ABC 7 Project Immigration: Americanized El Salvador|ABC 7 News

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ABC 7 Project Immigration: Americanized El Salvador

posted 11:15 am Fri February 29, 2008 -

tags: immigration • mccarren • salvador

Local immigrants from El Salvador are making great U.S. impact back in their home.
D.C. area immigrants send over $400 thousand a year to their families still living in the countries they left behind.

Milagros Pineda is a single mother who left her five children behind in El Salvador to work in Northern Virginia. She says she hasn't seen her children in 15 years. Like many Salvadorans, Pineda sends home $400 a month.

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Even in rural parts of El Salvador, it's now clear who has relatives in the United States and who doesn't. So-called "remittance homes" are quickly emerging, built by dollars earned in the U.S.

George Washington student, Sarah Walker, who recently visited El Salvador could see the U.S. resemblance, "It turns out, not only does the money come from the U.S., but a lot of times, the floor plans do also," Walker mentioned that people here in the D.C. area take pictures of local houses and send them home for building plans.

Walker found American influence everywhere, from bilingual billboards touting American made products to upscale shopping malls, "Not only are all the stores exactly the same as they are here, from McDonald's to Levi's to everything else, their prices are the same too."

Remittances fund more than just American style homes and products. "With $20,000 you can buy a water treatment plant, you can pay at least 2 km of road, or you can completely build a health care facility."

The average Salvadoran immigrant in our area now sends home as much as 20 percent of their annual income.

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