# What to do about immigration? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 28, 2006, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258 "2006-03-28T16:03:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2006, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/161 "2006-03-31T17:51:18Z")
The texts for Sensenbrenner’s bill should be available, [from this page](http://thomas.loc.gov/). Enter “ **hr 4437** ” into the search box and click the “Bill Number” button. (The Thomas software resets searches after each use, so linking directly to the bill will bring up a “not found” error.) To find Frist’s bill, use the same search engine and enter “ **S 2454** ” into the search box. ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2006, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/162 "2006-03-31T20:44:17Z")
[QUOTE=GIGObuster] Take into account that I’m in favor of protecting the border and more enforcement, but all your points are non-starters, except #3. [/QUOTE] No, actually they are all quite feasibile. Difficult to achieve, yes, but doable. ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2006, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/163 "2006-03-31T20:47:29Z")
[QUOTE=even sven] And what, exactly, will this achieve? High immigration states are among the most prosperous in America. There are plenty of states that would kill to have the economic vibrancy and industry that California enjoys. Far from being a third world country, we have a tech industry that drives the nation, we are the entertainment center of the world, and we grow a huge percentage of America’s produce on our farms. Why would California strive to be more like Montana? [/QUOTE] Where did that come from? Illegal immigrants do not add to prosperity in any way whatsoever. The prosperity in California most assuredly did NOT come from having illegal immigrants sucking the resources out of the state’s social services like leeches suck blood. ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2006, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/164 "2006-03-31T21:09:41Z")
[QUOTE=Unregistered Bull] One heck of fence. It’s going to expensive. Way more so than the “costs” of illegal immigration IMO. And take for ever. And let me get this clear, you wan’t the US Military to stationed at the border to kill men, women, and children who try to cross the border? Or do you want more Border Patrol agents to participate in the mass killings of men, women, and children? Killing illegal immigrants, especially brown ones that speak Spanish, seems easy on the internet, but IRL I think that it would be a bit harder. I have hard time imagining that the legality of using lethal force to stop illegal immigration would be upheld by US Courts or that you could actually hire enough people willing to kill potential illegal immigrants. Who would want to make a living doing that? [/QUOTE] We’re being invaded by foreigners. Sounds like war to me. Especially when they can be considered to be waging germ and economic warfare against us, considering the huge spike in diseases like tuberculosis and leprosy, not to mention other medical costs such as anchor baby delivery. > **[Illegal Immigration and Public Health | FAIRUS.org](https://www.fairus.org/issue/illegal-immigration-and-public-health?pagename=iic_immigrationissuecenters64bf)** > > The impact of immigration on our public health is often overlooked. Beside, I don’t think we will have to shoot that many. Station the military and/or civilian teams along the fence, pop a couple of them and the word will get around real damn quick. They cross the border now because they have nothing to fear by trying. This will give them something to fear. As far as the cost of building the fence goes, there is a project underway at this time to not wait for the government to get off its collective dead ass, but instead to go ahead and build the fence using private donations. As opposed to the government’s estimate of $3 billion dollars or so, the project estimates around $25 million. ([http://www.borderfenceproject.com/](http://www.borderfenceproject.com/)) But even if the government builds the fence and maintains it, it’s still a damn sight cheaper than having the illegals coming over the border. Given that California’s costs of illegal immigration alone are estimated at over $9 billion, it’s a win-win situation. ([VDARE.com](http://www.vdare.com/rubenstein/border_fence_costs.htm)) ---
**Author:** ![Lissa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/85f322/32.png) [@Lissa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissa)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2006, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/165 "2006-03-31T21:36:39Z")
[QUOTE=Clothahump] We’re being invaded by foreigners. Sounds like war to me. Especially when they can be considered to be waging germ and economic warfare against us, considering the huge spike in diseases like tuberculosis and leprosy, not to mention other medical costs such as anchor baby delivery. > **[Illegal Immigration and Public Health | FAIRUS.org](https://www.fairus.org/issue/illegal-immigration-and-public-health?pagename=iic_immigrationissuecenters64bf)** > > The impact of immigration on our public health is often overlooked. [/quote] How can it be a “war” if there’s no intent to harm anyone? > [@](#): > > Beside, I don’t think we will have to shoot that many. Station the military and/or civilian teams along the fence, pop a couple of them and the word will get around real damn quick. They cross the border now because they have nothing to fear by trying. This will give them something to fear. I remember hearing that there was a problem in recent years of illegals dying of thirst in the desert in their attempts to reach the US. Cubans sail in rickety boats across shark infested waters to reach the US (wasn’t Elian Gonzales’ mother eaten by a shark right in front of him?) Others spend hundreds of hours locked in hot, stuffy truckbeds. It seems to me that if they’re willing to risk dying of thirst, or being eaten alive by a shark, the idea of dodging a few bullets wouldn’t deter many. Everyone always thinks they’ll be the one to make it, after all. > [@](#): > > As far as the cost of building the fence goes, there is a project underway at this time to not wait for the government to get off its collective dead ass, but instead to go ahead and build the fence using private donations. As opposed to the government’s estimate of $3 billion dollars or so, the project estimates around $25 million. ([http://www.borderfenceproject.com/](http://www.borderfenceproject.com/)) > > But even if the government builds the fence and maintains it, it’s still a damn sight cheaper than having the illegals coming over the border. Given that California’s costs of illegal immigration alone are estimated at over $9 billion, it’s a win-win situation. ([VDARE.com](http://www.vdare.com/rubenstein/border_fence_costs.htm)) But will the fence actually keep enough people out to make a difference? Only 40% of illegal aliens come across the Mexican border. Though Mexicans make up 60% of illegal aliens, 85% of our resources go to that border-- probably more if this wall gets built. I think the Chinese could tell us about the efficacy of Great Walls, or in more modern history, people from Berlin. Hell, there’s a museum now dedicated solely to people who smuggled themselves through it in very ingenious fashion. Where there’s a will, there’s a way. ---
**Author:** ![CBEscapee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b19c9b/32.png) [@CBEscapee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CBEscapee)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2006, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/166 "2006-03-31T22:59:08Z")
[QUOTE=Clothahump] Where did that come from? Illegal immigrants do not add to prosperity in any way whatsoever. [/QUOTE] These 2 died for the USA. **Lance Corporal Jose Gutierrez** "Lance Corporal Jose Gutierrez was the [first American](http://www.senate.gov/~feinstein/03Releases/garibay-statement.htm) killed in combat. He was struck by enemy fire while fighting alongside fellow Marines near the southern Iraqi port city of Umm al Qasr. He was 22 years old. Corporal Gutierrez arrived in the United States when he was a 16 year old orphan, having left poverty-stricken circumstances in Guatemala City and a country racked by a brutal civil war. He traveled over 2,000 miles by foot, north through Mexico, in search of a better life here in the United States." **Marine Corporal Jorge Garibay** Born in Jalisco, Mexico, Corporal Jorge Garibay played football at Newport Harbor High School, in Costa Mesa. He, too, was just 21 years old. One of his teachers, Janis Toman, described him as a hard worker who frequently returned to the high school campus in full uniform, to encourage students to do their best. Ms. Toman received a letter from Corporal Garibay just a few hours before learning of his death, as she packed him a care package. “He wrote of simple things that we take for granted but make soldiers happy,” she said. “Things like moving from a small tent to a bigger one.” “I want to defend the country I plan to become a citizen of,” he wrote to her. He also left a tape recording before his deployment for his beloved uncle Urbano, whom he regarded as a surrogate father. ---
**Author:** ![CBEscapee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b19c9b/32.png) [@CBEscapee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CBEscapee)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2006, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/167 "2006-03-31T23:29:19Z")
[QUOTE=Clothahump] We’re being invaded by foreigners. Sounds like war to me. Especially when they can be considered to be waging germ and economic warfare against us, considering the huge spike in diseases like tuberculosis and leprosy, not to mention other medical costs such as anchor baby delivery. > **[Illegal Immigration and Public Health | FAIRUS.org](https://www.fairus.org/issue/illegal-immigration-and-public-health?pagename=iic_immigrationissuecenters64bf)** > > The impact of immigration on our public health is often overlooked. [/QUOTE] From the above site: > [@](#): > > “Typhoid struck Silver Spring, Maryland, in 1992 when an immigrant from the Third World (who had been working in food service in the United States for almost two years) transmitted the bacteria through food at the McDonald’s where she worked.” So someone can harbor the typhoid bacteria for two years before passing it on?! > [@](#): > > “Contrary to common belief, tuberculosis (TB) has not been wiped out in the United States, mostly due to illegal migration. In 1995, there was an outbreak of TB in an Alexandria high school, when 36 high-school students caught the disease from a \*\* foreign student\*\* .” Nowhere in the article linked is this attributed to an illegal alien. Unless all foreign students are in the US illegally. Talk about purposely misleading staements. I think this source has some very questionable information and shouldn’t be taken seriously. ---
**Author:** ![Eva\_Luna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e495f1/32.png) [@Eva\_Luna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eva_Luna)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2006, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/168 "2006-04-01T01:18:38Z")
[QUOTE=tomndebb] The texts for Sensenbrenner’s bill should be available, [from this page](http://thomas.loc.gov/). Enter “ **hr 4437** ” into the search box and click the “Bill Number” button. (The Thomas software resets searches after each use, so linking directly to the bill will bring up a “not found” error.) To find Frist’s bill, use the same search engine and enter “ **S 2454** ” into the search box. [/QUOTE] Thanks for taking care of that while I was at work! I swear, the links were fine last night when I pulled them up. ---
**Author:** ![Eva\_Luna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e495f1/32.png) [@Eva\_Luna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eva_Luna)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2006, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/169 "2006-04-01T01:39:34Z")
[QUOTE=Clothahump] We’re being invaded by foreigners. Sounds like war to me. Especially when they can be considered to be waging germ and economic warfare against us, considering the huge spike in diseases like tuberculosis and leprosy [/quote] Ummmm, war is generally something that is waged _on purpose._ Even the most hardcore conspiracy theories I’ve seen haven’t alleged that foreigners enter the U.S. illegally in a concerted, organized attempt to infect the U.S. population with TB or leprosy. > [@](#): > > not to mention other medical costs such as anchor baby delivery. > [http://www.fairus.org/site/PageServer?pagename=iic\_immigrationissuecenters64bf](http://www.fairus.org/site/PageServer?pagename=iic_immigrationissuecenters64bf) Did you not read my cite above where I provided evidence that [there is no such thing as an “anchor baby”](http://uscis.gov/graphics/howdoi/parents.htm) under current U.S. immigration law. Parents of U.S. citizens cannot have their children petition for them to immigrate legally until their children turn 21, which is a rather long-term legal strategy, to say the least. And merely giving birth to a child in the U.S. does not, in itself, give anyone the right to remain in the U.S. legally. > [@](#): > > Beside, I don’t think we will have to shoot that many. Station the military and/or civilian teams along the fence, pop a couple of them and the word will get around real damn quick. They cross the border now because they have nothing to fear by trying. This will give them something to fear. Yeah, sure, crossing the border from Mexico illegally is totally risk-free. Tell that to all the people who die of dehydration and exposure every year while trying. Tell that to my college roommate, the Salvadoran-American who immigrated legally, but whose grandmother (who rasied her from age 3 onward) died alone in the desert in Arizona of dehydration when the smuggler she had paid to get her across safely abandoned her. She couldn’t immigrate legally, because [there is no legal immigration category for parents of permanent residents.](http://uscis.gov/graphics/howdoi/parents.htm#Whois) So the alternative was for an elderly, sick woman to stay in a country where there was a civil war going on, and where she had no remaining family members. P.S. I simply cannot believe you are seriously suggesting murdering people who try to cross the border. You do realize, don’t you, that plenty of people who are legitimately fleeing torture and persecution enter the U.S. that way? Or do you just not care? > [@](#): > > But even if the government builds the fence and maintains it, it’s still a damn sight cheaper than having the illegals coming over the border. Given that California’s costs of illegal immigration alone are estimated at over $9 billion, it’s a win-win situation. ([VDARE.com](http://www.vdare.com/rubenstein/border_fence_costs.htm)) For every quote from a restrictionist site that you unearth, it’s simple enough to find an alternative calculation that will prove the economic contributions to the U.S. made by people here illegally. But if you want unbiased statistics, a hint: FAIR isn’t the place to find them. ---
**Author:** ![yBeayf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/e274bd/32.png) [@yBeayf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yBeayf)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2006, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/170 "2006-04-01T02:06:18Z")
> [@](#): > > These 2 died for the USA. What evidence is there that they were here illegally? ---
**Author:** ![CBEscapee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b19c9b/32.png) [@CBEscapee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CBEscapee)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2006, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/171 "2006-04-01T02:33:50Z")
[QUOTE=yBeayf] What evidence is there that they were here illegally? [/QUOTE] The Guadalajara newspapers and TV news ran the story of Garibay, who is from Jalisco. Here’s Gonzalez’ story: "El viernes 21 de marzo pereció en enfrentamientos el cabo originario de Guatemala José Gutiérrez. Fue el primer hispano que entrega la vida en la Operación Libertad Iraquí. Gutiérrez ya había arriesgado su vida por el sueño estadounidense. Igual que miles de inmigrantes centroamericanos, el soldado de primera clase José Gutiérrez recorrió 3,220 kilómetros desde su Guatemala natal, cruzando México hasta el sur de California, cuando era un adolescente. Gutiérrez tenía 16 años cuando llegó al sur de California, sin familia ni amistades. Su amigo Héctor E. Tobar dijo al diario Los Angeles Times que Gutiérrez viajó en 14 trenes para llegar hasta la frontera. Gutiérrez corrió con suerte, ya que consiguió hospedaje con una pareja mayor que albergaba niños inmigrantes." [Link](http://www.terra.com/noticias/articulo/html/act141718.htm) ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2006, 3:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/172 "2006-04-01T03:15:13Z")
> [@yBeayf](#): > > What evidence is there that they were here illegally? **CBE** has answered the question about those particular servicemembers, but they are certainly not the only undocumented immigrants who’ve entered the US military [recently](http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0540,gillison,68594,2.html): > [@](#): > > The report says an investigation began on August 11, 2004, after an intelligence report by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency revealed that a Marine at Camp Pendleton in California, who had admitted to entering the United States illegally and enlisting with a counterfeit green card and stolen Social Security number, identified Lucas as the individual who charged her $250 for the documents for the purpose of effecting her fraudulent enlistment in the Marine Corps. […] > > According to the report, investigators found 23 recruits who may have fraudulently entered the Marine Corps. Twenty suspect alien registration numbers, along with Social Security numbers for all 23 recruits, were queried through federal databases. It turned out that every single one was “either completely fraudulent or assigned to a different person.” The investigation later identified three more alien recruits suspected of fraudulently enlisting. […] > > But last year, after several cases surfaced of illegal aliens enlisting in the military using counterfeit documents, the Defense Department told the Military Entrance Processing Command to begin verifying alien registration and Social Security numbers with the appropriate federal authorities. This may mean that many illegal aliens who have enlisted since are cases of identify-theft. > > There are currently about 37,500 foreign nationals from over 200 countries serving in the active duty forces and reserves. Seventy-one have died in Iraq and three in Afghanistan. The law currently provides for expediting the citizenship applications of U.S. service personnel, who become eligible to apply the first day they enlist. Speeding up the citizenship process is a powerful incentive for healthy young immigrants to enlist in the military, as are the relatively generous wages and benefits compared to what most illegal immigrants can expect to get. I wouldn’t be very surprised if there are as many as hundreds of US servicepeople who have no legal status as Americans. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2006, 6:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/173 "2006-04-01T06:07:55Z")
[QUOTE=Kimstu] Speeding up the citizenship process is a powerful incentive for healthy young immigrants to enlist in the military, as are the relatively generous wages and benefits compared to what most illegal immigrants can expect to get. I wouldn’t be very surprised if there are as many as hundreds of US servicepeople who have no legal status as Americans. [/QUOTE] Indeed, my cousin (with a legal green card but it also had come to America illegally once) joined the Navy and will soon get citizenship. For my part I was the one in my family that got in illegally in the 80’s due to the civil war in El Salvador. Even though the rest of my family managed to get in legally, my family decided there was no time to wait due threats to our lives. Even before I got legal residency thanks to the Simpson-Massoli amnesty to Central Americans, I managed to get a job working in the testing of electronic components for the military and aerospace industries, I have to say I got some bad feelings working in that industry, that is until the Tomahawk missiles kicked the butt of Saddam in the first Gulf war and saved the lives of many soldiers that did not walk into hostile fire by armament that had been destroyed by the missiles. Really \*\*Clotahump \*\*, we wring something else besides tuberculosis and leprosy, and we already added to your prosperity too. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2006, 6:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/174 "2006-04-01T06:18:41Z")
And the “besides tuberculosis and leprosy” was supposed to be mentioned with quote marks as that was sarcasm. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2006, 6:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/175 "2006-04-01T06:21:15Z")
And I assumed the “wring” was supposed to be a “bring”. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2006, 6:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/176 "2006-04-01T06:23:55Z")
[QUOTE=Kimstu] And I assumed the “wring” was supposed to be a “bring”. [/QUOTE] :smack: Yes, thank you **Kimsu**. ---
**Author:** ![pantom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/34f0e0/32.png) [@pantom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pantom)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2006, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/177 "2006-04-02T01:01:39Z")
It pains me to bring facts to a thread like this, where so many fact-free assertions are being made, but given that a few posters have tried to introduce actual fact into this discussion (GigoBuster, Lissa, EvaLuna) I figure I’m not alone, so here goes: Japan, which has an immigration policy that’s pretty restrictive, which it can enforce far more easily because it’s an island, just finished 16 years of stagnation on the economic front. Its stock market, if you run a chart of it (here’s [one](http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=%5EN225&t=my)) reflects the benefits of this policy; as of right now, it’s lower than it was in 1987, and Japan also rejoices in the [oldest population on the planet](http://www.foreignaffairs.org/19970501faessay3774/milton-ezrati/japan-s-aging-economics.html) (with, as the cited article says, " no hope of an influx of youthful immigrants to mitigate the problem"), since like every other developed country (other than the immigration-soaked US, of course) its fertility is below replacement, so its population is aging apace. Of course, we also face the same problem: as of 2000, boomers started turning 55, thereby becoming eligible for early retirement at a lot of large companies. I personally know a number of people who have voluntarily left the workforce at well under the standard retirement age of 65 already. The US now is currently running an unemployment rate of 4.8%, with a [stagnant to declining participation rate](http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/CIVPART/10), and while a lot of explanations can be given for having such a historically low rate given the declining rate of participation, I think the simplest and most obvious answer is, that boomers are taking early retirement in numbers large enough to affect these statistics. As of right now, as I write this, the Census Bureau is projecting, from the base of the 2000 census, that the number of people 18-24 is _less_ than the number aged 55-64 (see [table 12 here, and add the 55-59 and 60-64 ages together, and compare to the 18-24 age at the bottom of the table](http://www.census.gov/prod/2005pubs/06statab/pop.pdf)), so without an influx of youthful immigrants, we will face the problem of a shrinking workforce, and a rapidly aging population. I find it absolutely crazy that the House should have passed the kind of restrictive proposal that it did in the face of the actual fact that our workforce is soon going to stop growing and actually start shrinking. Demographics - including attracting immigrants into an economic zone - reflects the success of that area, nothing more and nothing less. NY City, in the nineties, prospered mightily, for example: > [@](#): > > from [New York City’s Economy before and after Sept 11](http://www.newyorkfed.org/research/current_issues/ci9-2/ci9-2.html): > > In the late 1990s, New York City experienced its strongest economic boom of the past half-century, both in absolute terms and relative to the United States…The city’s boom was equally strong on the income side. Wage and salary earnings in the private sector expanded at a 9.6 percent average annual pace between 1996 and 2000, compared with 7.6 percent nationally. In inflation-adjusted terms, this growth represents a 7 percent pace—also about two points above the adjusted national rate—as well as the strongest four-year performance in more than three decades. This attracted a large number of immigrants: > [@](#): > > from [the NYC Dept of Planning:](http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/html/census/pop2000.shtml) > > According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the population of New York City as of April 1, 2000, was 8,008,278, the largest enumerated census population in the city’s history. The previous peak was in 1970, when the enumerated population stood at 7,894,862…Immigration played a crucial role in the population increase over the decade, with nearly 1.2 million immigrants admitted to New York City in the 1990s. This high level of immigration has, to a large extent, countered a substantial net outflow of residents to other parts of the nation. At the same time, a high level of births in the 1990s and fewer deaths, added substantial numbers to the population. With more than 1.266 million births and 682,000 deaths, the level of natural increase totaled 584,000. The increasing share of immigrants in the city, **who tend to be younger on average than other residents, is largely responsible for the high level of natural increase.** So, did these immigrants bring in a big crime problem? Nope: > [@](#): > > from [The NYC Insider](http://www.theinsider.com/nyc/survive/011crime.htm): > > **New York’s Falling Crime Rate** > > The truth is though, that crime in New York City has gone through an amazing decline. In 1995, for example, overall crime in New York City dropped by 15% from the prior year, according to statistics released by the FBI. While this decline is consistent with an overall decrease in crime throughout the country, New York’s drop is rather remarkable when compared with the 2% drop in Dallas and Detroit and the 4% drop in LA. This decrease is part of an ongoing trend in New York. Crime had been falling a bit each year since the late 1980s, but in the last couple of years, it seems as though the numbers have gone into a free-fall with double digit drops across the board. The falling rates have continued through 2004, resulting in the lowest crime rates in NYC since the 1960s. > > **Less Crime Than Other Cities** > > The result is that on a per-capita basis, New York City now has one of the lowest crime rates in the country. FBI data shows that among the 25 largest American cities, New York ranks the 23rd most dangerous, beaten only by San Diego and San Jose. New York is safer than many smaller cities, too: among the 182 U.S. cities with populations of more than 100,000, New York City comes in at 136 – about the same as Boise, Idaho. As for the overheated anecdotes being passed around by the anti-immigrant crowd, they remain just that: anecdotes. ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2006, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/178 "2006-04-02T03:00:53Z")
[QUOTE=pantom] It pains me to bring facts to a thread like this, where so many fact-free assertions are being made, but given that a few posters have tried to introduce actual fact into this discussion (GigoBuster, Lissa, EvaLuna) I figure I’m not alone, so here goes: [/QUOTE] Two questions: 1. Do you know the difference between correlation and causation? 2. Have you ever heard of Rudy Guiliani? ---
**Author:** ![Eva\_Luna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e495f1/32.png) [@Eva\_Luna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eva_Luna)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2006, 3:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/179 "2006-04-02T03:33:47Z")
[QUOTE=magellan01] Two questions: 1. Do you know the difference between correlation and causation? 2. Have you ever heard of Rudy Guiliani? [/QUOTE] Hmmm, is Rudy Giuliani the mayor of San Diego and/or San Jose, which are chock-full of illegal immigrants and also apparently have low crime rates? If so, then he’s been awfully busy since leaving office in NYC. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [April 2, 2006, 4:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258/180 "2006-04-02T04:20:23Z")
[QUOTE=magellan01] 1. Do you know the difference between correlation and causation? [/QUOTE] Do you? Regardless whether the rise in immigrants caused a drop in crime, (neither likely nor asserted), or whether the rise in immigrants failed to cause a rise in crime, the reality is that NYC supports _neither_ causation _nor_ correlation linking high immigration and crime. As the largest and most difficult to manage city in the country with either the largest or second largest immigrant population, its story argues strongly against any link between crime and recent immigration. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-to-do-about-immigration/350258.md?page=10)