A new report from the immigrant advocacy group FWD.us looks at the economic impacts of the Trump administration’s ongoing deportation campaign.
The report outlines immigration shifts like the ramping up of ICE deportations and workplace raids, the cancellation of tens of thousands of work permits, and legal immigration curtails.
The group says those changes not only tear apart immigrant families, they also will lead to a rise in costs for households across the board. That, as industries with large shares of immigrants — like agriculture, construction and health care — lose their workforce.
The price of most food products is set to rise by nearly 15%, according to the report, increasing the average grocery bill of $165 a week to nearly $200 in the next four years.
“Recent and proposed immigration policies will result in American families paying an additional $2,150 for goods and services each year by the end of 2028, or the equivalent of the average American family's grocery bill for 3 months or their combined electricity and gas bills for the entire year,” the report says. “Unlike past periods of inflation, Americans have not been saving at the same rate as earlier years, and can’t as easily absorb these price increases, squeezing American budgets even further.”
The report comes as the Trump administration moves to revoke work permits and legal status for hundreds of thousands of immigrants from Cuba, Haiti, Venezuela and Nicaragua, among others.
The report says as a result of the new policies, the U.S. would also see a loss of billions worth of lifetime earnings contributions to the economy — as immigrant families leave the U.S. — and open U.S. citizen children to the possibility of being left alone in the U.S. without a way to support themselves.
