For as long as I've been paying attention, anti-immigrant types have been shouting from the rooftops that immigrants just come here to live off of welfare.
Imagine my surprise when the Washington Times reported that, according to the DC-based Center for Immigration Studies — a very conservative organization — "all of the net jobs added by the U.S. economy [since 2000] have gone to immigrants, both legal and illegal".
Hmmm.
It would seem that immigrants, by and large, really come here to work — to make a better life for themselves and those they care about.
As GMU's Don Boudreaux put it, "For years we've heard immigration opponents repeatedly insist that we must restrict immigration into the US because too many immigrants allegedly flock here to free-ride on the US welfare state. But if this new CIS finding is correct, it is strong evidence that immigrants overwhelmingly come to the US for work and not for welfare. So this CIS study can fairly be read (contrary to its authors' intentions, to be sure) to support the case for making immigration into the US, not harder, but easier." [Emphasis in original]
I wholeheartedly agree.
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