L America buoyed by migrants' pay

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Latin American immigrants living in the US will send more than $45bn (£24bn) to their relatives back home this year, an increase of more than 10% from 2005.

The total sum surpasses the amount the region receives in direct foreign investment and official development aid from international donors.

A third of the remittances go to Mexico, making it the country's second largest source of income after oil.

The report was compiled by Washington based Inter-American Development Bank.

Another $15bn is sent home by Latin Americans living in countries other than the United States, the report says.

More lucrative life

The report's findings illustrate the uphill challenge that those who favour building fences and walls to keep Latin American immigrants out of the United States face.

The $45bn that Latin American immigrants will have sent home by the end of 2006 - more than 50% higher than the figure was just two years ago - will keep food on the tables of millions of their relatives, help pay the rent and in some cases, will keep entire families afloat.

The study, based on a telephone survey of immigrants, also demonstrates that the majority of those polled find life in the US a great deal more lucrative than the life they left behind.

Most of those surveyed said that while they did not have full-time jobs back home, they found one within a month of moving to the US, with 38% finding a job in less than two weeks.

The average salary for their first job, according to the study, was $900 a month, about six times more than what the majority said they could expect to earn in their home countries.

Perhaps more telling is the fact that the money they send back home surpasses the amount of money the countries receive in direct foreign investment and official development aid.