Illegal workers bolster tax rolls

Illegal workers bolster tax rolls:

As S.C. politicians craft new immigration laws, the numbers they rely on are unverified cost estimates generated by avowed foes of immigration who some brand as a hate group.

Meanwhile, leading economists say illegally hired workers prop up the state economy and contribute almost as much to the state budget as they take out.

Fuzzy statistics

When the immigration reform bill passed the House of Representatives in January, House Speaker Bobby Harrell, R-Charleston, issued a news release describing 75,000 illegal immigrants in the state who cost more than $186 million a year in services.

Greg Foster, spokesman for Harrell, said researchers gleaned the figures from the Web site of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, or FAIR, a national organization that includes among its goals an effort "to stop illegal immigration."

For the population figure, FAIR used census figures for the foreign-born population and subtracted the number of people known to have emigrated to South Carolina legally, said FAIR special projects director Jack Martin. This method is similar to that used by the Pew Hispanic Center, a research center that does not advocate any policy positions.

Unlike the data-based method for population, the public-services cost was more of a "back-of-the-envelope-typ e computation," Martin said. FAIR analysts used population estimates and multiplied them by general cost-per-pupil, cost-per-inmate and cost-per-patient figures derived from more detailed research in other states.

The cost estimate did not include specifics such as the amount spent on English-language teachers, Martin said. Nor did it account for taxes paid into the system by illegal immigrants, which help to offset those costs.

Although those figures have not been explicitly challenged, the organization that calculated them has.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, a controversial civil-liberties organization that historically fought the Ku Klux Klan in court, brands FAIR as a hate group with "ties to known racists and a long track record of bigotry."

FAIR officials counter that the designation is politically motivated.

"We've been on the opposition's hit list for years," said FAIR spokesman Bob Dane, noting that it condemns groups such as the KKK or the Aryan Nation.

When asked about the organization, Foster said Harrell's office was previously unaware that anyone had labeled FAIR a hate group and that he personally is opposed to any form of racism.

"They were the best sources we could find," Foster said, calling the numbers credible, reasonable estimates. "We didn't use them to form any opinions about illegal immigration."

Effects on state taxes

Although no economists have studied how much illegal immigrants pay in taxes or how much they cost South Carolina, the margin between the two in other states has been razor thin...

As usual, the "facts" and figures one acquires from any study group normally reflects the groups' political ideals and motives. No matter what any study indicates, ILLEGAL is still ILLEGAL in any language or situation!!!!! Get them out - it is as simple as that!!!!!

Paying them under the table goes on every where ... Contractors committ felonies hiring them.

Get the jails ready. Some employers will be visiting soon for a long stay.