(illegal) immigration in northwest Arkansas

Just read a WSJ article about my home turf, northwest Arkansas, via Malkin. (Aside: That's two out of three days--those of you who would question her spot on the blogroll have some answering to do.) According to the authors the area is in the beginning stages of an economic boom. From living there and visiting often I'd say it's been booming for the last few years. So I'm curious as to how much the growth will escalate in the near future. I hope it stays somewhat rural and the living costs stay down, in case I should ever decide to move back, but I doubt that will happen. (The costs staying low I mean; I could see myself returning to my old stomping grounds one day.)

The part of the article that really jumped out at me, though, was the bit on immigration. Good discussion on the effects of too many immigrants from third world countries--both legal and illegal--on the local economy. Basically, jobs are becoming more scarce and many that are available are too low-paying to support a household. This is rightfully bothering people there a lot, as there's a widening gap in household income--the very rich and the very poor. (As a side note, immigration isn't a new problem in northwest Arkansas. I remember the biggest local employer getting busted for importing illegal alien workers when I was growing up and the situation is continually getting worse. So the economic boom didn't cause the immigration problem.)

Any nutjobs who still support Bush's watered-down version of amnesty need to think hard on that. If there are unemployed Americans who can't get jobs due to the overpopulation of unskilled workers or people having to work two or more jobs just to support a family, that should say something about the wages. The solution isn't to farm out domestic jobs to anyone in the world willing to come work for that meager allowance, at least not if you don't want our standard of living to plummet. Companies simply need to start paying realistic money to their workers. It simply doesn't make sense to look for a workforce elsewhere when we've got one here at home.

Another problem that arises from excessive immigration, and one that often seems to get overlooked, is the burden placed on schools. Putting aside the argument over the validity of the public school system, it's easy to see that schools are having to stretch their dollars to cover more students. Immigrant workers often rent instead of purchase housing, which means they aren't increasing the property value by developing land or paying the millage to support the local schools (at least that's how it works in Arkansas). Yet those same schools are burdened with having to accommodate students who speak little or no English. When one considers the extra cost of translators, books, etc. for these students, it's easy to see how this can become a major expense. And it's especially hard on rural school districts that don't have much resources to work with in the first place. This was a huge issue in my school district when I graduated in 1997 and I can only expect that it's gotten worse.

What has been happening in northwest Arkansas for some time is happening across the country. Folks had better wake up, and presidents had better quit playing pander politics, or we're in for a rough ride in the coming years.