Immigration is a hot button topic these days. Reports of 10’s of thousands of children crossing the border. Stories of them bringing potential illness, stealing our jobs, or worse. Then you have an unknown number of people that are already here illegally.
Politics and immigration
When you talk about immigration people turn it into a political debate about how President Obama has created this problem, or is overstepping his executive powers by trying to force change. There are others that will blame former President Bush. Although I believe in our government system, it is run by humans and we are not perfect. I personally can’t stand the political debate over such a human issue! No matter how it started it needs a solution.
Often when you talk to people about illegal immigrants a standard argument is “they are taking away Americans jobs”. Maybe it is the cynic in me, but I don’t see many Americans wanting a job that pays $10 per hour or less. These jobs usually entail doing hard manual labor and only getting maybe 1,500 hours per year (2,080 at 40 hours/week standard per year). Currently, undocumented immigrants account for approximately seventy (70) percent of the farm workers alone in the US.
I have been researching things to run a small farm. Much of the information includes food supply. Immigration is a huge factor in our food supply and agricultural businesses.
The Agriculture System
Recently USA Today published a special edition newspaper about the US Department of Agriculture and the factors that affect our food system. As I read through this paper I was surprised and irritated by many of the statistics. A major statistic included the number of people working on farms is not enough to keep up with demand. We are importing fruits and vegetables from other countries.
A larger article in this paper was about the passage of the recent “Farm bill”, now the Agricultural Act of 2014. The bill needed to be renamed because it includes everything from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits to conservation funding as well as expected crop insurance for farmers. The largest amount of money within this bill is for nutrition/SNAP benefits. The new bill has allocated over $97 billion a year towards SNAP for the 1 in 7 people that rely on the program.
23.5 million Americans receive these benefits, benefits from another broken system. As I mentioned in my article How to Reduce Food Deserts and SNAP Benefits , I applied for SNAP and only was allotted $16 because I had a part-time job. Our country has a problem with unemployment, we are funding programs to feed people and experiencing an issue with illegal immigrants. Immigrants that are “stealing jobs” from American’s. It seems that we are not focusing on how to make our country more efficient.
Immigrants Connection with Agriculture
On Friday it was reported that Congress is once again stalled on the issue of immigration. There are multiple bills floating around ranging from $659 million to $3.7 billion to deal with the influx of children crossing the border. No one wants to come to an agreement. As with many of the issues we have seen lately there is a game of chicken going on within our government.
Immigration, SNAP benefits and unemployment are complex by themselves, but as I have found they are also interconnected. Our focus tends to be separated, but each has a cause and effect. The connection of immigration and SNAP benefits can be seen within the supermarket if you pay attention. 1 in 7 Americans are relying on SNAP benefits for food. Due to this stores and consumers demand low prices. This in turn forces the American farmer to seek inexpensive labor so they can keep their farms functioning. The farmer will hire an illegal immigrant that is grateful for the opportunity to work and make any money.
Refocus Our Concerns
Unfortunately, politicians are not going to take time to focus on the real issue. If we really want to deal with the immigration issue, we need to look at how immigrants impact our country. Immigrants ensure that we have low cost food. We also have to recognize that many immigrants are here legally, and some run businesses that keep Americans working.
I would enjoy hearing about an impact that you believe immigration has on your life. Please just be respectful and compassionate.
