Okay, in response to Dee Baby’s column last week, it looks like it’s time for one of my seemingly annual letters.

I’m confused where this idea came from that illegal immigrants can apply for welfare when one of the things you need in order to apply is proof of citizenship. Perhaps people think the system is easily fooled since some of our own citizens are able to abuse it? If that’s true, shouldn’t the main concern be fixing that system to alleviate it being taken advantage of in general?

I’ve also heard the argument that illegal immigrants aren’t paying taxes. Well, let’s go through said taxes:

Property tax – this can easily be circumvented by renting, but it wouldn’t be logical to place the expectation to buy property on illegal immigrants when we don’t place this expectation on our own citizens. 

Sales tax – There’s really no way to get around this one except through EBT / Food Stamps, which I’ve already touched in the paragraph about welfare.

Income tax – Some illegal immigrants do pay income taxes by using fake social security numbers, the majority of them not receiving any income tax returns due to the system recognizing that the social security number doesn’t match the data in the system. 

As for the illegal immigrants that are paid under the table to avoid paying income taxes, I’ll play devil’s advocate and ask, why are they the ones that are blamed? There are two reasons that come to mind for why someone would hire an illegal immigrant over a U.S. citizen. 

Number one, employers can’t find any legal resident that is willing to work the more distasteful jobs. Thus, they turn to the illegal immigrants that are willing after coming from a country that has 42 percent of its population below the national poverty level. (I’m pretty sure the people from such a country aren’t able to afford having their noses in smartphones 24/7 either.) Shouldn’t you then blame our citizens that are unwilling to do those kinds of jobs and are instead content to milk welfare?

Two, the employers want to cut back on their own expenses, as illegal immigrants are usually paid less than usual. In this case, why wouldn’t you be angry at the employers for choosing avarice over providing an income to their fellow Americans?

In regards to the wall, it probably won’t come as a surprise to anyone that I’m against it. I’m with Dee; why spend that much on a wall when there are other more important things that money could be spent on? If you disagree and think border security is most important, fine. Then vote to hire more people to work as border patrol. They’re understaffed from what I’ve heard. According to an internal report by the Department of Homeland Security, the wall’s total estimated cost is 21 billion, 600 million dollars, which doesn’t even account for costs of upkeep. The border between the U.S. and Mexico is 1,989 miles. If we hired 50,000 workers, having 25 workers per mile, and paid them the average border patrol salary of about $41,000, every year it would cost 2 billion, 500 million dollars, less than a tenth of what it would take just to build the wall. Sounds much more effective to me, in cost and results.

If you’re still unsatisfied even after hearing all this, if nothing will change your mind about a wall alone being enough to deter illegal immigrants from crossing (with not enough workers to patrol the border, let alone the wall, as it is), I don’t want to hear you argue that more gun control won’t deter criminals from acquiring guns.

Tired of obstinance,

Parker Senska,

Woonsocket