Yes, you do have to file taxes to get an EITC. Plenty of non-Americans work here and pay taxes here. Plenty of non-Americans work here, pay taxes, and also can tap our welfare programs if they have American born children. It has nothing to do, actually, with whether the non-American came into the country illegally or legally.
I know this from experience. For the past year, I've been volunteering for a local group that is sponsoring a flow of Africans coming into the US as refugees. My church is providing the monthly upkeep for one particular family and we signed up to contribute a certain dollar amount for one year. Last fall this particular family had an unmarried daughter give birth here (father back in refugee camp in Africa). After that birth, my friends and I helped them get SNAP and Medicaid for the baby.
The father of this father worked fulltime at a Wal-Mart store since last July. Someone in the church will help him fill out the taxes and apply for the EITC as well as the expanded personal exemptions for children that the Trump tax plan created. Since it is a credit and not just a tax deduction, this African family could theoretically get $1000 per child, or $8000 (based on 7 children plus the new baby) and as much as $1500 for the EITC. Thus he could get a check from the government for $9500 even though he owed nothing in Federal or State income tax.
Now this is a family who is sponsored and getting help from a community. The typical illegal family might not know how to get this assistance on their own. They might even try avoid filing so as not to draw attention to themselves. Nevertheless, there are plenty of "welfare" type benefits to be gotten by those who are not yet legal citizens. Government welfare benefits, not things through charities, etc.
I will have to disagree with the myth that these are the 'best kind of taxpayer' for the country. As a whole our illegal population is not a net positive for the country financially speaking. As a whole, they don't earn enough to even owe taxes in the first place. Remember half the country doesn't pay federal income taxes. Now illegals do end up paying small amounts of FICA taxes they may never even get back. But that amount is miniscule relative to the amounts of government benefits they get through their children.
As a whole, our illegal population is a big drain on the system. When you throw in free schooling, unpaid emergency room care, subsidized Obamacare, etc., illegals are a huge drain. And then when you throw in the fact that a surplus of them keeps wages suppressed, one has to marvel at the fact that Democrats are supportive of open borders. |
