When one considers Mexican immigration to the U.S., many envision groups of poor families sluggishly yet relentlessly crossing numerous boundaries in order to reach the land presumed to abound with opportunities. However, in some cases, the families that cross the U.S./Mexican border are not impoverished but affluent, using the resources they have to escape the violence that continually looms over them.
The biggest influx of immigrants is located in Texas and California, in cities such as San Antonio, Dallas, El Paso, and San Diego, respectively. From an American standpoint, local authorities are growing more aware of the financial benefits that Mexican immigration is bringing to the country. This welcoming is assuring to Mexicans of wealthy families, who flock to the United States for its geographic proximity to their country of origin, as well as a life much safer than what they can hope for in Mexico, where the statistics of kidnapping and violence are alarming.
Although moving to the U.S. means abandoning their homeland, many successful Mexican businessmen make it their top priority to instill values from both cultures into their children upon arriving to the U.S. Along with chains of markets that sell the same products found in Mexico and strings of Mexican restaurants and cafés, concern to accommodate to Mexican immigrants and their families is also manifesting itself with bilingual schools. At first targeting its student population to the children of immigrant families, these schools have so grown in popularity that there is a lottery system in place for prospective students, as well as a more diverse pool of applicants. American families who wish for their children to be bilingual from an early age are also competing for spots in these promising schools.
Unfortunately, while there has been little investigative research done to show how the departing wealthy Mexican families has impacted Mexico, the effects surely cannot be beneficial. Most families leave out of fear that they will be victims of kidnapping or violence from drug traffickers; it is likely that their children, after growing up in America and receiving American educations, will not return to the country that put their families at risk.
That being said, the close proximity to one's roots gives this new generation a wide range of opportunities to visit the land of their heritage, as well as having the privilege of access to many Mexican traditions.
