Recently, the leftist organization Idaho Center For Fiscal Policy (ICFP) reported on a national study that illegal immigrants contribute $72 million in Idaho taxes per year, and they pay taxes at a higher rate than citizens in the top 1%.
First off, the only way illegals can pay income taxes is with fraudulently obtained social security numbers, unless they obtain an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number (ITIN). The ITIN does not authorize work in the U.S. but allows those “not eligible” for Social Security numbers to pay taxes if they want to. Because why would the IRS turn down money? Second, the top income tax rate in Idaho is now 5.8% (dropping to 5.695% for the current tax year), which is under the sales tax rate of 6%. But the article doesn’t mention dollars paid; it just compares tax rates. So, a group of people here illegally who can only legally pay income taxes using an ITIN is being compared to people who are required to pay income taxes, with no comparison of actual tax dollars paid?
More to the point, the study made no mention of the costs incurred by the government to provide services to these illegals — education, justice costs, food, and medical expenses, for example. When the taxes contributed by illegals are balanced against the costs to provide services to illegals and their dependents on a net basis, Idaho’s state and local governments are on the hook for several hundred million dollars.
Perhaps the people at ICFP are trying to deter the Idaho Legislature from taking up key legislation aimed at saving Idaho taxpayers from the burden they pay because of illegal immigration. Conservatives believe that the Legislature should prioritize the needs of Idahoans who are U.S. citizens and not roll out the carpet for illegals.
Interestingly, the same promoters of illegals who claim that illegal immigrants are net contributors to Idaho and can’t collect on as many government social programs as citizens still want them to be able to get other free stuff courtesy of the taxpayers: free school lunches, K-12 education, “emergency” Medicaid, food assistance, shelter assistance, immunization, prenatal care, etc. Some of these services are required by federal law. But not surprisingly, the federal government is intent on weakening verification, as we have pointed out elsewhere.
What do illegals cost Idaho taxpayers? The answer is that according to two recent studies, illegals consume millions of dollars more in benefits than they pay in taxes. The Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) has done an in-depth analysis and concludes Idaho’s state taxpayers pay a net $303 million to cover the cost of illegals and $405 million if you include the cost of their children. According to the report, about 63% of the cost of illegals in America falls to state and local governments. The net cost, after accounting for taxes paid, to the state of Idaho for each illegal immigrant is over $4,800 per year.
The report estimates that nationally, illegal immigrants cost federal, state, and local taxpayers $182.1 billion in services, offset by $31.4 billion in total tax contributions, for a net cost of $150.7 billion per year. Even if we use the data from the left-leaning group noted above, the net cost to the taxpayers is $85.4 billion. FAIR notes that most mainstream organizations have not updated their population estimates of illegals despite the surge under President Biden.
“An essential part of our calculations relies on FAIR’s latest illegal alien population estimate, which is 15.5 million (20.9 million when the U.S.-born children of illegal aliens are included) as of the beginning of 2022. Our estimate is higher than those offered by most mainstream immigration research organizations, most of which stick to the oft-repeated “10-11 million” figure, despite record illegal immigration over the past couple of decades and even further surges over the past few years.”
The largest categories of federal costs are for medical and law enforcement expenditures. However, at the state level, the largest expenditure is for education, followed by medical and then justice costs. According to the FAIR report, illegal immigrants (national total) cost state and local taxpayers $115.6 billion per year, including education expenditures of $73.2 billion, medical expenditures of $21.8 billion, administration of justice costs of $18.6 billion, and welfare expenditures of $2.0 billion. Yet illegals only pay $15.2 billion in income, property, fuel, and other sales taxes. This means that illegals only cover about 13% of the cost of state and local services they use. A bargain for them, not for taxpayers.
Because of the high cost of K-12 education, over $11,000 per student, provided by the state funds and local property taxes, Idaho picks up most of the cost of education of illegal immigrants’ children. Some of the children born here are U.S. citizens, but those brought over by their parents are not.
In testimony before Congress on January 11, 2024, Steven A. Camarota, Director of Research
Center for Immigration Studies, made the following points about the costs of illegal immigrants:
The attempts to sell illegal immigrants as “taxpayers” to Idaho fall flat when we review the data. Idaho should prioritize the needs of U.S. citizens for the use of taxpayer dollars and not remain a magnet for illegals by giving them services that cost Idaho taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars.
