Refugee Resettlement Is a Loss for Citizens

“A new study of foreign-born refugees who live in Tennessee has found they contributed almost twice as much in tax revenues as the consumed in state-funded services in the past two decades.” – The Tennessean, 10/13/13

Fact Check: To determine the fiscal impact of refugee resettlement programs on the state of Tennessee, a committee of the state legislature asked its Fiscal Review staff to do a study. The resulting study claimed that refugees paid two times more in taxes than benefits they received.

This conclusion, said Don Barnett, an authority on refugee resettlement, was “a completely innumerate and illogical financial analysis.” Writing a rebuttal to the report in The Tennessean, Barnett observed that the study only included English Language Learning (ELL) and TennCare, which were not the only the social service programs that Tennessee provides. Also the study assumed, inaccurately, that refugees on average have the same incomes and pay as much in taxes as average Tennesseans.

As Barnett observes, available data show that refugees are much more likely than native-born Americans to be unemployed, working at lower-wage jobs when they are employed, and significantly more dependent on public assistance.

This study, it seems, is simply another attempt to hide the costs of the refugee resettlement program. The program, which operates across the nation, is one based on dishonesty and practices that approach outright fraud.

Many of the refugees aren’t true refugees, traditionally defined as people facing persecution from their governments. “Refugees” who come to the U.S. quite commonly are people who simply want more economic opportunities than they can find in their home countries.

Often the religious groups and other organizations that sponsor refugees are using the system to make money. The federal government provides them payment per refugee. Then after the refugees come, these sponsors leave them to be supported by public assistance. In effect, the sponsors provide charity with taxpayers’ money.

Another liability with the refugee resettlement program is that it rarely considers the divisive impact that mass resettlement has on the wellbeing and cohesion of American communities. Its promoters simply ignore the problems and claim that the communities are benefit from the “enriching diversity.”

For more detailed information about the harm brought about by this program as it now operates, a good source is a recent issue of The Social Contract magazine, entitled “The Refugee Racket.” To access it online, click on the following link: View online

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here