A popular video on TikTok features the tried and true “man on the street” interview style with interviewer Walter Masterson posing the same question to various people dressed in MAGA regalia. The question: How much money do you think undocumented immigrant workers pay in taxes?
The interview subjects are men and women of various ages and ethnicities. With the exception of one who suspects the undocumented workers pay $100 bucks, they each offer a guess that undocumented workers contribute nothing in taxes.
When Masterson claims that undocumented workers paid $96 billion “into the system” in 2022 alone, the interviewees are dumbfounded. “I don’t know what to say about it,” says one. Another responds that it seems “ludicrous.”
Masterson concedes that it seems ludicrous and “insane” because it “runs counter to everything we’ve heard in the past few years” — in other words, the idea that undocumented workers simply take from a system they don’t pay into is part of a deliberately amplified narrative meant to stoke anger and resentment, and corral votes, even if it is not backed up by facts.
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The comments attaching to the video — where those on the Left castigate MAGA as uninformed and those on the Right remain doubtful and call Masterson’s assertions about the taxes lies — are typical of the divide in the country.
The comments also exemplify one of the great sources and challenges of that seemingly unbridgeable divide: how a bifurcated information delivery system has essentially created two separate realities, and how challenging it is to defang ubiquitous narratives designed to deceive.
Is Masterson right when he says undocumented workers are responsible for such a large contribution to the tax base?
The American Immigration Council offers the following statistics pertaining to 2022:
- In 2022, households led by undocumented immigrants paid $75.6B in total taxes. This includes $29.0B in state and local taxes and $46.6B in federal taxes.
- In 2022, approximately 4.5% of the U.S. workforce was undocumented.
- 89.8% of undocumented immigrants are of working age.
The Bipartisan Policy Center reports another benefit American entitlement programs enjoy courtesy of undocumented workers having Social Security taxes withheld by their employers, just as documented workers do. “Undocumented immigrants also help make the Social Security system more solvent, as they pay into the system but are ineligible to collect benefits upon retiring,” BPC writes. “In 2010, $12 billion more was collected from Social Security payroll taxes of undocumented workers than were paid out in benefits.”
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