Abstract Is there a definite relationship between the current immigration policy and the haphazard state of our health care system? This paper investigates the relationship between the two with the assumption that it is possible to separate the two and solve each problem with a focus on what is best for everybody. The U. S. would like the illegal immigrants to go away in order to reduce its health care costs; it would also like to reduce the number of legal immigrants for the same reason; at the same it is evident that immigrants add value to the U.S. economy.
While it is evident that kicking out illegal immigrants would leave more money for true American health care, this paper address the question of legalizing the illegal immigrants and solving the problems of health care at the same time. This discussion naturally revolves around the central question of this research paper: How will a change in the current immigration policy affect the United States healthcare system? Immigration Policy and Health Care in the United States 3 Introduction
It is not possible for a newspaper to hit the newsstands these days without a story on immigration alongside news about the increasing cost of health care. Yet, all relationships that seem to exist between the current immigration policy and the state of the health care system in the country cannot merely be coincidental. Every year, the Border Patrol makes at least one million apprehensions of individuals that blatantly violate the immigration laws by crossing the United States borders unlawfully in order to work or to enjoy the benefits of free public services (“Illegal Immigration,” 2006).
No wonder, health care access has become a problem for countless legal citizens and residents of America to boot. There remain around 10 to 20 million illegal immigrants in the United States today. There are approximately 12 to 15 million jobs held by these people. So, illegal aliens represent around 8 percent of the U. S. work force. Between 4 to 6 million jobs held by illegal immigrants are serving the “underground economy. ” The United States is foregoing around $35 billion each year in income tax collections because of such jobs.
The country does not seem to be taking very strict action against the undocumented immigrants and their methods of employments because it “is simply hooked on cheap, illegal workers and deferring the costs of providing public services to these quasi-Americans” (Justich & Ng). What is most relevant to this discussion, however, is the fact that America is paying the consequences of being lenient toward illegal immigrants by suffering serious defects in its health care system.
Illegal immigrants continue to add to the population of America needing health care but ‘naturally. ’ While America Immigration Policy and Health Care in the United States 4 does not want to kick out all illegal immigrants because of their use to the U. S. economy, it also cannot afford health care for everybody. It is clear that the illegal immigrants have an effect on the health care system of the country, just as they have an effect on the U. S. economy, which is counted among one of the most blessed economies in the globe.
Thus, there must be something right about not taking stricter action against illegal immigration. After all, most of these people come to the United States with great hopes in a world-class system. At the same time, however, the United States believes that it cannot afford a health care system that includes illegal immigrants, when the legal residents and citizens of the country – the naturally born and the naturalized Americans – are complaining that they are finding health care too difficult to access because of the high prices.
High prices are, no doubt, led by high demand. Hence, it is obvious that the illegal immigrants are raising the demand of goods and services in the United States, thereby raising the prices. Only by checking the immigration policy and trying to control illegal immigration with stricter measures than before could the United States hope to achieve a balance in its health care needs, thereby making the health care system easily accessible to all. Then again, is this the only method of checking both illegality and health care costs?
This research paper addresses the question: How will a change in the current immigration policy affect the United States healthcare system? Since it is obvious that illegal immigration would have to be controlled, and a huge number of illegal immigrants sent away for the health care system of America to come to its natural balance, supporting the number of people that it was naturally meant to support (as in the Naturalization process); this paper is based on the
Immigration Policy and Health Care in the United States 5 assumption that there might be a way for the United States to improve the health care system without changes in the current immigration policy. Would United States be able to support its health care system fully if it does not change its immigration policy? Reflecting on possible answers to this question would help us to understand the significance of immigration reforms with respect to the health care system.
If it is possible to have the best health care system in the world without changes in the current immigration policy, it is quite possible that the health care system is largely independent of immigration. Even though this assumption appears far from truth, it is necessary to explore, in light of the fact that we would like to discover the true relationship, if any, between immigration policy and health care reforms in order to answer our principal question. Is there an unavoidable relationship between immigration policy and healthcare?
Politicians have probably become used to stating that health care is “the Number One challenge, the Number One domestic issue” (“Senator,” 2006). Senator Richard Burr from North Carolina added that health care would consume one hundred percent of the U. S. budget by the year 2020 if other sources of financing the health of the nation are not discovered and/or organized immediately. He did not say that the health care system would cost that much to the U. S. without the illegal immigrants, however. Illegal immigrants are not about to go away in abundance any time soon.
Rather, as the Senator indicated, the United States would like the Immigration Policy and Health Care in the United States 6 illegal immigrants to somehow turn legal (“Senator”). Given the benefits that illegal immigrants add to the U. S. economy, this is not surprising. Moreover, the comments made by the Senator entail that it is possible to ignore the negative effects of illegal immigration on health care, and to focus instead on making health care available to all, including the poor people from South America who came to the U.
S. hoping for better living conditions. Perhaps, therefore, the United States should be prepared to accept the illegal immigrants permanently into their lives. It is magnanimous on the part of the world’s leading nation to search for a way to meet its health care costs despite illegal immigration. Still, it remains clear that the United States is finding it harder to support its health care system because there are too many people that require their health care needs to be met at present.
The onrush of legal immigrants during the 1990s has exacerbated the problem: the supply of health care is insufficient at reasonable prices also for legal immigrants in the U. S. (Camarota)! The supply of health care is less than the demand at the prices that the demanders mostly quote. Only by reducing the population of the country by changing the current immigration policy and making it stricter, may the country hope to meet the costs of health care for its true citizens and residents.
The illegal immigrants would have to be sent back to their poor nations; and legal immigration checked more strictly. But, once again, it may be possible to consider other methods of change on behalf of the health care system before we single out the immigration policy as the perpetrator of poor health care. It is important to consider how else to improve the health care system on an immediate basis, seeing that the United States is not truly desirous of kicking out all illegal immigrants right away.