Topic: Dittohead Dogma
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Even illegal immigrants don't escape taxes

April 7, 2005 editorial

The myth endures that illegal immigrants in the United States don't pay taxes. You hear it all the time, accompanied by complaints about how illegal immigrants are bankrupting the country and don't contribute to society.

This is wildly untrue. It's simple: If you live in the United States, the government will find a way to tax you. Illegal immigrants pay sales tax every time they buy a shirt at a store or a gallon of gas for the car. They pay property taxes when they rent an apartment or buy a home. You heard right. Illegal immigrants can buy homes. Most banks in the United States have no qualms lending money to illegal immigrants as long as the borrowers are willing and able to pay it back with interest as would anyone else. And not all undocumented immigrants are poor farmworkers.

Illegal immigrants also fork over a fortune in payroll taxes each year, which helps keep afloat some of America's most beloved entitlement programs. In fact, what illegal immigrant workers kick in annually to the national kitty for Social Security could be mistaken for the GNP of a small country.

We're talking about as much as $7 billion a year, according to recent estimates by the Social Security Administration. That's the amount of Social Security tax revenue collected annually on earnings by illegal immigrants in the United States ? earnings estimated at more than $50 billion annually. The government keeps a record of all this in something called the "earnings suspense file," which lists the estimated hundreds of billions of dollars that illegal immigrants have generated in W-2 earnings since the late 1980s, as well as the Social Security taxes generated along the way.

Here's how it works. An illegal immigrant enters the country and purchases a bogus Social Security card. He goes to work and he earns a few dollars, but he also has taxes withheld for Social Security. Unlike other U.S. workers, that is money that he will never see again. After all, he is in the country illegally. The government simply keeps the funds. In fact, according to a spokesman with the Social Security administration, without the payroll taxes collected in this manner, the Social Security system's long-term funding deficit would be much worse ? as much as 10 percent greater over the next 75 years.

None of this, of course, is meant to justify or condone illegal immigration. Let's not forget the economic strain suffered by cities and counties that provide health care and other services to illegal immigrants. In fact, the debate rages about whether illegal immigration is, for this country, an economic burden or benefit.

But this much is beyond debate: It's just not accurate to say that illegal immigrants don't pay taxes. When it comes to Social Security taxes, they're paying their share ? and someone else's.