American employers can stop illegal immigration

Steve Chapman claims that America can't realistically stop illegal immigration. Once again a conservative expresses the opinion that only government can solve problems, and since government can't solve the illegal immigration problem, the problem is unsolvable. This is a crock, because its fundamental assumption is wrong - that the only possible solution to verify immigration status is dependent on government.

Hardliners think the way to get rid of illegal immigrants is to get rid of the jobs they fill. In the Senate bill endorsed by President Bush, advocates of tougher enforcement got a new system for employers to verify that their workers are entitled to be here. Anyone newly hired (and, in time, anyone with a job) would have to pass a check of federal databases.

It's a fine idea in theory, but note that it requires government authorization for every employment decision in a large, dynamic economy, an approach that is just slightly at odds with the free market. It also presumes a level of efficiency that conservatives do not usually expect of government.

It's a terrible idea in theory and would be worse in practice. This is how big-government conservatives and big-government liberals destroy America. Both liberals and conservatives mistake America for the federal government. America was made great by its people, not the government, and the American people can solve this problem. The federal government can't stop illegal immigration, but the American people can.

American employers are more than capable of effectively identifying the citizenship of their prospective employees. We don't need any special ID card. We don't need any big-government plan. All we need to do is provide employers and incentive to verify citizenship of their employees, and that incentive is already built into existing law - send employers who don't verify citizenship to jail.

Mr. Chapman is right that free market forces drive American employers to hire illegal aliens at lower wages than Americans will take for the same work. In the absence of any penalty for hiring illegal aliens, we can't stop the southern invasion. No fence will stop it. Militarization of the border won't stop it.

But when employers are faced with the prospect of going to jail, as proscribed by law, for hiring illegal aliens, they will stop hiring them. They will review the IDs and citizenship of their employees and they will thoroughly check the citizenship documents of prospective employees. Currently employed illegal immigrants will lose their jobs, and they will be unable to find new jobs. With no market incentive for being in America, illegal immigrants will go home and work to build the economies of their own countries and Americans and legal immigrants will take the open jobs at fair market wages.

There will still be a problem with counterfeit documents, but the vast majority of illegal immigrants don't buy counterfeit documents. They don't need to because our government refuses to enforce the law against employers. Our government wants illegal aliens to provide labor at sub-market prices.

The government is the problem. The people are the solution. All we need to do is enforce existing laws. By having employers take the jobs for illegal aliens off the market, the illegal alien invasion will be reduced to a manageable amount for existing authorities to handle. Hard-core illegal aliens who won't leave will be caught and deported. Counterfeiters, having a greatly reduced market and comparably reduced funds, will be arrested and convicted.