Research Proposal +Bibliography

Samantha Iellimo

201- College

Professor Goeller

October 15, 2013

Working Title: The DREAM Act and American College Students

Topic

The DREAM Act is a piece of immigration reform legislation first introduced in 2001 that aims to aid illegal minors in achieving legal status through higher education. The DREAM Act, which stands for Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors offers a path to American citizenship for students who were most likely brought to the United States as children and have known no other home. The United States is the only country they have ever known, and sometimes they are unaware of their illegal status until they attempt to apply for a college education. The DREAM Act allows these minors to be eligible for federal and state financial aid, and if two years of higher education or military service is completed, they are eligible for American citizenship.  This piece of legislation has been talked about for many years in the political arena, but it has not been passed yet because of the many who oppose it based on its’ unfairness to American college students. The goal of my research paper is to prove how the DREAM Act will not negatively impact American college students economically and will even offer positive consequences.  I will offer counter-arguments that include the use of privatization facts for the possible negative impacts of the Act, as well as positive impacts that will result from alien minors receiving higher education.

Research Question

How will the DREAM Act negatively and positively impact American college students’ economic futures?

The Opposition

When Alabama’s unemployment rate soared above the National Average to ten percent, Republican Governor Robert Bentley signed a law that would attack this problem and essentially aim to create more jobs for legal Alabama residents. According to Amanda Beadle at ThinkProgress.org, the law, passed in June of 2011 and deemed “the nation’s harshest immigration law” makes it  “illegal to even live as an undocumented immigrant in Alabama” by announcing it unlawful for illegal immigrants to participate in a business transaction with the state (Beadle 2).For those like Alabama Governor Robert Bentley, whose law “has become a point of pride of some Alabama Republicans” (Beadle 1), it seems that the general opinion of his supporters is that illegal immigration has a negative impact on the United States’ job market and ultimately harms citizen workers. According to Jennifer D. Williams, “U.S. jobs continue to be viewed as the chief attraction for illegal aliens” (Williams 29). In her 1990 article, “Illegal Immigration: the Effects on Native Born Workers”, Linda Levine introduces the “displacement effect”, which is used to describe a negative consequence of illegal immigration on American, or “native” workers. The “displacement effect” illustrates that because illegals accept less money for lower skilled jobs, workers wages become lower, and therefore “native-born workers will find other activities to be more attractive”. Levine explains that as a result, “they leave the labor force and employment among the native-born population, as noted above, declines”.  As American workers leave and lose their jobs to workers that accept lower pay and therefore cost the employer less money, “the initial employment of foreign-born workers expands as they assume a portion of the jobs formerly held by native-born workers” (Levine 51). The theory affirms that American workers are therefore “displaced” and thereby explains why Republicans believe that illegal aliens in our job market are a negative influence.

In Support of the DREAM Act

In her article, Linda Levine plainly states that, “immigrants affect the private economy in their role as workers” (Levine 50), and as I uncovered more information it became clear that illegals actually do have a positive effect on the job market by causing job growth, which will actually aid American college students. To explain this belief, Ramanujan Nadadur utilizes his 2009 article titled, “Illegal Immigration: A positive Economic Contribution to the United States”, to assert the idea that “illegal immigrants perform jobs that no US worker will fill” and he expands on this notion by introducing the “dual labor market theory” (Nadadur 1041-1042). According to Nadadur, the theory suggests that the United States labor market consists of two parts: the skilled primary sector and the unskilled secondary sector. The former is characterized by “skilled work, employment stability, the presence of job ladders, effective trade unions and efficient management”. As for the second sector, it contrarily consists of  “low or unskilled work or service jobs, linked by the fact that they are characterized by low earnings, job impermanence and low returns on education” (Nadadur 1041).  Since most Native American workers seek jobs in the first sector where the conditions are more favorable, it seems obvious that a shortage is created in the secondary sector. Illegal immigrants, who employers are forced to turn to, then fill this shortage of lower waged manual jobs. Nadadur summarizes that “in short, there are more jobs in the secondary sector than there are native workers to fill those jobs”, and therefore by taking them, illegal immigrants benefit the job market.

Conclusion

In my research paper, I will explore these topics further and provide further arguments to support the passing of the DREAM Act. I believe that the law will actually benefit college students in the long run and is not an unfair law. I believe that any arguments against the DREAM Act, stating negative impact, can be disputed. Though there is the argument that it could cause an increase in costs for American students, privatization is creating more of a negative impact on the wallets of students. The DREAM Act is a piece of legislation that will keep us moving forward.

Bibliography

Conlan, Mark Gabrish. "The Effects of Illegal Immigration: An Overview." Print. Rpt. in

            Illegal Immigration. Ed. William Barbour. San Diego: Greenhaven, 1994. 67-71.

            Print.

 "Governor Brown Signs Second Half Of California Dream Act.” Fox News – Breaking

 News Updates | Latest News Headlines | Photos & News Videos. 08 Oct. 2011.

Web. 21 Oct. 2011

Horwedel, Dina M. "For Illegal Students, an Uncertain Future." Diverse: Issues in Higher

            Education 23.6 (2006): 22-26. Academic OneFile. Web. 05 Nov. 2011.

Levine, Linda. "Immigration: The Effects on Native-Born Workers." Print. Rpt. in

            Politics of Immigration. Ed. A.M.      Babkina. New York: Nova Science. Print.
Motomura, Hiroshi, Making Legal: The Dream Act, Birthright Citizenship, and Broad-Scale
            Legalization (January 15, 2013). 16 Lewis & Clark Law Review 1127-48 (2012); UCLA
            School of Law Research Paper No. 13-01.

Ramanujan Nadadur (2009): Illegal Immigration: A Positive Economic Contribution to

 the United States, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 35:6, 1037-1052

Williams, Jennifer D. "Immigration: Recent Estimates of the U.S. Illegal Alien

            Population." Print. Rpt. in Politics of Immigration. Ed. A.M. Babkina. New York:

            Nova Science.