No English = no income

In almost every society, language skills follow the money. When Americans cross into Mexico's border towns, they find cab drivers, shop owners and peddlers wonderfully able to speak the King's English. To the north, Hispanic immigrants who earn a living tend to pick up English as a self-preservation tool. Those who do not — more than a fourth of Utah households where no member is fluent in English — languish at or below the poverty line, earning an average of about $15,000 a year.

The bright side of that is the number is relatively small — only about 3 percent of Utah's households. Needless to say, however, things aren't so bright in those families. Along with the lack of language skills, such families also struggle with education in general and struggle with health and insurance issues. Many of those families eventually will rise out of their situation.

The concern, however, is not only for people in those struggling households, but in homes where just one family member may be out of the loop: the mother. That happens when the father picks up English from work, the kids get it at school, but the mother — often a homemaker — speaks only Spanish. The problem may not be economical, but it is certainly social and domestic. Without the ability to speak English, many mothers can't help their children with homework, have no way of monitoring conversations between their sons and daughters and their English-speaking friends and, quite often, feel at sea in a new world.

Many people are familiar with a saying to the effect of, when mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy. In many Hispanic homes it's more like, when mama feels isolated, nobody feels connected.

The solution, of course — like many solutions — can be costly and time-consuming. It means not only offering English classes for children and husbands who are looking to hold down a job, but seeking out mothers and homemakers for special attention and helping them keep up to speed with the rapidly changing world of their families.

Learning a new language always is daunting. But the more English that immigrants speak, the better off they — and their families — seem to be. And, by extension, the better off the nation is, as well.