Immigrant Values
The role of immigrants in the United States labor market and Chinese import competition
Chan Yu
Journal of International Economics, forthcoming
Abstract:
Research has shown a limited labor mobility response to trade shocks. However, existing studies of aggregate mobility may miss important heterogeneity. This paper proposes a mechanism through which local labor markets adjust to trade shocks, namely immigrant mobility. I find a relative decline in the immigrant population in areas more exposed to import growth from China. An interquartile increase in Chinese import exposure decreases the immigrant population by 5.4% but has little effect on the native population. Additionally, immigrant mobility mitigates the effects of trade shocks on native labor outcomes. The present study shows that natives in areas with more immigrants experience smaller declines in employment relative to areas with fewer immigrants.
Law-Abiding Immigrants: The Incarceration Gap Between Immigrants and the US-born, 1850–2020
Ran Abramitzky et al.
NBER Working Paper, July 2023
Abstract:
We combine full-count Census data (1850–1940) with Census/ACS samples (1950–2020) to provide the first nationally representative long-run series (1850–2020) of incarceration rates for immigrants and the US-born. As a group, immigrants had higher incarceration rates than US-born white men before 1870, similar rates between 1880-1950, and lower rates since 1960. Although there are substantial differences in incarceration by origin country, the relative decline in incarceration since 1960 occurred among immigrants from all sending regions. This decline cannot be explained by changes in immigrants’ observable characteristics or immigration policy, but may reflect immigrants’ resilience to economic shocks.
Misrecognitions of Victimhood: Discretionary Power of Street-level Bureaucrats in Humanitarian Visas
Ryan Goehrung & Rachel Castellano
Law & Social Inquiry, forthcoming
Abstract:
Humanitarian visas provide one of few potential pathways to citizenship for foreign nationals victimized within the United States and are an important aspect of immigration law. Yet one form of humanitarian visas -- T nonimmigrant status (T visa) -- has received scant attention in the socio-legal studies literature. “T visas” were designed to aid survivors of human trafficking and, though the US government estimates that tens of thousands of individuals are trafficked in the United States every year, only 15 percent of the five thousand T visas available annually have been granted since the program’s inception in 2002. Why are T visas such an underutilized form of immigration relief? Drawing on twenty in-depth interviews with immigration lawyers, law enforcement personnel, and non-governmental organization service providers routinely involved in T visa applications, we find that the low rate of applications and approvals is driven by a combination of structural barriers and expansive discretion of key actors in the legal process to interpret and apply the law, which results in a narrow and often misinformed construction of victimhood. We add to the literature on the discretionary power of street-level bureaucrats to shape the law and determine how it is applied with considerable consequences for survivors of trafficking.
The Wall between Latinas and Latinos? Gender and Immigration Enforcement Attitudes among U.S. Latina/o Voters
Álvaro José Corral
Politics & Gender, forthcoming
Abstract:
Donald Trump’s surprising level of support among U.S. Latina/o voters in 2016 and his improved performance in the 2020 election posed a puzzle for Latina/o politics scholars given his stridently anti-immigrant agenda. Although scholars have acknowledged the political gender gap between Latinas and Latino men, few studies have outlined the theoretical basis or explored the empirical existence of gender differences in Latina/o immigration enforcement attitudes. Building on the Latina politics literature documenting Latinas’ greater engagement in solidarity work with immigrants and their greater desire for cultural transmission and the maintenance of pan-ethnic identity, I test two hypotheses. The first (the Latina/o gender hypothesis) postulates that Latinas will exhibit more liberal attitudes on matters of immigration enforcement relative to Latino men. The second (the immigrant identity hypothesis) postulates that Latinas are more likely to rely on their sense of commonality with immigrants in the formation of their immigration enforcement attitudes. Bivariate and multivariate analyses of the 2020 Collaborative Multiracial Postelection Survey support both hypotheses, which suggests not only that immigration attitudes among Latinas and Latino men are meaningfully distinct, but also that there are important structural differences underlying Latina/o beliefs in this policy area.
Hiring High-Skilled Labor Through Mergers and Acquisitions
Jun Chen, Shenje Hshieh & Feng Zhang
Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, forthcoming
Abstract:
Using random H-1B visa lotteries as a natural experiment, we find that firms respond to shortages of high-skilled workers by acquiring firms that employ such workers. The effect is stronger among firms with high human capital and more senior workforces, firms facing tight labor markets and legal barriers to poaching workers, and firms lacking foreign affiliates. The acquihired workers are highly educated, sharing skills and occupations similar to those of the acquirer’s existing workers. Our findings suggest skilled labor is an important driver of acquisitions and acquihiring is an effective means of obtaining skilled labor.
Uncertainty and Immigrant Entrepreneurship: Evidence from Brexit
Camilo Acosta & Astrid Marinoni
Organization Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
Immigrant entrepreneurs are a major driver of economic growth, and their decisions about where to locate can greatly affect the entrepreneurial ecosystem of a country. Meanwhile, increasingly uncertain immigration environments might discourage immigrants from establishing new ventures in host countries. This paper exploits the unexpected result of the Brexit referendum to investigate the relationship between immigration uncertainty and the entry of immigrant-founded ventures of different quality. We propose a model of immigrant entrepreneurial entry and introduce a new measure of venture quality at founding. We find that a surge in uncertainty decreases the growth rate of new immigrant-founded firms by 3.2%. The reliance on other immigrant actors exacerbates the negative effect that uncertainty has on entry. Moreover, low- and high-quality firms are the most affected, while the effect for medium-quality firms is negligible. Back-of-the-envelope calculations suggest that Brexit discouraged the entry of around 620 low-quality and 250 high-quality firms. Our model suggests that whereas founders of low-quality ventures might decide to take up employment, founders of high-quality ventures might be better off establishing their companies in another country.
Seeking sanctuary: Housing undocumented immigrants
Derek Christopher
Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, forthcoming
Abstract:
This paper studies housing market outcomes of undocumented immigrants in the U.S. and explores the mechanisms behind the differential prices that immigrants pay for shelter. I show that undocumented renters pay a premium for housing relative to observably similar, documented, immigrant renters occupying similar housing. Building on theory and suggestive evidence that the premium is the result of search frictions driven by fear of deportation, I employ a triple-differences strategy to evaluate the impacts of sanctuary city policies on housing market outcomes of undocumented immigrants. I find that sanctuary city policies, which limit immigration enforcement, reduce housing costs of undocumented renters, suggesting such policies mitigate search frictions for this group.
Remote Work, Foreign Residents, and the Future of Global Cities
Joao Guerreiro, Sergio Rebelo & Pedro Teles
NBER Working Paper, June 2023
Abstract:
As remote work opportunities expand, more people are seeking residence in foreign destinations. The resulting surge in foreign residents generates capital gains for property owners but negatively impacts renters and creates potentially important production, congestion, and amenities externalities. We study the optimal policy toward foreign residents in a model with key features emphasized in policy discussions. Using this model, we provide sufficient statistics to evaluate the impact of an influx of foreign residents and to calculate the tax/transfer policies required to implement the optimal policy. This policy involves implementing transfers to internalize agglomeration, congestion, and other potential externalities. Importantly, we find that it is not optimal to restrict, tax, or subsidize home purchases by foreign residents.
The effects of family and community in US immigration news
Guadalupe Madrigal
Politics, Groups, and Identities, forthcoming
Abstract:
Events about community and family separation at the US-Mexico border have been a regular feature of immigration news in the last several years. How do cues of community integration and family impact support for an undocumented immigrant? This study presents results from a web-based survey experiment fielded in 2022 in which White respondents read a news story about an undocumented adult that migrated to the US with two characteristics manipulated: (1) being an integrated member of the community or not and (2) arriving with a child or not. Results suggest that community integration leads to higher levels of support, while arriving with a child does not seem to impact support on the same level. Additionally, this study finds that support for the accompanying child is significantly higher than for the adult. These findings are discussed as they relate to immigration news representation, community integration, assimilation, and family migration.
Countering the Trump effect in Canada: Strengthening support for immigrants using national identity
Mark Pickup et al.
Politics, Groups, and Identities, forthcoming
Abstract:
Social norms are based on expectations of what others believe and do, and so they can shift in response to what trendsetters—highly visible media or political leaders—say or do. There is evidence that former President Trump as a trendsetter has weakened norms against expressing anti-immigrant attitudes in the US. As such, we ask: can trendsetters affect anti-immigrant norms across national borders? Can such spillovers be mitigated by countervailing norms attached to a national identity? We conduct two survey experiments to determine if there is potential for a Trump spillover effect in Canada and whether it can be mitigated by norms attached to Canadian identity. We find that priming Trump can weaken norms against expressing anti-immigrant sentiment in Canada. We also find that priming Canadian identity can mitigate the Trump as trendsetter effect, and attaching pro-immigrant norms to Canadian identity can strengthen norms against expressing anti-immigrant attitudes. The potential for a political trendsetter to have effects on immigration attitudes across national borders and the potential for national identity norms to mitigate such effects are important to understand given the recent global spread of anti-immigrant sentiment.