Immigration Reform Argumentative Essay

Nazira Coury
R.A. James
Rhetoric 450
12 November, 2014
Immigration Reform: A Necessary Action The evening news is ripe with controversial legislation, policy and debate from the lawmakers of the United States. Some of these include the most recent midterm elections taking place this week, with people anticipating which party will control the senate, others talk about what should be done with the growing problem of ISIS in the Middle East. Any of these topics could spark a heated conversation in any coffee house or diner in this country but perhaps there is no issue which stays on the forefront, which riles testy tempers, and which needs to be discussed so much as this country’s policies on immigration. Certainly immigration has served as
In a letter to budget chair Paul Ryan, CBO said the failed 2006 immigration effort would have increased federal revenues more than direct spending. The Joint Tax Committee agreed with that. The main idea is that immigration significantly increases the size of the U.S. labor force, and that more workers mean more growth. Former CBO director Douglas Holtz-Eakin seemed to agree and argued that “immigration reform can raise population growth, labor-force growth, and thus growth in gross domestic product. In addition, immigrants have displayed entrepreneurial rates above that of the native-born population.” Holtz-Eakin estimates that reform would lift GDP growth by a percentage point and would reduce the federal budget deficit by more than $2.5
However, Julian L. Simon, author of The Economic Consequences of Immigration, states: “Immigration does not exacerbate unemployment...Immigrants not only take jobs, but also create them. Their purchases increase the demand for labor, leading to new hires roughly equal in number to the immigrant workers.” In order to overcome this distrust towards foreigners, Americans have to abandon their suspicions and recognize, as Simon has, that our lives are enhanced by immigrants creating, and not taking, U.S.