Doyle Wants Taxpayers to Subsidize Tuition of Illegal Aliens
For the fourth straight budget, Gov. Jim Doyle has included a provision that would allow illegal immigrants who graduate from Wisconsin high schools to pay in-state tuition at University of Wisconsin institutions.
The state Legislature has stripped the item out of each budget in the past, but with a Democratic majority in both houses, advocates are hopeful it will be successful this time.
But even some Democrats say the measure faces serious problems, including the potential to conflict with a 1996 federal law. That law prohibits states from providing any higher education benefit based on residency to illegal immigrants unless they provide the same benefit to other U.S. citizens, regardless of where they live.
That could mean a student from, for instance, Montana, would pay in-state tuition at UW-Madison, said Rep. Kim Hixson, D-Whitewater, chairman of the committee on colleges and universities.
I know people on both sides love to pretend that this is a clean and simple issue, but unfortunately it’s not. I think the article is smart to mention a possible conflict with federal law. I think there are also two other points that are important to consider.
First is that these children are almost always not in control of the decisionmaking apparatus that brings them to the United States. They are not choosing to break the law. Many of them probably don’t even know that what their parents are doing is illegal when the act occurs. The kid is a victim of his/her situation even if s/he benefits greatly from being here.
The second, more important issue is that whether we like it or not, every one of us knows that the federal government has little to no interest in engaging productive alien families in deportation proceedings. It’s been that way under Republican administrations and it’s been that way under Democratic administrations. So I know some conservatives love to just say “well, let’s deport ‘em” but the stone-cold reality is that’s not going to happen. It never has and it likely never will. So the reality (a difficult word for ideologues to comprehend sometimes) is that we’re stuck with these alien kids regardless of how we feel about them.
At that point, the question is whether we wish to doom some of their best and brightest to a lifetime of unskilled, less productive labor because they can’t afford to pay for higher education out of pocket and most banks won’t give them loans based on their family’s credit history. Odds are they’ll stay in Wisconsin either way. Or would we collectively be better off if these kids could go to college, thereby improving their own earning potential and possibly helping their families to be less dependent on government programs that may otherwise be helping them?
I know some like to gripe about how these kids will displace native-born Wisconsinites. My answer to those people is that maybe those kids should study a little harder then. A little competition never hurt anyone. It is, however, a great boogeyman for parents to break out when their entirely unremarkable and average son or daughter can’t get into UW-Madison.
Posted by Recess Supervisor on March 22, 2009 at 1244 hrs
I appreciate the argument that they will be here anyway, so we might as well educate them. But I look at it more from the point of the taxpayer. Taxpayers already pay a fortune to educate and subsidize many of these kids up until the time they are 18. That is a social obligation that we have taken on as a society.
College is different. We haven’t all agreed that college is either a right or an obligation of the greater society. We subsidize some kids, but there are financial prerequisites to receiving funds and performance obligations on the part of the student to remain in the school. It’s substantially different from K-12.
The truth is that not everyone needs a college education to be successful. In fact, many people are quite successful in the trade or technical schools or… with no higher education at all. A subsidized college education is not a right - it is a privilege - and most taxpayers aren’t too keen on giving it to those who aren’t supposed to be here in the first place.
For the record, I also support dropping in state tuition and such for certain brands of criminals and malcontents. The lack of in state tuition does not put a college education out of reach. It merely makes them pay the full burden of it. There should be some deterrents to people coming here illegally. Perhaps if they think of the cost of education for their children, some of these parents will trouble themselves with going through the process to become legal Americans.
Posted by Owen on March 22, 2009 at 1430 hrs
Let me get this straight, Owen, we let them go through K-12 and then they can’t go any further? Why do you tolerate them attending K-12? This seems inconsistent on your part? Why the selective outrage?
This isn’t an easy issue to settle, IMO.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 22, 2009 at 1549 hrs
Nobody said it was easy.
It’s not that they can’t go any further past K-12. It’s that the taxpayers shouldn’t subsidize them past K-12. And yes, if I had my druthers, I would deport them when we discovered that they were illegal even if they were in K-12. But at this point, the schools aren’t set up to check for residency. The application process for college provides this mechanism.
In this case, I would rather focus on stopping the further spread of illegal immigrants being subsidized by the taxpayers. Then maybe we can focus on removing the existing subsidies.
Posted by Owen on March 22, 2009 at 1609 hrs
Your arguments make no sense whatsoever. K-12 is “subsidized” to a far greater extent than college. K-12 education is almost 100% taxpayer subsidized as there is no tuition component, only small payments for incidentals.
What sense does it make to let illegal immigrant children take up space in public school classes for 12+ years? Nip the problem in the bud!
The problem is that once these people have spent up to 12 (or more years) in K-12 education, what’s the rationale for telling them that they can’t get the education which will keep them off the welfare rolls?
Remember that a high school graduate is no longer guaranteed the right to attend college. Even places like Superior and Parkside have some standards.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 22, 2009 at 2121 hrs
RO. You are missing the point. Right now we DON’T give illegal aliens in-state tuition. Not on purpose, anyway. Doyle wants to change that and ADD the subsidy. K-12 is already subsidized.
As I said, I would deport them if we discovered them in K-12, thus eliminating the need to pay for their education, but that’s not something that’s on the table right now. Adding college subsidies is. That’s why we’re discussing it.
As for high school grads not being worth as much as they once were, that’s a problem with K-12 education. It’s not inevitable. We have chosen to devalue a high school diploma.
Posted by Owen on March 22, 2009 at 2137 hrs
I’m inclined to agree with both of you in part.
Owen’s certainly right in that a high school diploma is pretty worthless these days, and part of that is our own fault for expecting so little of high school students now. I’m not sure that kids are necessarily smarter or dumber than they were a generation or two ago, but I do think that K-12 education has failed to keep pace with the educational demands of society as a whole. That’s a problem.
At the same time, our system of higher education isn’t exactly teeming with students who are undocumented, and I’m guessing that changing this policy won’t have much of an impact on that. If we’re simply swapping one in-state student for another, there’s no actual cost to the state. For me, merit is more important than the money. I’d be happy to give in-state tuition to any kid graduating from a Wisconsin high school simply because I think in the long run, it makes the most sense for us economically to cultivate talent no matter who possesses it.
Then again, if you were to ask me if I’d rather deport the hard-working but undocumented Latino day laborers in New Orleans or the African-Americans who do nothing all day and then mug the day laborers when they get dropped off, I’d much rather deport our own citizens, thank you very much. A lot of these immigrants contribute more positively to our society than do our own citizens. If you’re here with your family, you study, you work hard in school and get good grades, I don’t have any problem giving you the same playing field as any other student in the state. I guess that in this particular situation, I don’t feel any particular loyalty based on citizenship. But that’s just me, of course.
Posted by Recess Supervisor on March 23, 2009 at 0022 hrs
Number 1, I would like to know more of the actual legislation.
If the legislation states that any kid with a Wisconsin diploma is eligible with no restrictions, regardless of how much time they spent here, etc. I am against it. I know a Latino family who took in a high school aged cousin from Chicago of illegal immigrants. The family he now stays with is legal, but he spent less than a year in Wisconsin. He is currently at MATC, but I don’t know if he is paying in-state tuition or not. he is a good kid and I like him, but I see no reason he can’t assume the school debt his station gives him. I know he has student loans so those, at least, are available to illegals.Number 2, I would like to know exactly how much of a subsidy in-state tuition is.
If in-state tuition only pays for half of all debt the school accrues for that student, but out of state tuition pays for the whole thing, you could argue he is paying something back for his family’s illegality. Anyone with the talent to graduate a decent college has the ability to assume that responsibility. Why shouldn’t he assume that debt as opposed to the taxpayer (the other ‘person’ who has the ability)?RS is right that it is not the fault of the kid. However, what is the rationale of rewarding the breaking of the law? You go through the system, you get rights and obligations. Illegal immigrants should not only get the rights in any situation. The truly best and brightest do not settle for a pizza delivery job as their life work, they just don’t.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 23, 2009 at 1058 hrs
Build the fence - start the deportations. Illegal aliens are just what the first word says - ILLEGAL.
Get them all out of here.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 23, 2009 at 1136 hrs
Why justify via the K-12 subsidy? Simply end that as well. What nuance of the word illegal eludes Diamond Jim?
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on March 23, 2009 at 1209 hrs
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Posted by student loan information on March 24, 2009 at 0610 hrs
This was such an enjoyable discussion until #9. Let’s all note how quickly the discussion deteriorated right about there. I knew the angry white rage would find us eventually.
Thanks to RO, Owen, and TUERQAS for your thoughts.
Posted by Recess Supervisor on March 24, 2009 at 0920 hrs
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