The Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas has published a new research paper that shows shocking findings about the effects of illegal immigration on the housing market. The paper provided the first systematic empirical analysis of the economic effects of the Biden administration’s open borders policies.
New administrative microdata showed illegal immigration caused a 30% increase in housing prices and a 20% increase in rent prices. Illegal aliens acted as a market shock, raising prices by reducing the supply of housing, with little to no increase in the housing supply working to balance the demand increase. As millions of illegals entered the country under the Biden administration, they increased demand for already-limited housing. Many also received taxpayer-funded assistance, putting additional pressure on the market. The result was greater housing scarcity and higher rents and home prices.
The research also found that illegal immigration acted as a positive labor supply shock, meaning that the illegal immigrants increased the number of people available to hire. This, of course, benefited the corporations hiring them, but overall hurt American workers by decreasing wages.
The empirical data in the paper showed that the employment growth caused by illegal immigration reduced labor income per capita, yet caused no noticeable change in local wages. This means that illegal aliens are taking many jobs for far less pay than American citizens.
In economics, the less supply there is of something, the higher the price is for it. This principle applies to markets for physical goods, but also to markets for services, such as labor. Thus, when we have more people seeking employment, wages decrease because there is less of a demand for them. When workers are few, wages go up as employers compete with each other to keep their employees from quitting and moving to a job that pays more.
The analysis of illegal immigration conducted by the Federal Reserve here conclusively supports the conclusion that illegal immigration causes extremely negative economic effects for working-class Americans. In the housing market, they raise prices for consumers. In the labor market, they prevent wage growth. The combined effects work to impoverish Americans over time.
Another important aspect to consider with regards to this study is that it only accounts for the effects of illegal immigration, not the effects of legal immigrants such as H-1B workers. If both legal and illegal immigration were analyzed together, the results would likely be even more overwhelming.
It is inescapably evident from this data that illegal immigration has harmed every single American. The policies that Texans for Strong Borders has advocated for were right the whole time, and now there are concrete numbers to back it up. While this is an intellectual victory over the Left and their lie that immigration benefits Americans, we must not celebrate this. Our state and our country are desperately suffering from the strain of illegal immigration, and our response should be to fight harder for policies like the Strong Borders Priorities that would protect us from the economic devastation caused by unchecked immigration.