Is illegal immigration beneficial to the U.S. economy Term Paper

Is illegal immigration beneficial to the U.S. economy - Term Paper Example Illegal immigration, also known to as unauthorized or undocumented immigration refers to the passage and settlement of immigrants in a manner that contravenes the immigration rules and regulations of the destined country. Barry Chiswick, PhD, Distinguished Professor and Head of the Department of Economics at the University of Illinois at Chicago  defined illegal immigration as follows; "By definition, illegal immigration arises from a divergence between whom the United States will accept as an immigrant and the desire of some foreign nationals to live and work in this country† (Procon 2007). Broadly speaking illegal immigration may take the form of undocumented/unauthorized entry, admission gained through fraudulent documents, extending the stay after the expiry of the temporary visas or crossing the border illegally. An estimated 11.9 million unauthorized immigrants live in the United States. In the last decade, on average, 5, 00, 000 new illegal immigrants made their way into the United States every year. The tally of total immigrant population in the United States touched 40 million in 2010, the highest in the history of the country. Approximately 66 percent of the unauthorized immigrants come into the United States by crossing the US-Mexico border; making Mexico the top illegal-immigrant-sending country. The rest of the one-third illegal immigrants reportedly continue to stay on in the country after the expiry of their temporary visas (Hanson 2009). At one point of time, the phenomenon of illegal immigration served the national interests of United States Pretty well. The illegal immigrants are willing to take up jobs in labor-scarce regions and also have no problems in accepting jobs that native workers and legal migrants shun. The illegal immigrants hold anywhere between 12 to 15 million jobs or 8 percent of the jobs in the United States (Hanson 2009). For varied reasons the existence of