Quite a few Americans are worried about the effect of President Trump’s immigration policy on our nation’s economy. “A significant portion of our industry relies on immigrant labor[.] … When there are sudden crackdowns or raids, it slows timelines, drives up costs, and makes it harder to plan ahead,” a former Democrat congressman and building executive told The Washington Post last week. “[F]ewer immigrants could take a hit to the economy, prompting labor shortages and slowing economic growth,” a USA Today op-ed warned earlier this month.
Whether or not that’s true, it’s obvious that a dramatic decline in illegal immigrant labor — something that as yet has not happened — would affect many Americans’ lives and pocketbooks. But is that necessarily a bad thing? Perhaps becoming less reliant on illegal labor would make Americans more self-reliant, more engaged with their communities, and even happier and more fulfilled.
How Illegal Immigration Affects Middle-Class Suburban Lifestyles
In Northern Virginia, where I live and grew up, there are thousands of illegal immigrants. A 2019 study estimated that statewide, a quarter of a million residents are illegal. As evidenced by their daily lounging around Home Depot, Lowe’s, and various gas stations, many of them seek employment as day laborers for contractors or in construction, though many others work in agriculture, landscaping, restaurant work, or domestic services. Undoubtedly, illegal immigrants influence the price of how much Virginians spend on various home repairs or maintenance, and even food, given that they work for sub-market wages.
Of course, the same can be said in cities and communities across the country. Some estimate more than 18 million illegal immigrants in the United States today, depressing wages for lower-income native-born Americans by as much as 7 percent, and, as a recent Federalist article described, running many American-run businesses into the ground. Yet that is a hidden social and economic cost for urban and suburban elites who’ve come to depend on that labor to support a lifestyle they’ve come to expect as normal, perhaps even their right.
A Typical Weekend in Northern Virginia
This was made abundantly clear to me on a recent Saturday morning in Virginia. After an early breakfast, my oldest son and I got to work on the yard. A good part of an oak tree had come down during a recent storm, so my son dragged branches off the lawn and sawed them into pieces for firewood for the winter. I started mowing, which takes about two and a half hours with a push mower (it’s great exercise). While we worked, neighbors casually walked by in pajamas or yoga pants with their dogs. Others jogged by, wearing the latest athletic wear and hydration packs, presumably training for their next half-marathon.
By the time we finished the yard, it was time for a hurried lunch and then to take my son to baseball practice, where, once again, parents in designer athletic wear lounged on bleachers, sipping coffees and talking about the latest concerts they attended and their summer vacation plans. I, in turn, ran off to the hardware store to purchase what I needed for the next home improvement project. After that was more shuttling of kids to and from weekend activities, directing them to do their chores while my wife cooked dinner, and then getting them to bed.
Many, perhaps most, of my neighbors do not spend their weekends like my family does. They have Latino landscapers take care of their yards during the week. They are dual-income, which means they have significant discretionary income to spend on eating out, taking Pilates classes, and paying babysitters so they can frequent local concerts or whatever other entertainment they desire. They subject their kids to a merry-go-round of extracurricular and summer activities motivated by a competitiveness of keeping up with the Joneses and securing freedom from childcare.
In contrast, we homeschool our kids so they don’t have to attend the disaster that has become Fairfax County Public Schools, meaning my wife brings in no income. I work multiple jobs to pay the bills and spend my weekends working in or around the house. Our older kids all have an activity or two, but we also put them to work — indeed, we need their labor to make our household function. And, frankly, my wife and I both prefer it that way.
Americans Can Find Pride in Self-Reliance
Sometimes I’m envious of my neighbors and their leisure or liberty to spend liberally on whatever they want, wherever they want. But most of the time, I’m grateful for the opportunity to be self-reliant. My kids and I do the landscaping and gardening, and can take pride in it as we gaze out over our deck during dinner. Our kids lack the frenetic lifestyle of many of their peers, but we get constant compliments from other parents about their maturity and comparatively good behavior. They are rarely bored. Whenever we’re not putting them to work, they’re riding their bikes, rampaging through the woods, or conceptualizing some new Lego creation in their playroom. There are no screens or video games.
It’s an interesting paradox: Though our family has more responsibilities for our property and life than most, it feels like we possess a deeper calm and happier rhythm than those who use their abundant free time and money to pursue not the kinds of life-giving leisure described by philosopher Joseph Pieper, but things that only seem to make them more stressed. “Wealth consists not in having great possessions, but in having few wants,” said the ancient Stoic philosopher Epictetus. Homeschooling, in turn, means my family is all learning together, as my wife and I read books on the same subjects we are teaching our children.
Not relying on immigrant labor means we have to learn to take care of ourselves, much as Americans have for most of our history. A tight budget means we rarely eat out, but also that we have fun trying new recipes. A life less dependent on illegal immigrants may be one with less entertainment and excitement, but also one in which Americans are freer because they are not reliant on an underclass of laborers. This is republican government as the founders intended, and one that offers a deeper, more fulfilling form of flourishing.