Coming to Iowa

Immigration into the U.S. is an issue that makes for strange bedfellows. Supporters of a current immigration levels include corporate interests that profit from cheap foreign labor, ethnic lobbies seeking to increase their political base and religious activists, humanitarians, and civil libertarians who focus on the human rights and other ethical concerns. Opponents include atavists who view immigrants as a threat to American culture, environmentalists who dread immigration fueled population growth, and labor advocates who fear that immigration is taking jobs from the I.S. citizens and causing the U.S. wages to drop. What most Americans fail to realize is that they too are immigrants from somewhere else, unless you're a Native American Indian. For example my dad's side of the family came to America during the Potato famine of 1845.

So what's the problem? Our ancestry for the most part is immigration from some other country. Immigration has been going on since the year 1492 when the most famous immigration happened with Columbus. The question to me that remains is, why are these immigrants leaving their home country and coming to the U.S or, for that matter, Iowa? After contracting Immigration Study Circles and the Iowa Immigration Legal Project, I found out why. They, the immigrants come to Iowa for jobs. It's as simple as that. They are trying to make a life in a country that is richer, smarter, and healthier than their own.