An Economic Reversal

We all know that the American economy has taken a bit of a hit over the past year or so. Unemployment is dancing around double digits, home values have fallen drastically, and people run around wildly pointing fingers. This is the standard we’ve all come to know and love. So when some unexpected reversal of this status quo occurs, like if Mexican immigrants were to stop sending money home to poor relatives and instead received money from Mexico to tide them over until they could find work again, many of us would understandably do a double take and reread that day’s headlines.

The New York Times this past Monday reported that this very unusual (and very sad) situation has actually come to pass, at least to a certain extent. Mexican families have been sending their saved pesos up north to help relatives who seem to be in far more dire straits than themselves. It wouldn’t be fair to say that this is a widespread occurrence; from the data gathered, only small amounts of money have been wired to the United States. The percentage of Mexican families funding their millions of relatives north of the border, while dramatically greater than in previous years, is hardly substantial.

A group of Mexican-Americans participate in an immigration march in Austin, Texas

Nevertheless, this serves as a pretty poignant reminder of the state of commerce and production in America. The largest influx of immigrants ever known in the history of our nation came about as a result of the opportunity that poorer Mexican immigrants hoped to find in the States. This mass immigration has been the center of many debates. There are those who would welcome everyone who could walk across the border. And then there are those who have proposed creating a guarded fence along the length of the border to completely stop any aliens from entering. It’s an understandable but still foreboding problem for a country with a historical record of prosperity and human rights. It should be shocking when the same impoverished people who have been flocking to our soil for decades become less able to support themselves than those they left behind in a developing country.

What then, is the next logical step to this deterioration of all we know? Will the flow of immigration stop? Even be reversed? Will Mexico City get its own English-speaking district? Will America slide into the Pacific under the weight of its own debt, leaving China free to take over the world? Probably not, though there are certainly people who speculate that the last will eventually become reality. It’s probably best for now to simply wait and watch as the economy picks itself up again, and hope that the rest of the world keeps on wanting to move here.

Photo by Mr. Wright – http://flic.kr/p/bY3Rd

Photo by victoriabernal – http://flic.kr/p/diC5V

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