Determining the costs of undocumented immigrants to the U.S.: Jeffrey Passell: Senior Research Associate, The Pew Hispanic Center: at the heart of the immigration debate there is a two part question: how many illegal immigrants live in the United States today? And what do undocumented immigrants cost federal, state and local governments each year?

Latino Leaders: The National Magazine of the Successful American Latino, Oct-Nov, 2006 by David Liss

How these questions are answered, who chooses to answer what questions, their point of view and maybe a selective use of facts and assumptions has and will continue to shape the debate, legislation and immigration reform laws far into the future.

Estimates of the fiscal impact from illegal immigration cannot be projected beginning with an agreement on a baseline number of undocumented immigrants in this country. Today, them is a reasonable agreement that between 11 and 12 million illegal immigrants live in the U.S., with the undocumented population growing by about 500,000 people every year.

Demographers develop answers for the first question. They study the size, growth, distribution and characteristics of people and populations. They tend to be careful, and build population studies that reflect a "snapshot" of groups of people at a specific point in time. Most other people who talk about demographics are not that precise.

Few people in the U.S. today are as qualified as Dr. Jeffrey Passel to detail and explain the population numbers part of the illegal immigrant equation. Passel is a Senior Research Associate at the Pew Hispanic Center. His research with the Pew Center and the focus of his research for the past 25 years is the demographics of the Hispanic population, the immigration trends and the tracking of income tax payments. Passel develops his numbers from data supplied by U.S. government agencies, including the Department of Homeland Security (which contains the Immigration and Naturalization Service), the State Department and other agencies.

Who are Today's Undocumented US. Residents?

By Passel's numbers, 75-80% of all of the undocumented population and growth of this population is Hispanic. 55-60% of all undocumented Hispanics are Mexican followed by India, China, and several other Central and South American countries. Through the early 1990's, about 80% of undocumented immigrants lived in 6 states: California, Texas, New York, Florida, Illinois and New Jersey. In 1990, this means that the rest of the country had about 700,000 undocumented immigrants (20% of 3.5 million).

By the mid-1990's, the settlement patterns changed and more undocumented immigrants started going to other areas of the country (especially in the southeastern and mountain states). By 2005, only about 60% of the undocumented immigrants lived in those initial 6 states. Since the total number of undocumented people has increased to 11+ million, the trend seems to indicate that the remaining states now have about 4.4 million undocumented immigrants--or more than 6 times the numbers in 1990. And, in terms of the migration of undocumented people, Arizona, Georgia and North Carolina have moved into the "large" states category, with all the 3 probably having more undocumented immigrants than New Jersey.

Misconceptions about the Undocumented

According to Passel, there are several misconceptions that the public has about undocumented Hispanic immigrants:

* Many people equate undocumented illegal immigration with Mexican immigration. There is a big overlap, but Mexican immigration does not represent the whole picture. One half of all illegal immigrants are Mexican and a bit over one half of all Mexican immigrants are illegal.

* Between 40-45% of illegal immigrants overall came into the country through legal places of entry. Many legally, others with fraudulent documents, who did not leave when their visas expired. * The common perception of the face of the illegal immigrant is a young male here by himself--the day laborer. Only a quarter of all immigrants fit this profile.

* The typical profile of an illegal immigrant is a family with young children. Today there are 3 million children whose parents are undocumented. One huge open question that is often lost in immigration reform legislation is: what will happen to these children if their parents are forced to leave this country to return home?

* Illegal immigrants do pay taxes, but they may not pay as much as other groups of people, in large part because their incomes aren't as high. Research by the Center for Immigration Studies assumes that 55% of undocumented workers pay income and social security taxes. Taxes paid by illegal immigrants will be higher in some states than others as a result of laws and monies from sales and property taxes. Most pay property taxes either directly, as property owners, or indirectly, as renters where their rent goes toward paying property taxes. Overall, the degree to which illegal immigrants pay taxes is not clearly understood.

Determining the Fiscal Impact of Illegal Immigration

"My sense is that immigration in general helps the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and the overall economy," notes Passel. "However, there is no agreement on what the specific amount of this benefit is to our economy." He adds, "There is some agreement that the GDP is bigger because of immigrants, but not about what kind of benefit this represents to the economy on a per capita basis."