The REAL cost of a Mexico border fence

According to GlobalSecurity.org, "A 2,000 mile state-of-the-art border fence has been estimated to cost between four and eight billion dollars." But they go on to caution that cost overruns in the 14-mile border fence in San Diego make any estimate uncertain. They also caution that since 9/11, 40 tunnels have been discovered under America's border.

As reported by NPR, "Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-CA), the main backer of the [Congress' 700-mile] fence plan, has been quoted as estimating the project would cost about $2.2 billion. That's roughly $3 million per mile." But as critics have countered, that estimate does not include labor, surveillance cameras, sensors, lighting and road construction," not to mention the construction problems posed by rough terrain.

The Congressional Research Service (CRS) is even more pessimistic. In January 2007, CRS estimated that the cost of a 700-mile fence along the U.S.-Mexico border could be as much as $49 billion for the expected 25-year life span of the fence. But even the CRS's higher estimate did not include the cost of buying private land along hundreds of miles of border, or the cost of labor if the job is done by private contractors. (And if levels of outsourcing in Iraq and post-Katrina are any indication, such a fence would certainly be outsourced to private contractors). This could add up to untold $ billions more.

Then there's the problem of the 12 to 20 million illegal immigrants, most of them Mexicans, who are already here. How does a border fence help get rid of them? In fact, it would only prevent them from going home. America would have to spend untold $ billions more for increased manpower and legal services to track them down and deport them. This is not to mention the messy, Gestapo-like tactics that would be necessary to round them up -- kicking down doors of countless homes and raiding thousands of businesses. This makes the alternative -- that dirty word, "amnesty," -- seem more attractive by comparison.

Then there is the moral dimension. America would be joining Israel as the only democratic country to voluntarily wall itself off (I'm not including Egypt and Saudi Arabia). What great company. But even Israel's planned 440 miles of border fence would be dwarfed by comparison. The message that such a massive "Great Wall of Mexico" would send to the world would directly contradict the words at the Statue of Liberty, the world's most iconic symbol of freedom: "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free...".

That said, $49 or even $100 billion is "affordable," depending on our national priorities. Indeed, we have spent about $100 billion per year in Iraq so far, with a forecast total bill of $1-3 trillion, depending on whose estimate.

But if we do commit the resources and manpower, and risk our national identity, to build such a massive 2,000-mile fence, we'd better be damn sure it's worth it.