Estimate up to 12 million

These numbers are not going to get smaller. We must solve this problem. These people are being taken advantage of, mistreated and are working for very little money. Businesses here are benefitting and so are consumers. In other words, we are all benefitting and they are suffering. DP

By BART JONES, STAFF WRITER

Newsday.com: The number of undocumented immigrants in the United States has grown to as many as 12 million people, according to a study released yesterday.

The study by the Pew Hispanic Center, a nonpartisan research organization in Washington, D.C., found the number of "unauthorized migrants" rose from about 3 million in 1980 to 11.1 million last year to between 11.5 million and 12 million this year. The report's author, Jeffrey Passel, attributed the increase to a combination of jobs that attracted mostly low-skilled workers from Latin America and increased border enforcement that made them reluctant to return home.

"There's work to be had and these are people who want to work," Passel said. "Once the people manage to get in, they tend not to want to leave because it's so hard and dangerous to get in."

The study estimated that undocumented immigrants fill one in four agricultural jobs, 17 percent of office cleaning positions, 14 percent of construction jobs and 12 percent of those who work in food production. The report - based on Census data - also estimated that the number of people in the country illegally grew by about 500,000 a year since 2000, and that undocumented immigrants make up nearly 5 percent of the national labor force.

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