The Erickson Tribune recently asked our readers what some of their biggest concerns are. Not surprisingly, immigration was a huge issue for our readers. Many were adamantly against foreign-born workers coming into the country.

Question: Can this country survive the coming age wave without immigration?

Now, before I start getting waves of hate mail, let me start off by stating I am not an expert on this matter and my mind remains open on this topic. I’d be very interested in your thoughts because I am still trying to formulate a position. In other words, I’m trying to educate myself on the subject.

My first thought is that we MUST tighten our security measures and admission standards. Illegal entry into our country cannot be rewarded. If you are working in this country, you must be a contributing member (meaning you’re paying your fair share of taxes). In addition to the financial ramifications of illegal aliens, we now have to worry about the security issues in an age of terrorism.

That being said, we face some serious challenges in the near future. The U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics projects that by 2010 our economy will support 168 million jobs, but the workforce will only have 158 million workers to fill those jobs. Therefore, a shortfall of 10 million is predicted (R. E. Herman, T. G. Olivo, and J. L. Gioia. Impending Crisis: Too Many Jobs, Too Few People, Oakhill Press, Winchester, VA., 2002).

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the U.S. birthrate has fallen to about a breakeven level (from 3.3 births per couple in 1960 to 2.2 in 2000), while at the same time the dependency level of our growing population of aging citizens is increasing. By dependency, I mean that as we age we require more services: health care, maintenance, etc. In other words, who will mow my lawn or take care of me when I have Alzheimer’s?

“The soaring number of elderly people will affect the dependency ratio, which describes the impact of a nonworking population on a working population. In the United States, where there will be 246 elderly people for every 1,000 workers in 2010, there are projected to be 411 elderly per 1,000 workers in 2030.”

-D’Vera Cohn,
The Divergent Paths of Baby Boomers and Immigrants
Click Here for the article

What makes the issue even more serious is that so many of us are choosing to retire at 62 (60%) rather than 65, robbing our economy of valuable workers and experience. In fact, in my humble opinion, we would be less dependent on immigration if our economy was better equipped to allow us to work more flexible hours, well into our late 70s/early 80s . . . but that’s an issue for another day.

Thoughts?

Unrelated trivia: Two of the top search terms on Google and Yahoo! are social networking sites: http://www.myspace.com/ and http://www.bebo.com/. Are computers replacing human interaction?

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