Economic Advisers See Positive Contribution by Illegal Aliens

Foreign workers who enter the country illegally are easily absorbed into the labor force and can sometimes make a positive contribution to the U.S. economy, President Reagan’s Council of Economic Advisers told Congress on Thursday.

“Illegal aliens may find it possible to evade some taxes, but they use fewer services (especially Social Security benefits) than do other groups,” the report said.

The President’s top economic advisers said that while they were not condoning illegal immigration, they could find no evidence that the employment of illegal aliens displaced native-born workers from jobs.

The report on aliens was one of seven separate economic studies accompanying Reagan’s annual economic message.

The chapter on immigration became controversial even before it was released with published reports saying the President’s economic advisers had been forced to delete comments saying that proposals to punish employers of illegal aliens would have adverse effects on the economy.

Beryl W. Sprinkel, chairman of the council, denied that there had been pressure to remove parts of the report on the economic consequences of employer sanctions.

Sprinkel said he made the decision to delete those sections from a draft report because he did not believe he had the expertise to talk about enforcement activities.

The report stated that “although many aliens work on farms illegally, the availability of such workers may enable U.S. production of certain fruit and vegetable crops to remain competitive with that of other nations.”