Will self deportation result from employer crackdown?

Peter Brown:

The defining characteristic of the battle over immigration reform has been the insistence from each side that their statistics and assertions about why and how illegal residents come to the United States are stone-cold facts.

The truth is that because illegal immigrants live in the shadows, we really don't know how much weight to give to the various claims that advocates on both sides make as they seek to change the law.

That's why a crackdown on U.S. employers who hire illegal immigrants may shed some valuable light on exactly what is going on, and how government efforts to enforce the existing law will affect both immigrants and the overall economy.

It could also provide some insight into the real intentions of some of the players in the immigration debate.

The Department of Homeland Security has announced that beginning in September it will crack down on workers whose Social Security numbers do not match the names in the government computers for that account.

In other words, that should mean that illegals, or anyone else for that matter, will not be able either to get a fake card, or a fake number, just to fill out employment forms. If they do, the computers will show that number is not theirs.

Employers would then have to fire the workers or face stiff fines, not the current ones that many companies see as just the cost of doing business.

Already some business groups that hire lots of workers thought to be in the United States illegally - farmers, restaurants, janitors and construction companies - are claiming this crackdown could put them out of business, and cost legal workers their jobs, too.

During the congressional debate over immigration reform this spring that failed to produce legislation, the forces who wanted to make it easier for illegal immigrants to work here legally and eventually become citizens predicted that the U.S. economy would grind to a halt if federal officials enforced the existing statutes.

Those opposed to the reform plan that President Bush, and most of the Democratic and Republican leaders agreed to, said there were plenty of Americans willing to work, especially if the absence of illegal immigrants meant that wages would increase.

These folks also argued that if the laws were strictly enforced it would remove the incentives for undocumented immigrants to come to the United States, and that would greatly decrease the numbers trying to sneak across the border.

Well, the federal government is calling both sides' bluff.

...

I don't think either side was bluffing. However, a crackdown will demonstrate whether a lack of a job will cause self deportation. One of the misleading arguments of the advocates for legalization was that you "can't deport they all." the fact is you want have to if they self deport because they do not have jobs. It is also an important first step to get control of the border and the immigration process. If it turns out that industry needs these workers and can't find local people willing to work, they can then make a case for a regulated system of bringing in workers who would have to go through the immigration process and be screened. That is a system that makes much more sense than giving a blanket amnesty which would only encourage more illegal entry. It would also return the rule of law to the process.

Captain's Quarters reports that self deportation is already working in Arizona where the state is cracking down on employers. It apparently is not as hard as immigration advocates argued.