The immigration policy Essay

In the US, the immigration policy is a crucial law.

Many immigrants come to the United States from war-torn countries like Syria and some of its neighbors, like Mexico. The paper takes a close look at immigration legislation or policy as well as the driving forces behind systemic change. The immigration policy in the United States aims to draw families and individuals who are likely to add to society to the country and to keep out those who will burden it. Primarily, the United Sates Immigration law is a shamble as the Congress, and the government wakes up after every 20 years to find that the nation is flooded with illegal immigrants. The problem with the previous regimes is that they provided amnesty to the immigrants while they did not follow the correct procedure to gain citizenship. The illegal immigrants they are willing to take wage cut limiting the chances of American securing jobs.

Keywords: Immigration Policy, United Sates, Society, Illegal Immigrants.

The Immigration Policy United Sates

Introduction

The American public overwhelmingly argues that the country’s immigration policy needs an overall sweeping change (Epstein and Carrillo 2014, p 268). Primarily, more than 75% of the American population argue that the loophole in the immigration policy allows the nation to be flooded with immigrants who come to take the jobs of the American citizens and increase the burden to the public (Martinez et al.,. 957). Moreover, 35% of the population say that the policy needs to completely rebuild among the seven policy tested (Steil and Vasi 2014, p 1123). Currently, the government calls it immigration reform but what it is doing is advocating for amnesty for more than 11 million undocumented illegal immigrants in the United States who are mainly unskilled and uneducated (Samson, 2015, p 119). While the United Sates of American is a country of who come to the nation without following the rules of gaining citizenship (Fussell 2014, p 488). The undocumented cisterns in the country cause a major problem to the state’s workforce and economy.

Primarily, only 13 percent of the green cards issued by the United Sates government in 2012 were mainly for economic reasons while 63% of them were for family unions (Peters, 2014, p 823). This raises the question if the immigration policy is achieving the intended purpose. This means that the nations are having is having a generation of unskilled and uneducated workers who are shipping their family members who are also unskilled and uneducated (Brubaker, 2014, p 42). The situation has resulted in a situation where the goal is not for the economic objective, but the destination is welfare, unemployment insurance, and other government benefits (Amuedo-Dorantes and Lozano 2017, p 78). The New York Times reported that the Congress debate on the issue of illegal immigrants and immigration reform is made on economic reforms (Akbari and MacDonald 2014, p 812). Primarily, the undocumented or unlawful immigrants takes jobs that the world takes jobs that would go to Americans (Caponi and Plesca 2014). This goes to the fact that the illegal immigrants they are willing to take wage cut limiting the chances of American securing jobs.

How the Immigration Law works in the United Sates

The immigration law of the United States is a complex, and it causes much confusion no how it works. Primarily, the Immigration and the Naturalization Act (INA) and the body governing the immigration policy provide for an annual limit of 675,000 immigrants with exceptions for close family members (Ngai 2014, p 35). Moreover, the lawful permanent residency allows for the immigrants to live lawfully and work permanently in the United Sates. Importantly, the legal permanent resident is welcomed to apply for all jobs, and they can also remain in the United States even when they become unemployed (Hatton, 2015, p 352). Moreover, each year the United Sates admits noncitizens to work in the country on a temporary basis. On the other hand, the Congress and the President annually determine a separate number or refugees to be admitted to the country (Ewing, Martínez, and Rumbaut 2015, p 97). Primarily, the immigration law or policy in the United Sates is based on the following principle that includes reunification of families, promoting diversity, protecting refugees, and admitting refugees or people with a skill that are necessary and valuable in boosting the economy of the country. Below is the legal system in which the immigration policy is based (Rhodes et al., 2015, p 332).

Family-Based Immigration

The family unification is an important policy that governs the United States Immigration Policy. It allows United Sates citizens and the Lawful Permanent Residents (LPRs) to bring their family members to the United Sates (Spring 2016, p 43). Importantly, the family-based immigrants are mainly admitted through immediate relatives of United Sates citizens or by the family preference system. The prospective immigrant for the immediate family’s category to be accepted in the United Sates must meet certain eligibility criterion (Slack, Martínez, Lee, and Whiteford 2016, p 26). Moreover, the petitioners must also meet certain financial and age requirements. The immediate relatives according to the immigration policy are the spouse of United States citizens, they are unmarried minor’s children of United States citizens primarily under 21 years old, and parents of State Citizens (Beyer and Matthes 2015, p 843). Moreover, a limited number of visas are therefore available under the family preference system every year, but the possible immigrants must meet certain eligibility criteria. Consequently, the petitioners must meet a certain financial and age requirement (Gutiérrez 2016, p 108). The requirement under preference system includes adult children either married or unmarried and sisters and brothers of United States citizens. The other requirement under the preference criteria is spouse’s unmarried children of legal permanent citizens (Djajić, and Michael 2014, p 819).

To balance and keep in check the number of immigrants arriving at the United Sates by a family reunion, the United Sates Congress started a system that calculates the available number of the available preference visas to be issued in a given year (Yoshikawa, Suárez-Orozco, and Gonzales 2017, p 17). Mainly the number of the permits is determined by starting with 480,000. Then it is followed by subtracting the number of permits issued during the previous year. Importantly, the number of family-based visas allocated by the preference system cannot be below 226,000 during a particular year (Chinn 2016, p 27). Mainly because of a high number of immediate relatives living in the United Sates wanting to bring their families to the U.S the number of issued visa available each year has only been 226,000 (Levy, Wright, and Citrin 2016, p 675). For an individual to be admitted to the United States through the family-based immigration system a Legal Permanent Resident or a United Sates Citizen must petition for the relative by establishing the legitimacy relationship the individual meets the minimum income requirements and also sign an avidity stating that the citizen or the sponsor will be financially responsible for the immigrants arrival to the United States (Philbin, Flake, Hatzenbuehler, and Hirsch 2017, p 36). On the other hand, the children and spouses who accompany the principal immigrants under the immigration law they are referred to as derivative immigrants (Grossman, 2017, p 90). Moreover, the number of the visas that are granted through the family-based immigration to the derivative immigrants it mainly counted under the appropriate category limits (Massey, Durand, and Pren, 2015, p 1019).

The Employment-Based Immigration

The immigration law provided a way for people who are skilled to enter the United Sates on either temporary or permanent basis.

Provisional classification

The temporary designation allows an employer to petition and employ skilled and educated foreigners for specific jobs for a given period (Papademetriou, Alba, Foner, and Banulescu-Bogdan 2016, p 35). Primarily, most of the workers in the country must work for the employer that gave them a job and this limits them from changing jobs (Brown and Brown 2017, p 13). Moreover, there are more than 29 different types of visas available for nonimmigrant workers in the United States. They Include the L-1 visas intracompany transfer, R-1 visas for the religious workers, various P visas for athlete, skilled performers, and entertainers, O-1 for the extraordinary ability, and H visas for both lesser-skilled and highly-skilled employments among other types of visas (Ellis, Wright, and Townley 2016, p 899). Such relevant permits make it easy for the United Sates to attract the skilled individuals who help the country to grow economically. However, the visa classification may vary from duration, eligibility requirements, and whether it permits the workers to come with their dependents among other factors (Nunn, Qian, and Sequeira 2017, p 89). Primarily, temporary visa holders are mandated to leave the United Sates when their employment is terminated, or their status expires.

Permanent Immigration

The overall limit for the permanent immigrant is 140,000 per year including eligible minors and spouses. Moreover, the 140,000 visas are divided into five categories that include:

Persons with extraordinary abilities. This includes people in the fields of arts, business, education, athletics, science, researchers, professors, and multinational managers and executives (Yoshikawa, Suárez-Orozco, and Gonzales, 2017, p 9). They are accorded 40,000 visas and any other unused visa from the 5th and 4th preferences.

The second preference is members of any profession having advanced degrees or people with exception skills in the fields of business, science, or arts (Riva, 2017, p 15). The immigration law gives this preference 40,000 visas and any other unused visas in the first preference.

The third preference under the permanent immigration is skilled workers who have at least two years of experience or training and professions with college degrees (Helbling and Michalowski 2017, p 10). They have 40,000 per year plus any unused visas in the 2nd and 1st preferences.

The fourth preference under the immigration policy are special immigrants, and they include religious workers, former United States government workers, employees of United States Foreign Service posts, and other classes of immigrants (Cobb, Xie, Meca, and Schwartz 2017, p 258). This preference has 10,000 visas per year.

The fifth classification under the permanent immigration is people who are likely to invest more than $500,000 and will employ more than ten permanent full-time United Sates workers (Hatzenbuehler et al., 2017, p 172).

Refugees and Asylees

People who are unable to return to their home countries are due to extraordinary, and life-threatening conditions are absorbed to the United States as either refugees or asylum seekers (Rodriguez and Dawkins 2016, p 18). The refugees are absorbed into the population by their inability to go back to their motherland because of fear of prosecution due to race, political opinion, and religion (Venkataramani, Shah, O’Brien, Kawachi, and Tsai 2017, p 178). On the other hand, Asylum is available to people living in the United States, and they are seeking protection from the same factors accorded to the refugees (Rodríguez, and Hagan 2016, p 28). Moreover, both refugees and asylum seekers are eligible to become legal permanent residents one year after admission as refugees or asylum seekers.

The diversity visa program

The diversity program allows nations that have low nationals in the U.S to send in the application. Primarily, the variety act gives 50,000 visas to countries that have sent less than 55,000 citizens to the United Sates in the last five years. Importantly, the permits are assigned randomly (Mobasher, 2016, p 158). To become eligible for a visa under the Diversity program one must have a high-school education, a minimum of two years working in a profession, and at least two years of experience of training (Goldring, 2016, p 1123). Moreover, minors or spouses of the principle can be absorbed as a dependent.

Reasons fueling for the immigration policy reform

It is evident that the immigration policy has a lot of loopholes that allows undocumented or illegal immigrants to continue benefiting from the United States government resources at the burden of the Americans (Jiang and Han 2016, p 347). The illegal immigrants cause a labor competition with the American citizens. This because the illegal immigrants are willing to take a pay cut on their wage hence lowering the minimum wage (Alarcón et al.,. 2016, p 866). This makes American lose jobs to the benefit of illegal immigrants. Consequently, illegal immigrants bring their extended family to the United Sates causing a strain to the local schools and hospitals. Similarly, they cause the rise of the black markets for products and services (Goldring, 2016, p 12). Moreover, the result in the increase of insurance rates as some states make its hard for illegal immigrants to secure drivers license.

Conclusion

Moreover, the effects of the loopholes in the immigration law are felt in the social programs such as school and hospital that cost the taxpayer and therefore adding to the national debt of more than $16 trillion national debt. The United Sates is a nation that lives by the laws, and it must secure its border to ensure the safety of the country and every person should come on board. So this begs the question should the ultimate verdict be to restrict immigration? The answer to this question is no. some of the brighter innovators and mind were not born in the United Sates such as Einstein, Pulitzer, and Carnegie and may other but they made major contributions to the economy in profound and significant ways. Primarily, more than 40% pf the fortune 500 organization were started by immigrants and their children. This results to that immigrants can be a crucial part of the economic growth.

Restriction of immigrants results in the loss of great mind or the case of Japan where there is less than 2% of the foreign population. Primarily, America needs immigrants, and it must make it easy for international students attending United colleges and universities to remain in the country to contribute to the nation’s economic and innovation growth. Moreover, if the United States wants to remain globally competitive, it means that the Congress must remove the barriers associated with the collection of visa process to aloe swift entry to the country and attract high skilled workers, innovators, and investors who will improve the economy of the country.

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