By Linda chavez and John J. Miller.

Reprinted from the May 1996 Reader's Digest.

Americans like immigrants as individuals-the decent, hardworking Korean grocer on the corner, the Russian computer programmer who lives down the street or the Filipino nurse who works at the local hospital. But as a nation we don’t seem to think much of immigration in general.

In a 1994 Newsweek survey, for example, half the public agreed that "immigrants are a burden because they take our jobs, housing and health care." Passions run high. "We are flooding areas of the country with millions of uneducated immigrants," complained one Wall Street Journal reader. They "take over, impose their culture and don’t even try to assimilate."

Everyone agrees that we must police our borders against illegal immigrants. But some, including Presidential candidate Pat Buchanan, want to declare a moratorium on all immigration. Sen. Alan Simpson (R., Wyo.) has sponsored a bill that would reduce the number of legally admitted non-refugee immigrants from 675,000annually to 540,000.

Yet in sharp contrast to the prevailing rhetoric that feeds on the misinformation, the evidence shows that the problems attributed to immigration are false or greatly exaggerated. In reality, today’s immigrants contribute positively, in much the same way our own ancestors did. We would only hurt ourselves by shutting the door in their faces. It’s time to debunk the myths that are clouding our public debate and policy.

Myth: Today’s immigrants are less educated than in the past.

In fact, the educational level of immigrants has been increasing, not decreasing. About one-third of all new immigrants in 1960 had less than eight years of schooling. In the past decade, that proportion has dropped one-quarter. The percentage of immigrants with a college education and with advanced degrees has been increasing too. In the 1980’s, for example, there were about 11,000 foreign-born engineers and scientists here. By 1992 that number had doubled.

An astonishing 40 percent of engineering doctorates at American universities in 1993 went to foreign-born professionals, who have become a vital force in the high-technology sectors critical to our future-telecommunications, biotechnology, chemicals and computers.

"How important are immigrants to my company?" asks T.J. Rodgers, president and CEO of Cypress Semiconductor, a manufacturer of high-performance computer chips in San Jose, Calif. "We would be out of business without them." In the research and development offices of the firm, pins on the world map represents employees places of birth. Almost half lie outside American borders. Home countries include China, Ghana, India, Panama, the Philippines, Russia, Taiwan and Zimbabwe.

This is true of countless firms in America’s computer industry. At giant Intel, maker of the Pentium processor use in millions of home computers, many of the people working on the Santa Clara-based company’s top projects are immigrants. Take Indian-born Ryan Manepally. He co-developed the concept for a computer-to-computer video-conferencing product that would allow, for instance doctors in different states to discuss X rays simultaneously. Intel CEO Andy Grove is from Hungary, and at least six of the company’s 29 corporate vice presidents are also immigrants.

"Without immigrants, we would have to send work overseas," notes Anant Agrawal, Indian-born vice president of engineering at Sun Microsystems, Inc., a leading designer and manufacturer of workstations used for commercial and technical computing. "That certainly would not help the American economy."

Myth: Immigrants steal jobs from Americans.

Behind this myth, notes economists Julian Simon, is a basic fallacy: that the number of jobs is finite, and the more that immigrants occupy, the fewer there are for others. Numerous studies dispute this myth. For instance, the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution in Arlington, VA., found that between 1960 and 1991, the ten states with the highest immigration presence had a lower unemployment rate than the ten states with the lowest immigrant presence. Blacks-often portrayed as economic victims of immigration-were found to earn more when they live in cities with large immigrant populations than they do in cities with small ones.

Immigrants, notes Simon in a resent Cato Institute report on immigration, "make new jobs by spending their earnings on the output of other workers." What’s more, less skilled immigrants take work Americans shun. IBP, Inc., near Garden City, Kan., operates the world’s largest meat-packing plant. Workers at IBP are reasonably paid-$7 to $10.35 per hour. Yet most of the workers on the "kill floor" there and at a nearby competitor, Monfort, are from Mexico or Southeast Asia. Meat-packing is the most hazardous job in the United States. Workers make several cuts on carcass every few seconds for eight hours a day, six days a week. The kill floors can get wet with water and blood, and even the most experienced worker can fall or get cut. "There are jobs that native-born Americans simply won’t do," says Steve Orozco, a program specialist at Job Service Center, a state agency in Garden City. "Meat-packing is one them."

The 40 workers at the Dalma Dress Manufacturing Company in New York City are all foreign-born. "Hardly any Americans apply for a job here," says Tonia Sylla from Liberia, an 11-year veteran. "Even when they so, they don’t last long." Says Dalma’s owner, Armand DiPalma, "Immigrants are the only labor pool we have."

Half of the 800,000 garment workers in the United States are immigrants, part of a $120-billion industry. If they were not doing work, the jobs would probably move overseas. "Every time you see a Made in the USA’ label on a piece of clothing," says Bruce Herman of the Garment Industry Development Corporation, "chances are you can thank an immigrant."

Myth: Immigrants are welfare moochers.

Because immigrants admitted as refugees are guaranteed cash and medical assistance by federal law, the proportion of foreign-born on welfare is 6.6 percent, versus 4.9 percent of native-born. However, only 5.1 percent of non-refugee working-age immigrants-the vast majority of legally admitted foreign-born-receive welfare benefits, compared with 5.3 percent of working age native-born.

In reality, the work ethic of today’s immigrants is just as strong as that as that of the Irish, Italians and Poles of yesteryear. According to the 1990 census, foreign-born males have a 77 percent labor-force participation rate, compared with 74 percent for native-born Americans. Hispanics have the highest rate of any group, 83 percent.

No doubt, too, many immigrants receive government benefits. However, the problem is not the immigrants but our overgenerous welfare state. California, for example burdened as it is by federally mandated programs, it is also laden with state-sponsored aid programs. The strain on the taxpayers boiled over in 1994 when Proposition 187, a ballot measure that denies benefits to illegal immigrants, passed by a huge margin.

Texas, on the other hand, spends less on welfare. It has taken in millions of immigrants in recent years without the public backlash. Gov. George W. Bush opposes laws modeled on Proposition 187, which have gone nowhere in the Texas legislature.

"Immigrants have the determination to succeed," declares Patricia Charlton, who arrived penniless from Jamaica in 1981 and started work at McDonald’s in Manhattan. She worked her way up, eventually being named a regional manager of the year. She’s married, owns a house and has a child in private school.

Like Charlton, immigrants often start on the lowest rungs of the economic ladder and move up. Typically, their household income reach parity with the native-born after about ten years, according to census figures. "Often immigrant-owned businesses invest in inner cities where rents are cheap, becoming a revitalizing force there," says Stephen N. Solarsh, a New York City business and real-estate advisor to many immigrant owned businesses. Korean immigrant Kim Suk Su, for example, currently owns property in some of the worst areas in Brooklyn, N.Y. Each was vacant when he bought it, but today most are back on the tax rolls.

Koreans Choi Duckchun and his wife, Hea Su, work seven days a week in their New York delicatessen, paying a $15,800 monthly rent and a $10,000 monthly payroll, while trying to save enough to eventually send their three children to college. It’s a struggle, and crime is a problem. Nevertheless their hard work pays off. "In Korea, money and politics determine everything," Choi says. "Here it’s the land of opportunity."

There is one final irony in the charge that immigrants are welfare moochers. Most immigrants arrive in their prime working years, their late 20s. "The payroll taxes of these young immigrants," notes economists Simon, "help underwrite the Social Security checks of America’s senior citizens."

Myth: Immigrants don’t want to assimilate.

Language is the key issue for assimilation, and self-interest impels most foreign-born to learn ours quickly-unless government gets in the way. "I didn’t speak any English when I came here in 1984," says Miguel Angel Rivera, who lives in Baltimore. "I didn’t need to because I was washing dishes and busing tables." Then the Salvadoran decided to become a waiter. "I started working the floor and picked up English from the customers," he says. Today Rivera is fluent. He also owns and operates Baltimore’s Restaurante San Luis, which specializes in Chinese and Salvadorian cuisine. "I have no problem communicating with any of the customers," he says.

Although many immigrants don’t speak a word of English when they arrive here, most recognize that learning it is the key to their economic success. A study of Southeast Asian refugees in Houston found that fluent English speakers earned almost three times as much money as those who only spoke a few words.

Progress might even be faster among the young were it not for bilingual education, which can reinforce the native tongue and delay the learning of English for years. Failed policies such as bilingual education and multicultural curricula are not being demanded by Mexican laborers or Chinese waiters. Instead they are being rammed down immigrants’ throats by federal, state and local governments, at the behest of native-born political activists and bureaucrats.

Culturally, immigrants believe in the melting pot and want to join the mainstream. Ninety percent of Hispanics are "proud" or "very proud" of the United States, according to recent Latino National Political Survey. Greg Gourley teaches citizenship classes at several Seattle-area community colleges. To become citizens, immigrants must speak, read and write in English, and pass an exam about U.S. history and government. The test is not easy. "If they didn’t want to be Americans, they wouldn’t be here," Gourley says. "We’ve got a waiting list a mile long."

Not every politician has jumped in the anti-immigration bandwagon. Many, including House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R., Texas), Sen. Joe Liberman (D., Conn.), and Gov. George Pataki (R., N.Y.), see through the myths, and understand that the United States gains when the legal immigrants arrive. As Sen. Spencer Abraham (R., Mich.) says, "We should not shut the door to people yearning to be free and to build a better life for themselves and their families."