I know you. You’re the good guy, fair and objective. You don’t hate immigrants or anything — you’d rather shove an icepick in your eye than vote for Donald Trump — but the fact is, as you say, illegal immigration is illegal. Like, it’s literally a crime. You’re not racist, you just want people to follow the law! You’re not a bigot, you just don’t think it’s fair that people who aren’t here legally get to have the same benefits and opportunities as people who are.

Okay. I get it. We’re all patriots here, we all want what’s best for our country. So — let’s talk about immigration.

Fact: Obtaining legal status is an endless, winding road of bureaucratic torture.

The path to U.S. citizenship is not as easy as most people believe. For a lot of immigrants, there isn’t even a path at all. Visas based on employment are only granted for workers with certain skills and levels of education. Visas based on family sponsorship are highly restricted, and take years and years to get approved because of annual per-country quotas of a mere 7%.

For example: My father was sponsored for a U.S. visa in 1983. He wasn’t granted one until 1997. That means that in the time it took to acquire that visa, my father was able to graduate from university, establish a career, meet a wonderful woman, marry that woman, grow an enviable mustache, and start a family, all before he was able to join his mother in the States.

For immigrants who are desperate, facing poverty and violence in their home country, 14+ years is simply too long to wait.

Fact: Deportation is costly, and the last thing I want to pay taxes for.

Putting aside (though we shouldn't) the grievous humanitarian costs of deportation and detention of undocumented immigrants, there are financial costs as well.

Taxpayers — that's you and me — spend about $5 million per day on immigrant detention.

Detaining immigrants (including families and unaccompanied minors) that we deem illegal costs us in terms of providing facilities, beds, food, counseling, staff, and the costs are driven up by long and convoluted legal processes that keep immigrants waiting in detention for longer than they need to be.

What if we were to immediately deport every single unauthorized immigrant already in the U.S.? Well, go ahead, if you can handle a -.17% cut in our GDP (more on immigrant contributions to our economy later).

Talk about a drain on resources. I'd much rather my taxpayer money go towards cooler stuff, like public education, or covert government research on aliens — the extraterrestrial kind.

Fact: Undocumented immigrants pay taxes. A lot of them.

In the last fiscal year, undocumented immigrants contributed 8% of their income to tax revenue — for California, that means over $3.1 billion, and $11.64 billion nationwide.

They pay taxes in a number of ways. In addition to sales tax on the purchase of every consumer good from Doc Martens to tampons, they pay property taxes, as homeowners and renters, and even income taxes (using IRS-issued Individual Tax Identification Numbers). Furthermore, if we were to wave a magic wand and legalize everyone in the U.S. who’s undocumented, tax revenue would increase by an additional $2 billion.

And yet, their lack of legal status makes them ineligible for many taxpayer-funded social and welfare programs, meaning that they pay taxes just like everybody else, but don't benefit.

Fact: Immigrants are the Red Bull-boost this economy needs.

The ways that increased immigration benefits the U.S. economy are numerous. If we were to wave that sparkly magic wand again and legalize everybody, it would boost our GDP by .53% and create 200,000 jobs a year. Further, immigrants are twice as likely to become entrepreneurs who start businesses and, guess what — create jobs!

The U.S. needs low-skilled workers to do jobs that Americans are less willing to do, and as it turns out, low-skilled foreign-born workers fill up industries such as agriculture, food service, construction, and janitorial services. So rather than taking jobs away from Americans, immigrant labor is actually complementary.

Also, the assumption that immigrants just send all their money back home, meaning that their U.S. earnings don't circulate back into the U.S. economy, is hardly true. Only 10% of their income is sent back as remittances ($50 billion in 2008 — U.S. citizens spent nearly twice that amount as tourists in countries abroad). Plus, that 10% represents US dollars that go back into the economies of their home countries, which are often poorer and less developed. When people of those countries have the buying power of the USD, it contributes more to their economy and improves the global economy as a whole.

So. Where's that magic wand again?