[RickSp]

As this thread is discussing the wisdom of author who would only identify himself as "anonymous" and was first posted on the website of Glenn Spencer, a white supremicist vigilante, I suspect that any response is pretty pointless.

Nevertheless, here are the comments of someone with a name. Douglas S. Massey is the Henry G. Bryant Professor of Sociology and Public Affairs at Princeton University, where he is co-director of the Mexican Migration Project at the Office of Population Research. Massey's research focuses on international migration, race and housing, discrimination, education, urban poverty, and Latin America, especially Mexico. He is the author, most recently, of Crossing the Border: Research from the Mexican Migration Project (with Jorge Durand), and International Migration: Prospects and Policies in a Global Market (co-edited with J. Edward Taylor). I wonder what credentials "anonymous" has?

Seeing Mexican Immigration Clearly

In 25 years of research on a variety of public policy issues, I have never seen so much misinformation as in the debate on Mexican immigration during 2006. Thanks to the media and political entrepreneurs, Mexican immigrants are routinely portrayed as a tidal wave of human beings fleeing an impoverished, disorganized nation who are desperate to settle in the United States, where they will overwhelm our culture, displace our language, mooch our social services, and undermine our national security. This profile, however, bears no discernible relationship to the reality that I know as a social scientist. Since 1982 I have co-directed a large data-gathering effort known as the Mexican Migration Project. My collaborators and I have conducted representative surveys in communities all over Mexico and the United States, and over the years, we have surveyed 20,000 households and 120,000 individuals to gather detailed information from U.S. migrants about their experiences crossing the border, living in the United States, and returning to Mexico. My understanding of Mexican immigration rests on these data, and if anyone thinks I’ve got it all wrong, they are free to download the data, analyze it, and see for themselves. Mexican immigration is not a tidal wave. The rate of undocumented migration has not increased in over two decades. Neither is Mexico a demographic time bomb; its fertility rate is only slightly above replacement. Although a variety of trans-border population movements have increased, this is to be expected in a North American economy that is increasingly integrated under the terms of a mutually-ratified trade agreement. Undocumented migration stems from the unwillingness of the United States to include labor within the broader framework governing trade and investment. Rates of migration between Mexico and the United States are entirely normal for two countries so closely integrated economically. To Americans who fear cultural displacement, I say look at what’s happening south of the border. Cultural influences travel in both directions and in an integrated economy they are inevitable. Given the global hegemony of the United States, however, the cultural effects are asymmetric. We influence Mexican culture and society far more than they affect U.S. culture and society. Within Mexico, Wal-Mart, McDonald’s, Toys ‘R Us, and 7-11 are increasingly displacing Mexican outlets. Even Taco Bell is making inroads, and American cultural traditions such as Halloween and Santa Claus now compete with Mexican celebrations such as Day of the Dead and Three Kings Day. Mexican immigrants do not migrate to take advantage of U.S. social services. Their service usage rates are well below those of other immigrant groups and have fallen sharply since the mid-1990s. Undocumented migrants, in particular, are more likely to pay taxes than to use public services, and even those they do use—mainly education and medical care—are consumed at rates well below what one would expect given their socioeconomic characteristics. The problem of paying for services to immigrants is serious, but one that is easily solved through federal transfers. Whereas tax revenues accrue disproportionately to the federal government, the costs of immigration are borne locally. Mexico is not a threat to U.S. national security. It is an ally and friendly trading nation that annually spends less than 0.8% of GDP on its military. There are a million U.S. citizens living in Mexico and ten million Mexicans living in the United States, all of whom have multiple ties of kinship, friendship, and commerce that cross the border. Tourism is extensive and large shares of citizens in both countries have spent time on the other side of the border. Mexico has no resident Islamic community, no known terrorist cells, and has never been a launching pad for terrorist attacks on the United States. Those attributes describe our neighbor to the north, not our neighbor to the south. The demagogic portrayal of Mexico as a threat to American culture, society, and security has not solved the problems associated with Mexico-U.S. migration; it has only made them worse. Rather than seeking to build a wall between our two countries, we should adopt the stance taken by the European Union when it integrated poor neighbors such as Spain and Portugal in the 1980s and Poland and Hungary today. Rather than seeking to block flows of people that naturally follow from trade and investment within a common market, we should work to make sure these movements occur under circumstances that are beneficial to all concerned, promoting growth in Mexico, minimizing costs to the United States, and protecting the rights of immigrant and native workers. (emphasis added)