Stephanie Jackter
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Registered: 11-3-2002
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more on the migration conundrum
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/mexico/20030529-1352-cnsm...
Mexican pols press for immigration, neglect home front, critics say
By Jerry Kammer
COPLEY NEWS SERVICE
1:52 p.m., May 29, 2003
WASHINGTON ? While Mexican politicians continue to press the United States to improve the lives of illegal immigrants north of the border, they are
failing to make urgently needed reforms that could help their countrymen stay home, political analysts said this week.
"Mexico has been totally incapable of resolving its own problems and is finding a convenient scapegoat in the United States," said Luis Rubio,
president of the Center of Research for Development, a Mexico City public-policy think tank.
Throughout the three-year administration of Mexican President Vicente Fox, feuding within the leading political parties has thwarted proposals
designed to benefit millions of Mexico's poor. Many now see the United States as their only chance for a decent life.
Calls for reforms in Mexico have gone unattended amid mounting public frustration and disillusionment. As a result, Mexico's feeble tax-collecting
system fails to collect funds needed to finance roads, schools and hospitals; a regulatory thicket strangles business start-ups; the arthritic
state-owned energy industry lacks capital to grow; and a notoriously unprofessional judicial system tilts the social playing field to the well
connected, according to analysts.
Fox this week renewed his demand that the United States commit to an "immigration accord" with Mexico. In an interview with the Washington Post, he
said that in its talks with Washington his government "will be insisting on our priority, which is migration."
Fox wants the United States to provide legal status to an estimated 4.5 million Mexicans here illegally. He also is calling on Washington to provide
hundreds of thousands of temporary work visas annually, as well as development funds for poor areas of Mexico.
But he is taking criticism for failing to forge political consensus behind reforms that would reduce the migrant surge northward.
"Fox is not a politician," said Rubio. "He had the charisma and stamina and looks to be a strong candidate, but he does not know how to twist arms and
make deals."
George Grayson, a Mexico expert at the College of William & Mary, echoed the criticism. He said Fox is performing a familiar Mexican political
maneuver: demanding that the United States be a migratory safety valve to relieve political and economic pressure at home.
"Fox's domestic agenda is paralyzed, so he's hoping the skies will open and there will be sunshine beaming from the United States in the form of an
immigration accord," said Grayson.
Grayson scoffed at Fox's claim to the Post that he is taking strong steps to develop the economies of the country's poorest regions.
"He's trying to tout his own accomplishments, and that doesn't pass the laugh test," said Grayson, adding that Fox's three-year-old administration has
not reformed a corrupt political culture established during 70 years of one-party rule that ended with Fox's dramatic 2000 victory.
"People are leaving Mexico because too many Mexican politicians act in a self-serving way and exploit their enormously wealthy country," Grayson said.
He said the economic stability of entire regions of Mexico depends on the money immigrants are sending home at the rate of $10 billion a year.
Gary Hufbauer, a senior fellow at the Institute for International Economics here, described a desperate need for fiscal reform in Mexico.
He said government is hamstrung by tax collections that represent only 14 percent of the country's gross domestic profit, well under the U.S. level of
25 percent to 28 percent.
As a result, he said, "Basic social services and infrastructure are awfully lean for a country that wants to move ahead. While I'm not usually an
advocate for larger government, Mexico is a country where public investment, done wisely, could pay huge dividends."
The fundamental problem, Hufbauer said, lies with the Mexican elite.
"Basically, it's up to Mexico to solve its problem, and basically the wealthy classes do not want to tax themselves, period. It's basically an
attitude of look out for yourself."
The Mexico-born director of the Mexico program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies also lamented the systematic failure of Mexico's
political system.
"I look at all the Mexicans who want to leave Mexico, and to me it's as much a statement on Mexico's failure to push through the necessary reforms to
better the country as it is about the opportunities present in the U.S." said Armand Peschard-Sverdrup.
But Peschard-Sverdrup said both Washington and Mexico City have systematically failed to address the problem of migration.
"My view is that both governments have been hypocritical," he said. "The Mexican government has benefited from using migration as a safety valve. The
U.S. government has benefited from the supply of cheap manual labor."
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Braulio
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Registered: 11-7-2002
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I agree with you Grover.
As kind of an aside - many of the cities and towns in the northern part of Sinaloa are having population declines or are at best stagnant despite
relatively high birth rates because the best, young, and brightest are going to the US or Baja. You'd think the region would be able to do pretty
well economically - in terms of resources it has everything that California has.
The "safety-valve" thing and threatening to open the human floodgates from the mexican side goes on at some point for practically every mexican
president.
I still don't think it's fair to blame Fox too much - he's constanly being stabbed in the back by either political side and doesn't enjoy the majority
in congress that his predecessors had.
Braulio
[Edited on 6-4-2003 by Braulio]
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Nancy Drew
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Registered: 4-9-2003
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Grover in another generation or two. The time has arrived. Look at the trillions of dollars the middle class has lost in the stock market scams.
The dirty dealers have walked away with multi million dollar settlements.
Hey America has slipped back to the Time of the late 1800's with the Super Wealthy [now replaced by todays CEO's at the top earning multi millions]
and the middle class taking wage cuts just to keep his job.
Cheap illegal immigrant labor was used to build the Winter Olympics and staffs many of the sweat shops as well as farm labor.
American wealth was built on the sweat of cheap imported immigrant labor from Europe.
You are seeing the Middle Class erode into the working poor.
What is interesting is the propoganda that is used. The blame is placed on government spending, schools , health care, to much taxation. That is not
the Case. America used to be small business not it is big corporations, who like to propogate the myth hard work and low taxes brings wealth while
they move their accounts offshore and piece meal their work to offshore destinations for the cheap labor cost. It is multi nationalism not patriotism
as they would like us to believe. However, many people still believe in the myth , and that is why the trend will continue.
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