Social Security and immigration

IMMIGRATION AND SOCIAL SECURITY

In general, researchers conclude that increases in immigration will somewhat improve the financial status of Social Security and that decreases in immigration will worsen it. According to the chief actuary of Social Security, “Provisions that will increase net immigration tend to improve the financial status of the [Social Security] program both because of the immigrants themselves and their children. This effect is much like the effect of increased birth rates, which also have positive effects of the financial status of the program.”[6] Adding more young workers to the labor force, whether through higher birth rates or more immigration, improves the outlook for Social Security because the resulting increase in payroll tax collections occurs relatively soon, while Social Security benefit outlays grow only in the more distant future. Social Security’s trustees estimate that an increase in net immigration of 300,000 persons a year would eliminate about one-tenth of Social Security’s 75-year deficit.[7] The Congressional Budget Office also finds that increases in immigration generally improve Social Security’s finances.[8]

The presence of unauthorized (undocumented) workers in the United States also has a positive effect on the financial status of Social Security. The earnings of unauthorized workers are less likely to be reported for tax purposes than the earnings of the rest of the population and even less likely to result in future benefits, according to Social Security’s chief actuary. Although the magnitudes cannot be precisely determined, the actuary has estimated that unauthorized immigrants paid as much as $13 billion in Social Security payroll taxes in 2007. About $1 billion in benefit payments were made based on unauthorized work (for example, survivor benefits paid to U.S. citizens who were dependents of deceased individuals who had made payments into the Social Security system while performing unauthorized work). Thus, undocumented immigrants improved Social Security’s cash flow by an estimated $12 billion in 2007.[9]

For any "free market" advocates the free flow of labor should be top priority... also you "the government is going broke" types. Lynn Westmoreland didn't get the memo... for all the "free market" grandstanding he does...