Is Illegal Immigration Threatening Your Identity?

Is Illegal Immigration Threatening Your Identity?

Identity theft is one of the most widespread controversies facing us as Americans

today. There is a definite chance that someone has unsuspectingly cloned your identity

and is exploiting it at this very moment. Who would do such a thing, and what could

their motive possibly be? Illegal immigration is a major contributor to this crisis, mainly

for the sole purpose of employment, but the fact is, its still illegal.

According to the Center for Immigration Studies in 2002, the Census Bureau

estimated that 8.7 million illegal immigrants were residing in the United States. This is a

number that is growing by 500,000 a year. In order for these immigrants to be employed,

they would need items such as a social security card, driver's license, and even a birth

certificate. All of these items can be easily purchased over the black market. These

documents wouldn't be valid of course. The information from these documents can be

obtained from the trash, death records, and in most cases they are just made up. Children

are also likely targets because their social security number can go undetected for up to 18

years. This can cause problems later in life when applying for a loan, or even when

buying a car. The Welfare Office in Utah recently ran a search that matched the records

of children receiving welfare with a database of workers paying local taxes. Over 1,800

minor's social security numbers were attached to illegal immigrants that are paying taxes

with those same numbers. The taxes paid out for these illegal immigrants goes in to the

Earning Suspense File of the IRS and Social Security Administration. There is over $420

billion in taxes in this file. The money is there because they don't know who it should be

credited to, or it was paid under invalid/misnamed social security numbers. 70% of

illegal immigrants are using stolen or manufactured social security numbers. This has

affected the crucial rise in unidentified tax filers in the past five years, 9 million in 2002

alone, mainly because of the latest wave of illegal immigration from Mexico.

Many Americans who become victims of identity theft are unaware of it until it's

too late to do anything about it. Some Americans have been denied jobs and

unemployment income due to the fact that someone has cloned their social security

number illegally for employment purposes. Personally, I can't get a cell phone with any

provider because an illegal Mexican immigrant has unpaid phone bills with my social

security number attached to it. In most cases, people won't know that there is someone

duplicating their identity simply because institutions such as the IRS, credit bureaus, and

lenders are prevented from informing a person due to privacy regulations. It is possible

for the Social security Bureau to warn people, but they don't. Four years ago they sent

out letters informing employers about employees that are using the wrong social security

numbers to file taxes, but workers were quitting for fear of arrest or deportation.

Immigration Rights Movement protested this and the Bureau withdrew their letters.

Jobs and family connections are what attract illegal immigrants to America. The

average illegal Mexican worker earns one-tenth of what the average American earns.

This is why a number of businesses are attracted to hire illegal immigrants. The cheap

labor costs help the company earn more capital for itself. The only problem is, as more

and more illegal immigrants take jobs in America, jobs will become more scarce for

American citizens. Some may say that immigrants only take the jobs that American

would not want, but what happens when there aren't any jobs left? You would be

surprised at what jobs people would be willing to take. As the cost of living keeps going

up, the demand for work will go up too.

President George Bush plans to instate a temporary worker program to ensure that

companies will have access to cheap labor. If this were to go into action it would

decrease the need for illegal immigrants to obtain false identity documents. Congress has

also been urged to pass legislation that would allow social security officials to pass along

information about invalid social security numbers being used in multiple work places to

employers.

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