By George P. Hassett

One is from Egypt, the other Brazil. Neither has the proper documentation to be in the country but both, like millions of Americans, will be filing their income taxes with the IRS in the next few weeks.

The two illegal immigrants pay their taxes with Tax ID numbers instead of social security numbers and get them prepared at Carminati Tax on lower Broadway, where Charles Carminati said about 70 percent of his more than 1,000 clients pay their taxes despite being in the country illegally. 

The question Carminati has is, since illegal immigrants can not get refunds for the social security or Medicare taxes they pay, where is that money going?

‚ÄúYou always hear, ‘Oh those illegals don’t pay their taxes.’ That’s bull, a lot of undocumented immigrants pay their taxes like everybody else except they won’t have access to some of the benefits they are paying for like retirement.‚Äù

In 2006 1.4 million people used Tax ID numbers when filing taxes, Carminati said most of those people are undocumented immigrants making between $8,000 and $12,000 a year.

They pay their taxes, he said, out of a hope that a comprehensive immigration reform bill will one day pass Congress and give citizenship priority to undocumented immigrants who have been filing tax returns. Also, he said, they do it out of a sense of honesty.

“They know it is something they have to do so they do it the same as anyone else would,” he said.

The Egyptian man, whose taxes Carminati prepares, will receive about half of what he would if he and his family had their documents in order. And Carminati wants to know where that leftover money is going.

Undocumented immigrants are not eligible to receive refunds for the social security or Medicare taxes they pay because they do not have valid social security numbers so that money often ends up, according to Carminati, “lost in space.”

The Social Security Administration  estimates that undocumented immigrants pay approximately $8 billion each year in payroll taxes they will never be able to claim. As of 2005, the administration’s file containing paid-in taxes that cannot be matched to a social security number, was at $519 billion.

Carminati said that money should go to addressing the upcoming social security crisis. ‚ÄúIt’s unclear where it is now,‚Äù he said. ‚ÄúNobody is stealing it, it is just kind of being lost in space. It should be going to social security or Medicare like it is intended not moved around in any way.‚Äù

As the immigration debate continues to rage, those at the center of it – the immigrants themselves – are taking part in at least one American tradition: paying taxes and wondering where all that money goes.

Standing outside Carminati Tax, a man who would identify himself only as Javier said he is an undocumented immigrant who has paid his taxes every year he has been in the country. “I pay because I still have hope,” he said.