David Brancaccio

Fewer immigrants, according to this new analysis, hurt the fiscal health of the U.S.

The source of this new study is notable, the Cato Institute, a think tank that often aligns with conservative economic policies but has a consistently libertarian focus.

A co-author of the study is David Beer, director of immigration studies at Cato.

Good morning.

Broad brush, the presence of immigrants helps ease the federal budget deficit?

Now, immigrants is a huge class of people who moved here.

What happens if the question is do undocumented immigrants, people in the US without permission illegally, does that calculation hold up?

And unless a person is being paid, quote, under the table, they may be paying into those systems.

David, help me understand.

There was a I remember a line in the report that if immigrant workers were earning lower wages per hour, they can still pay more in taxes than the average person.

Now, I mean, I saw that line in the paper.

Even by this conservative analysis, immigrants may have already prevented a fiscal crisis.

Can we move that forward?

Can we extrapolate from that finding that an America with stricter immigration policies, the ones now in place, does that suggest the fiscal health of the country will get worse?

David Beer, Director of Immigration Studies at the Cato Institute.

Thank you very much.

And in Los Angeles, I'm David Brancaccio.

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