The Budgetary and Economic Costs of Addressing Unauthorized Immigration: Alternative Strategies

Unauthorized immigrants play a significant economic role in the U.S. making up 6.4 percent of the work force. The Budgetary and Economic Cost of Addressing Unauthorized Immigration examines the impact that strict immigration law enforcement would have on the economy.

It analyzes the expense of fully enforcing current immigration law, that is, apprehending, detaining, processing and deporting the 11.2 million undocumented immigrants currently living in the U.S. as well as preventing future migrants from unlawfully entering the country. The analysis shows that such enforcement would be costly: the U.S. government and taxpayers would spend up to $600 billion and it would take 20 years to complete. Additionally, deportation of all undocumented immigrants would reduce the gross domestic product (GDP) by $1.6 trillion due to of the loss of workers. According to the report, since undocumented immigrants rarely receive governmental assistance, the deportation of 11.2 million unauthorized immigrants would add to, not lessen, the federal budget deficit through loss of tax revenue and relatively unchanged spending. The report concludes that deportation costs for all the undocumented immigrants already in the U.S. are burdensome to taxpayers and harmful to the health of the overall economy. (Jamie Cross for The ILC Public Education Institute)

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