Today I remembered that our state budget still has not passed. It has been so long that I forgot that we had a problem . . . or a budget.
There are many people we could blame for this unfortunate situation including our governor, our education, our taxes or our parents.
Or Mexico.
The economic meltdown could be attributed to the 2.7 million illegal immigrants the Pew Hispanic Research Center claims live in California.
Of course, the jump to a $20 billion budget gap is clearly the fault of corporate giants and their illegal alien buddies.
And naturally, if you live in between four thin walls without a door or a roof, crammed next to relatives you may or may not like and using a large pail for a bath tub, you should never want to just jump a fence into paradise.
But $13.1 billion in taxes. This is the number the Federation for Immigration Reform believes we pay out of our pocket to support “non-Americans.”
California is obviously trying to ruin our lives and culture, suck our money from us and spen¬d most of it on illegal immigrants. If we just deported all of them, life would be perfect and all our money problems fixed.
Or we would still have a budget crisis and just spiral into a deeper recession after the loss of cheap labor and productivity.
No one seems to be positive about the impact of illegal immigrants on our state, thus opinions all depend on which side of the fence you are on. Literally.
Teresa Soliz’s children are American. Her husband was an illegal immigrant. The entire family is now stuck in Mexico City, Mexico, after being deported. Legally or not, Soliz wishes she had never left California.
It has been nine years and $6000 dollars in debt later and Soliz still cannot get her family back to this country. In the end, Soliz feels like California has sucked up way more of her money than she ever consumed in public resources.
It really is all about the money. For Californians, it is the money spent on supporting public services that are devoured by the illegals. For the immigrants, it is all about the better living, the better education and the opportunities to actually make more than 19 cents an hour.
Everyone has someone to fault for our money problems and the research is even more muddled than the blame-game.
“The fact of the matter is, yes, illegal aliens do create an extra burden on our economy and also on our budget situation. But, at the same time, that is not the reason why we have an economic downturn,” Gov. Schwarzenegger said.
More people means more taxes paid. The taxes that illegal immigrants pay are often overlooked, especially the sales taxes. Illegal aliens don’t get stuff for free either.
More people in California means a rising gross domestic product. This is the number of goods produced by society, a very beneficial growing point for the economy.
That twelve percent of our $110 billion dollar budget that has been attributed to illegal immigrants is mostly for the education of their children. Education is one of our top budget items, locally and nationally. We can hardly pin all the blame of our debt on the children of undocumented residents.
Oh and those children we are helping educated are technically American citizens. They were born here, just like you.
Instead of blaming a group of people that is shaping the culture of California, perhaps we should bond together for a joint cause: balancing that messy budget.
Our congress could take a moment outside the capital and learn from the best. Buy a piñata. Grab a beer. Go to the park and take a nice siesta.
On second thought, I think congress has taken a long enough siesta.
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Love the way you write this as being at odds with yourself. It did take me til the 3rd paragraph to realize the technique you were using, but that might be more of a reflection of my comprehension abilities rather than your writing abilities.
ReplyDeleteMaking points for both sides of this issue works very well. Highlights the fact that no one knows what the hell to do, but we do have other things to worry about.