A few weeks ago, I posted a cartoon depicting Obama pulling the Arizona-Mexican border to the north of Phoenix. My research on immigration frustrated me because I could not find a website to explain what the rules are for obtaining a green card visa into the USA. Today, I struck oil. One thing about the transparency of this administration, they put the information out there, but it is so layered in departments that it is dam near impossible to find.
In the Department of Homeland Security website is a tiny department referred to as the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. Isn’t that a mouthful? I found the rules there, but not the cost. I scoured the net for another hour looking for references to the cost of obtaining a green card. The best answer I found is an average of $6000.00. WOW! The average time to obtain a card is 3 to 6 months if you fall into the privileged needs category. If you are a peon, the time is 15 to 24 months.
The US Citizenship and Immigration Service manages to eke out a million green cards and a million work permits every year. The claim is that the applicants cover the cost of the department. A short review of their budget confused me. I am not an accountant, but the good Nuns of Our Lady of Hungary grammar school taught me numbers. I can recognize billions when I see them. The best I gleaned from the budget is that they spend between $21,613,000,000.00, and $50,138,000,000.00 per year. The good Nuns also taught me to divide, and I calculate the cost of those green cards and permits to be between $10,806.50 and $25,069.00 apiece. Didn’t I just say it costs the applicant an average of $6000 to obtain a green card? Who gets that money? Probably a lawyer.
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to determine that a person making the minimum wage, and working eighty hours a week can amass $55,000 in the time it takes to wait for the paperwork to process. So, why do I want to get a green card? A US worker sees that money as poverty level wages. The illegal alien sees it as a fortune with which he can buy his home town.
All this transparency stuff is making my head spin. It is time for a Grey Goose Martini. Before I do though, my recommendation is that we begin Comprehensive Immigration Reform by dissolving the US Citizenship and Immigration Service, and use the money to build a Great Wall like the one they have in China, except we coat it in Teflon.
Filed under: Cartoons, Conservative, economy, Government, politics, Society | Tagged: Border, Green Card, illegal aliens, Immigration, Transparency, USCIS |
Now the Federal Government is suing Arizona to stop their immigration law, using the money taken from “We the People” to pay for the lawsuit, when over 75 per cent of “We the People” are in favor of Arizonas Law. It seems to me that we are no longer, “Government of the people, by the people, for the people.” We are now, “Government of the government, by the government, for the government.”
Thats not what our forefathers intended.Time for the Revolution.
There are many, many illegals working for cash and they come and go to and from Mexico without any interference. Sure would like to know how many Federal Reserve Notes are circulating south of the border. I’m very confident in saying there are more greenbacks in circulation outside of the USA than there is in the USA.
Grumpa Joe,
Interesting research. I was somewhat aware of the time it took to become ‘legal’ and the very narrow stream of people that came that way, but I had no idea that the ‘legal’ cost to the immigrant was so competitive with the ‘coyote’ human smugglers. Best I can tell is the coyote makes a couple grand premium by doing his work in a couple of days vs. the government’s couple of years.
One thing that gets overlooked in our over-regulated, under-enforced system is that when the cost of coming is lowered, so is the cost of leaving. Fully 25% of Italian immigrants went back to Italy after coming to the US in the pre-immigration policy days. Today the mexicans stay because the cost (and time) to get back is so high. Once they get over the wall, they don’t try again!
My guess is the number of returning mexican immigrants would be much higher since they don’t have to pay the cost of trans-oceanic travel that Italian immigrants faced returning home. We just have to keep the north-south interstates in good working order!
If the INS would enforce the Laws that are on the books, there would be no need for immigration reform. Our lawmakers have passed so many laws, that there are not enough enforcement officers to uphold them all. What we need are less laws and more enforcement.
Now that is real immigration reform. I agree whole heartedly. In fact, they could eliminate half of the laws and never notice the difference except that things would work better.