This is highly disputed. Areas in recent times that have had anti-immigrant laws often feel an economic pinch in result. The boatlift, as mention, didn't hurt Miami's economy and you'll not find an example of more people rushing over so suddenly to a single place. Undocumented immigrants pay taxes and contribute to the local economies.And again, if it's just the illegal part which is the problem, why not... just make them legal?
There is no doubt that add to economies, thats also why its funny that Trump says he'll kick them out but on his website he never discusses throwing out all the illegal immigrants.
This study is one of the first to estimate the total impact of illegal immigration on the federal budget. Most previous studies have focused on the state and local level and have examined only costs or tax payments, but not both. Based on Census Bureau data, this study finds that, when all taxes paid (direct and indirect) and all costs are considered, illegal households created a net fiscal deficit at the federal level of more than $10 billion in 2002. We also estimate that, if there was an amnesty for illegal aliens, the net fiscal deficit would grow to nearly $29 billion.
Among the findings:
Households headed by illegal aliens imposed more than $26.3 billion in costs on the federal government in 2002 and paid only $16 billion in taxes, creating a net fiscal deficit of almost $10.4 billion, or $2,700 per illegal household.
Among the largest costs are Medicaid ($2.5 billion); treatment for the uninsured ($2.2 billion); food assistance programs such as food stamps, WIC, and free school lunches ($1.9 billion); the federal prison and court systems ($1.6 billion); and federal aid to schools ($1.4 billion).
With nearly two-thirds of illegal aliens lacking a high school degree, the primary reason they create a fiscal deficit is their low education levels and resulting low incomes and tax payments, not their legal status or heavy use of most social services.
On average, the costs that illegal households impose on federal coffers are less than half that of other households, but their tax payments are only one-fourth that of other households.
Many of the costs associated with illegals are due to their American-born children, who are awarded U.S. citizenship at birth. Thus, greater efforts at barring illegals from federal programs will not reduce costs because their citizen children can continue to access them.
If illegal aliens were given amnesty and began to pay taxes and use services like households headed by legal immigrants with the same education levels, the estimated annual net fiscal deficit would increase from $2,700 per household to nearly $7,700, for a total net cost of $29 billion.
Costs increase dramatically because unskilled immigrants with legal status -- what most illegal aliens would become -- can access government programs, but still tend to make very modest tax payments.
Although legalization would increase average tax payments by 77 percent, average costs would rise by 118 percent.
The fact that legal immigrants with few years of schooling are a large fiscal drain does not mean that legal immigrants overall are a net drain -- many legal immigrants are highly skilled.
The vast majority of illegals hold jobs. Thus the fiscal deficit they create for the federal government is not the result of an unwillingness to work.
The results of this study are consistent with a 1997 study by the National Research Council, which also found that immigrants' education level is a key determinant of their fiscal impact.
http://www.cis.org/articles/2004/fiscalexec.html
I am having a tough time finding the specific study that showed that change in cost/benefits of illegal immigrants essentially vs their children. It showed there was a net cost for first generation HOWEVER the children and beyond did well enough that they nearly negated the cost of their parents by the time they were 45 or so and were a net positive.
Yeah just have to pull a wiki:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second-generation_immigrants_in_the_United_States
Which generally supports my statement above. Mostly in part they become better educated and their earnings go up and contribute to federal taxes as well.