more than $7 billion has been spent to build what is now almost 653 miles of Southwest border fencing — costing nearly $5 million per mile in some spots.
According to the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), the length of the International Boundary line of the U.S.-Canadian border, excluding Alaska, is approximately 3,987 miles, while the length of the U.S.-Mexican border is estimated at 1,933 miles. The length of the Alaska-Canada border alone is 1,538 miles.
So, to build a complete Canadian wall (across even more rugged and remote regions than the border with Mexico), all 5,525 miles of it would cost approximately 27.625 Billion dollars. To complete the Mexican wall would be another 6.4 Billion. That is, if the land to build on comes "cheap" (as in free) and the $5 million a mile estimate is right.
There would have to be miles and miles (inland from the wall) motion detection and sound detection zones (similar to a mine field) to detect tunnels and people who actually make it over the wall. Probably at a cost of another $5m a mile.
Total to "secure the border" would be on the order of $68 Billion.
And that doesn't take into account the amount of money expended annually to track all legal visitors (including millions of Mexicans who come to the US from border towns to shop every year).
Add to that the cost of rounding up 11 million people already in the US illegally (and prove that they are illegal with a court trial) and you would spend at least $200 billion.
plus 10s of billions per year to patrol and maintain the border fences.
$200B would be enough to purchase and install 10 million homes with solar energy, or 40GW of energy
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