Immigration and the Mortgage Meltdown

*** "The state I live in California, for example, is utterly bankrupt and every knowledgable observer of politics knows it is because of massive unrelenting illegal immigration." ***

The state is at least $15 billion in the whole - again. It is THE biggest contributor to the mortgage crisis, not just in absolute terms, but in relative terms, too. Those of us who live in other parts of the West see native-born citizens who've fled Californians ALL the time. The first words of all of their lips, when asked why they left, is inevitably "it's so expensive there."

27% of Californians are immigrants. This is a number that does not include their children - just the first generation.

But the mortgage meltdown, the obscenely high costs of living, the ever constant financial ax hanging over the state, the fleeing of native-born from their own state - none of them are the least bit connected to mass immigration. There's nothing to see here, these aren't the droids you're looking for, move along.

I have a friend who used to live in the LA area. He left 2 years ago. He wanted to stay. He's a smart, polyglot guy with an MBA from a high-ranking school. He left. Why? Because he couldn't afford a home in the area. An MBA couldn't afford a home in LA without going over his head in debt. Repsonsible behavior doesn't work in this country anymore. You have to do stupid stuff and then wait for the government to bail you out while the irresponsible get kicked to the side of the road.

And what was immigration all supposed to be about? "Growing the economy." Well, the folks obsessed about "growing the economy" never bothered to ask whether the growth would benefit the average man or not. Looking at how the working class fared never factored in. It was just assumed they would keep paying their bills, even as they fell further and further behind thanks to soaring home prices and stiff competition by illegal immigrant labor. Instead of looking at GDP growth, perhaps fro long term prosperity you should look at savings rates and debt ratios. And both have been getting dramatically worse in high immigration countries.

Sorry, open borders wackos (Michael Barone included) - simply moving massive numbers of people from one country to another is no panacea for economic ills, especially if those immigrants are illiterate and especially if your politicians step all over each other to give them taxpayer funded benefits.

Bill of CO 2:15AM October 11, 2008

From border to border the illegal alien holocaust is becoming evident. They have slithered in on a sea of semen, babies dropping from millions of brown uterouses.Strip mining the citizens of the U.S. 5 million defaulted mortages loans belonged to illegal aliens.Orange county will spend 435 million dollars this year on welfare,foodstamps,HUD housing etc.Not including education.Murder,mayhem and finacial and cultural meltdown.Build the double fence that was made into law. The Democrats lied and called off the ivote about illegals.These lying bastards liberals need to be imprisoned for what they have done to us.Why are Democrats so stupid?So suicidal?They can cut their own throats,leave mine alone.

dharc of 1:31AM October 11, 2008

ok

all you Mexican-'immigrant' apologists, i don't know what you were reading but not once did he single out Mexicans in his piece. why don't you read the piece carefully this time and you will see he does nothing but equate lower Mexican and Latin American birth rates to lower immigration rates to the USA.

and he's right, all that subprime lending was nothing more than giving loans to people who should have never been approved in the 1st place. This was another form of public welfare that all of us have to pay for now. 10 years ago, none of these loans would have been approved because folks, these applicants had bad credit and were no/low income risks...nothing to do with skin color!

you're a bunch of over-sensitive hypocrites and you want to immediately attack anyone that doesn't agree with your communist/socialist agends

God I so hope that Obama doesn't win!

We will turn into a third-world nation run by special interest, and minority and immigrant rights groups!

We shall truly become, a banana republic.

God Help US!

Frankie of MA 7:13PM October 10, 2008

Sarah Palin is a breath of fresh air and I for one support her strongly. Do I agree with every view she has? Of course not, but I don't agree 100% with anyone, certainly no politician.

How have I done for the last eight years?

Just fine. How about you? My personal successes or failures aren't the result of who is occupying the White House. Never has, never will be.

RSG of IN 2:05PM October 10, 2008