Archive for August 2007

Using restricted-access Census data, a new study examines a quarter-million households on a block-by-block basis to yield new results about the correlation between household attributes and school quality. The researchers find that, conditional on income, households prefer to self-segregate on the basis of both race and education.

“Economists have long been interested in estimating household preferences for school and neighborhood attributes, given their relevance to many central issues in applied economics,” write Patrick Bayer (Duke University and NBER), Fernando Ferreira (University of Pennsylvania), and Robert McMillan (University of Toronto and NBER) in the forthcoming issue of the Journal of Political Economy.

Specifically, while all households prefer to live in higher-income neighborhoods, college-educated households are willing to pay $58 more per month than those without a college degree to live in a neighborhood that has 10 percent more college-educated households. In fact, the researchers find that households without a college degree would actually need compensating to live in a neighborhood with 10 percent more college-educated neighbors.

Similarly, blacks are willing to pay $98 more per month to live in a neighborhood that has 10 percent more black households, compared to a negative willingness to pay on the part of white households to live in a similar neighborhood. Perhaps unsurprisingly, increases in household income and education also lead to a greater willingness to pay for better schools.

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O’FALLON, Mo. - Gov. Matt Blunt issued a directive Tuesday that will tighten oversight of state-financed construction projects to ensure that contractors don’t employ illegal immigrants.

The directive came one day after the Republican asked state law enforcement agencies to check the immigration status of people they arrest.

Blunt said he was spurred to issue the new directive after construction projects in this suburban St. Louis town and elsewhere were alleged to employ illegal immigrants. “This will help ensure that Missouri taxpayers are not in some way subsidizing illegal immigration,” he said after announcing the directive at a news conference.

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The flood of foreign labor pouring into the United States, the European Union and other hospitable environs has brought political strains. But there is little chance of stemming migrant inflows, as long as the countries supplying immigrants embrace policies that effectively mandate labor dumping, says Steve H. Hanke, a professor of applied economics at the Johns Hopkins University and a senior fellow at the Cato Institute.

Mexico is the world’s largest labor dumper and the source of much of the contentious U.S. immigration reform debate. The source of the problem is Mexico’s statist economy, which can’t produce enough jobs. Rather than modernize the economy, Mexico’s politicians sweep the country’s surplus labor force into the United States:

Mexico’s 47 consulates in the United States, more than any other country has, facilitate the sweeping by issuing passports and offering assistance when Mexican immigrants run into trouble.
Thus 30 percent of Mexico’s labor force is working in the United States, and in 2006 they sent home $23 billion — 12 percent of Mexico’s exports.

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ARTICLE SYNOPSIS:

Our government is once again considering the funding of a “home made revolution” by financing a radical group that is directly opposed to our national interests. But there is more to the National Council of La Raza than advocating for open borders and special treatment for illegal immigrants. La Raza recently became part of The No Child Works coalition, formed to ensure that the No Child Left Behind Act (which radically increased the federal role in education) will retain as much clout as possible.

Follow this link to the original source: “Say NO to the Hope Fund Act of 2007″
http://capwiz.com/jbs/issues/alert/?alertid=9817586

COMMENTARY:

Maybe you have read about the National Council of La Raza before, maybe you haven’t. Basically, it is a pressure group advocating not only special treatment, but also circumvention of existing immigration laws, for people of Hispanic descent. Abolition of the “false” U.S.-Mexico border is an increasingly popular theme among La Raza members. Likewise they advocate the abolition of the Border Patrol, which they call La Migra.

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Chattanooga, TN - WASHINGTON — For decades, immigration officials have granted U.S. citizenship to all children born on American soil.

But Rep. Nathan Deal, R-Ga., wants to see that practice end for children of illegal immigrants.

“Birthright citizenship is one of those things that has become a magnet for illegal immigrants to come over here,” said Rep. Deal, who has filed a bill that would restrict birthright citizenship to children who have at least one parent with legal resident status or U.S. citizenship.

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According to a Pew Research survey, white respondents believe the media have treated Michael Vick fairly by a factor of nearly two-to-one when compared to black respondents.

Vick, one of the game’s flashiest players, has been involved in an illegal dog fighting operation that has drawn almost universal condemnation but has split the nation along racial lines.

According to the Pew Research Center’s News Interest for the week ending Aug. 24, 69% of whites say Vick has gotten a fair shake in the media while only 38% of blacks think that is the case.

Both groups agree that the story has been over-covered, however, with 49% of whites saying so and 56% of blacks. That may have been the perception, but according to the study, the Vick story took up only 4% of the news hole of 48 media outlets surveyed behind coverage of Iraq, midwest floods, Iraq, Hurricane Dean, and the 2008 campaign. The Vick story is just one of several scandals beleaguering professional sports. So far, there’s no indication the news has been bad for the business of televised sporting events.

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SYDNEY (AFP) - Migrants who want to become Australian citizens will have to be able to correctly identify the country’s prime minister and national flower, according to a new draft citizenship test released Sunday.

In a 40-page document outlining citizenship application procedures, the government has detailed the country’s history, political institutions and what it terms national values.

These include freedom of speech, religion and association, gender equality, and tolerance and compassion.

To gain Australian citizenship, migrants must respond correctly to 12 out of a possible 20 questions, drawn from a bank of 200.

Candidates could be asked to give the year of European settlement, name the colours on the flag or write down the first line of the national anthem.

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Three years ago, UCLA law professor Richard Sander published an explosive, fact-based study of the consequences of affirmative action in American law schools in the Stanford Law Review. Most of his findings were grim, and they caused dismay among many of the champions of affirmative action — and indeed, among those who were not.

Easily the most startling conclusion of his research: Mr. Sander calculated that there are fewer black attorneys today than there would have been if law schools had practiced color-blind admissions — about 7.9% fewer by his reckoning. He identified the culprit as the practice of admitting …

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In Texas, it isn’t surprising to see cowboy hats, belt buckles and boots glistening under the sun. But there’s one piece missing from the cowboy ensemble when Texans mosey on over to school campuses: a gun.

According to state law, guns are banned in several places, including schools, places of worship, correction facilities, bars, sporting events and other locations. Currently, individuals with concealed handgun licenses must check their weapon at the door, but maybe not for long.

In late April, Gov. Rick Perry called for “gun freedom” across Texas and said students should be allowed to protect themselves on campus. Arlington senior Andrew Sugg couldn’t agree more.

Sugg is the leader of the Baylor chapter of Students for Concealed Carry on Campus, a national group in favor of gun freedom in schools.

“I believe anyone with a CHL should be able to carry a gun everywhere,” he said. “Most people don’t even have to fire, just showing it is usually good enough (to control a situation).”

Sugg, who has been a licensed gun carrier for almost two years, recalls a time near campus in 2005 when the mere presence of his weapon distilled a potentially dangerous individual.

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As a couple of recent news stories indicate, when it comes to enforcing our nation’s immigration laws, the federal government isn’t just at odds with “sanctuary cities” and “sanctuary churches” and pro-illegal immigration activists.

It’s also at war with itself.

The first story concerned Elvira Arellano, the illegal immigrant who spent a year evading deportation in a Chicago “sanctuary church” before being arrested last week in Los Angeles. She was taken to a federal immigration facility in Santa Ana and then quickly deported to her native Mexico.

The Arellano case has prompted protests and calls by pro-illegal immigration groups for a daylong boycott next month. Some activists even compare Arellano to Rosa Parks, the black woman who in 1955 helped launch the civil rights movement by refusing to give up her seat on a bus in Alabama.

But Arellano isn’t a Rosa Parks. As Virginia Kice, spokeswoman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), told me, “This woman is not an icon. She’s a criminal alien fugitive.”

Kice is right. Arellano was first deported to Mexico in 1997 after being arrested for using fake documents to enter this country. She crossed back into the U.S. a few days later, which was a felony.

Later, after having a child in the U.S. (her son is therefore a U.S. citizen, and can remain here), Arellano got a job cleaning airplanes in Chicago by showing a counterfeit Social Security card – yet another felony. After being arrested during a post-9/11 nationwide sweep of airport employees, she pleaded guilty to using the phony card and later was ordered to report for deportation, at which point she became a fugitive

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