Fortress America? addresses a recent proposal to spend $5 billion more on policing the borders:
Never mind that since 1986 the U.S. strategy of spending more and more money on militarizing the border hasn’t worked. According to a recent Cato Institute study by Princeton sociologist Douglas Massey, ‘By 2002, the Border Patrol’s budget had reached $1.6 billion and that of the [Immigration and Naturalization Service] stood at $6.2 billion, 10 and 13 times their 1986 values, respectively.’Over the same 16-year period, the number of border patrol officers tripled, and the amount of hours spent patrolling the border increased by a factor of eight. By 2002, Professor Massey notes, ‘the Border Patrol was the largest arms-bearing branch of the U.S. government next to the military itself.’
Meanwhile, the illegal immigration flow has only increased, and all of this extra ‘enforcement’ is arguably one reason. When illegals felt they could more easily cross the border, they’d enter the U.S. on a seasonal (or sometimes even daily) basis or when they needed the money. Then they’d often return home. But with the difficulty of re-entry so much higher in the last 20 years, many more migrant workers choose to remain here permanently. The risk of staying is lower than the price of re-running the border gantlet.
The alternative:
Based on the fact that the vast majority of migrants come here in search of work, Senators McCain and Kennedy aim to lower the level of illegal immigration by expanding our relatively few channels for legal entry to meet the demand. Giving economic immigrants legal ways to enter the U.S. will reduce business for human smugglers and counterfeiters. Moreover, it will allow our border authorities to concentrate their resources on chasing down real security threats instead of nannies and gardeners.