The Missing Link

April 02, 2006

Wednesday Column Draft

Every newborn American baby has won life’s lottery, though we didn’t do anything to deserve it. A life that begins here, rather than sub-Saharan Africa or Central America, simply lasts longer. The average American can expect to live roughly 78 years. In Zimbabwe you’re lucky to reach your fortieth birthday.

The United States also offers unparalleled material comforts and life opportunities. If you’re born to a loving family here, you’re luckier than 99.9 percent of people in human history. That puts things into perspective when you’re having a rough day.

And it shapes the way some of us see the world.

Many Americans fear illegal immigration precisely because they appreciate how unique and fragile our society is. If most of the world has been poor for most of history, prosperous nations like America ought to be very careful about rapid, unpredictable changes of any kind, they reason. Otherwise prosperity might slip away from our citizens and future citizens, whether immigrant or native born.

In short, these Americans worry about preserving what we have more than sharing it with others.

Other Americans react differently to the undeserved luck of our birth. They feel an obligation to extend American opportunities to others by allowing them to immigrate here, and don’t worry so much about the negative effects uncontrolled immigration might have.

While most Americans see the truth behind both views I’ve sketched, and try to find a balance between them, this column’s composite character sees the immigration debate mostly through the lens of the latter position.

Caitlin can’t bring herself to support any crackdown on illegal immigration. She is 27 years old, has a bachelor’s degree from Swarthmore and works as a research assistant at Harvard, where she interacts with some of the most interesting and accomplished immigrants in the nation. If you hooked Caitlin up to a lie detector test and offered to make a $1,000 donation to Amnesty International for her blunt views on immigration, here’s what she’d say:

“All my life I’ve been privileged.

“Yes, I have bills like everyone else. I wish I could afford a bigger apartment. I’m still paying off student loans.

“But I work at a job that I like. I have health insurance. If my boyfriend and I get married one day we’ll be able to afford our own house and kids. I’ve taken a backpacking trip to Europe, and my parents have a time share in the mountains. I buy more new clothes than I really need, and I don’t think twice about ordering an $8 cosmopolitan when I go out for drinks with the girls.

“My ancestors come from Norway and Scotland. They arrived here generations ago, when there weren’t really limits to immigration. My privileged life is possible because they were allowed to come here back then. How can I say now that it’s not okay for others to come? Now that they’re young Africans and Latinos and Asians, instead of my European great-great-grandparents, is it really fair for me to keep them out just because they make my taxes a little bit higher?

“That just seems so selfish to me. Don’t get me wrong. I try not to judge people who care about those things, because I can imagine how hard it is for working class families to pay higher taxes or compete for jobs. I feel for them, and I support government programs to help working families.

“But I care most about government policies that help the poorest people to live better lives. They’re the least powerful, and the ones who need our help the most. Even if immigration makes things a little bit harder for some poor Americans, just like its costs make things a little bit harder for me, it makes things so much better for so many poor people from other countries.

“They gain so much more than we give up.

“Even low-wage jobs for immigrants seem unfair on some level. Every time I see an immigrant working as a janitor or a bus boy or a maid, I feel guilty that they are serving me, and adding luxuries to my privileged existence, when they probably can’t even afford basic human rights like health insurance. That’s why I think the living wage movement is so important.

“Even so, I understand when some people get upset that they are here illegally. But it just doesn’t bother me. These are good people who only broke the law because poverty forced their hand. If we did a better job fighting poverty we wouldn’t have illegal immigrants to begin with. Anyway, since I don’t think it’s fair to make it illegal for people to come here, I guess I’m glad we don’t enforce the unfair laws very well. It causes problems, I know, but it’s better than racially profiling all these immigrants and sending them home.�

Posted by Conor at April 2, 2006 06:12 AM