement for the females, but not at the expense of males.

Correlation does not equal causation. I can think of any number of reasons why male scores might fall more than female scores during the 29 year time period. Variations in drug and alcohol use, juvenile delinquency, you name it. Could even be just basic statistical variation. None of the data you cite supports your basic premise, that efforts to reduce gender disparities caused the drop in male scores in science, and the very statistics you cite show that your premise is just false for math scores.

If wages for advanced degrees drop, this will decrease the number of American students who see an advantage to earning an advanced degree. [...] I would prefer to see greater incentives for student in the US to earn advanced degrees rather than import the brains or export these important jobs to other countries as a completely free market approach will "dictate".

I somewhat doubt this theory.  There are already huge incentives to earning an advanced degree in certain fields -- benefits such as increased job security, and a much higher income.  Despite these obvious and visible benefits, there is still a shortage of graduates in those fields.

Part of the problem may be cultural, in that those fields might be seen as "nerdy".  But part of the problem is also due to the fact that our public education system generally sucks, and, on average, produces high-school graduates who are incapable of succeeding in the fields we're talking about.

I don't think a slight drop in salary is going to be a significant disincentive.

As I said before, I think that if we increase legal immigration, we will offer preference to those with education and skills.

To some extent, that's undoubtedly true.  But the U.S. economy still needs a source of inexpensive labor, and most proposals to increase legal immigration that I've seen address that issue, too (in fact, most of them are focused on that issue, and not the former one).

"There will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance."

That's what I figure, too.

Why assume that any request for information is part of the 90% instead of part of the 10%?

It has now been 48 hours since Mister Sincere Request For Information tricked me into spending a bunch of time on non-value-added work. Where is he?

He was a drive-by snarkshooter. That's all 90% of them are.