The Demand for Immigration to the United States

This paper examines trends and cross-national variation in the active demand for immigration to the United States in the period of 1984–1993, using data from the Visa Office and various other sources. The analysis is restricted to legal immigration in numerically limited categories. The results show that the total number of active immigrant visa applicants steadily increased in the aggregate and in each of the preference categories. Moreover, the active demand for immigration was highly skewed, with the majority of applications coming from a dozen countries: Mexico, the Philippines, India, mainland China, South Korea, Taiwan, Vietnam, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Jamaica, Hong Kong, and Pakistan. Most of these highly-backlogged countries displayed a significant increase in the growth rate of demand for immigration. The paper also shows a substantial cross-national variation in the active demand for immigration and explores its structural determinants. The regression results indicate that the level of economic development in sending countries and U.S. economic and cultural relations with sending countries play important roles in the determination process. Policy implications of the findings are also discussed.     

Immigration to the U.S.: the unfinished story

Annual totals of new immigrants and refugees in the US may now be up to the record highs of over a million immigrants counted in 6 years between 1905 and 1914. Since 1979, legal immigrants have averaged 566,000 a year (570,009 in 1985), newly arrived refugees and asylees approved have averaged 135,000, and the "settled" illegal immigrant population is growing by up to 1/2 million a year, according to some estimates. 1/2 of illegal immigrants are persons who entered the US legally but then overstayed the terms of temporary visas. Immigration and Naturalization Service apprehensions of illegal aliens, projected at a record 1.8 million for fiscal year 1986, indicate a sharp increase in illegal border crossers, driven by Mexico's and Central America's mounting population and economic pressures and lured by the prospect of jobs with employers who through a loophole in US immigration law can hire illegal aliens without penalty. The Census Bureau estimates that net immigration now accounts for 28% of US population growth and will account for all growth by the 2030's if fertility stays at the current low 1.8 births per woman. Public opinion strongly favors crubs on illegal immigration and legalization of illegal aliens long resident in the US, and in 1986 Congress enacted legislation to reduce illegal immigration to the US. Asians and Latin Americans now make up over 80% of legal immigrants and Latin Americans comprised 77% of illegal immigrants counted in the 1980 census. Asians far outstrip Latin American immigrants in education, occupational status, and income and might be expected to assimilate in the same manner as earlier immigrant group did. Hispanic immigrants so far appear to favor cultural pluralism, maintaining their own culture and the Spanish language. Research in California indicates that recent Hispanic immigrants (legal and illegal) have helped preserve low-wage industries and agriculture. Illegal immigrants appear to draw more on public health and education services than they pay back in taxes. With or without immigration reform, population and economic pressures in Mexico and the Caribbean Basin ensure that the numbers of people seeking to enter the US are only likely to increase.     

Immigration and status exchange in Australia and the United States

This paper evaluates the status exchange hypothesis for Australia and the United States, two Anglophone nations with long immigration traditions whose admission regimes place different emphases on skills. Using log-linear methods, we demonstrate that foreign-born spouses trade educational credentials via marriage with natives in both Australian and U.S. marriage markets and, moreover, that nativity is a more salient marriage barrier for men than for women. With some exceptions, immigrant spouses in mixed nativity couples are better educated than native spouses in same nativity couples, but status exchange is more prevalent among the less-educated spouses in both countries. Support for the status exchange hypothesis is somewhat weaker in Australia partly because of lower average levels of education compared with the United States and partly because of the less sharply defined educational hierarchy at the postsecondary level.     

Immigration data and national population estimates for the United States

The immigration component in national population estimates is comparatively small, but it is not insignificant and may indeed be an important source of error. Therefore, it warrants the considera-tion of those concerned with population estimates. The paper considers alternative methods for deriving estimates of immigration from the raw data and presents estimates of net immigration from 1950 to 1965. They are developed from estimates previously published by the Bureau of the Census, but they differ at some points where new data have become available or where a review of the data has led to a change in judgment on how best to use them. The paper also presents suggestions on how immigration statistics might be altered for purposes of improving the estimates.Census data may be used to estimate net immigration by three different methods, but upon analysis each method proves to be inadequate. Hence, data based on visas surrendered at the port of entry must be the principal source of immigration estimates. These data have their limitations because (1) they do not cover net arrivals of citizens from abroad and from Puerto Rico, (2) they do not report departures of aliens, and (3) they do not allocate all immigrants to year of entry. Alien registration and passenger data offer possible alternative estimates.The paper attempts to measure unrecorded immigration, discusses how net arrivals of citizens from abroad and from Puerto Rico may be estimated, and how the age, sex, and race of immigrants may be treated.     

Francis A. Walker on Restriction of Immigration into the United States

The desirable size and characteristics of current immigrant inflows into the United States, numerically larger than those experienced by any other country in history, are the subject of vigorous debate. This debate has striking antecedents, not only in its passionate intensity but also in the specifics of the arguments enlisted. Reprinted below in full is an especially articulate expression of anti-immigration sentiments and reasoning written by the eminent late-nineteenth-century economist and statistician Francis Amasa Walker. It appeared, under the title “Restriction of Immigration,” in the June 1896 issue of Atlantic Monthly (Volume 77, no. 464, pp. 822–829). In the 1880s, as Walker notes in this article, more than 5 million foreigners entered US ports. Immigration was accelerating. The 1890 census recorded a total US population of 62.2 million; 9.2 million of these were foreign born. More than 97 percent of this immigrant population came from Europe and Canada. But the composition of immigrants by country of origin, hence by ethnic background, was changing, with southern and eastern Europe taking an increasingly larger share of the total. Regulations on the admissibility of immigrants did bar entry to some persons with personal characteristics deemed undesirable. Walker notes “gross and scandalous neglect” in enforcing even these rules, but his concern is not with the numerically small effect their strict application would entail. He argues for restricting immigration at large—for “protecting the American rate of wages, the American standard of living, and the quality of American citizenship from degradation.” He recognizes that “the prevailing sentiment of our people [is] to tolerate, to welcome, and to encourage immigration, without qualification and without discrimination,” but seeks to refute the rationale underpinning those sentiments. To counter the notion that immigration represents “a net reinforcement of our population,” he sets out the thesis, perhaps most memorably associated with his name, that sees immigration as “a replacement of native by foreign elements”—because it is a cause of the diminishing fertility of the receiving population. He also rejects a second pro-immigration argument, that immigration is necessary “in order to supply the country with a laboring class…able and willing to perform the lowest kind of work,” which native-born Americans now refuse to perform. Such refusal, Walker argues, is the consequence rather than the cause of large-scale immigration. Walker's positive argument for restricting immigration emphasizes four factors. With the closing of the frontier, land is no longer free for new occupants; mechanization of agriculture now requires less labor for farm production; immigration creates a general labor problem, including unrest and unemployment, formerly unknown in America; and the character of new immigrants is inferior to that of the native population. Walker's main concern is with this last factor. In earlier times, “the average immigrant…was among the most enterprising, thrifty, alert, adventurous, and courageous of the community from which he came,” and immigration was “almost exclusively from western and northern Europe.” With cheap railroad fares and ocean transport, this is no longer so. The new immigrants, increasingly from southern and eastern Europe, “have none of the inherited instincts and tendencies which made it comparatively easy to deal with the immigration of the olden time….They have none of the ideas and aptitudes which fit men to take up readily and easily the problem of self-care and self-government.” Immigration, thus, is menacing to America's “peace and political safety.” Communities are formed “in which only foreign tongues are spoken, and into which can steal no influence from our free institutions and from popular discussion.” On immigration, Walker concludes, “we should take a rest, and give our social, political, and industrial system some chance to recuperate.” Walker's advice was not heeded until the 1920s. Immigration to the US in the first decade of the twentieth century amounted to nearly 9 million. In recent decades there has been a resurgence in numbers, and in the decade of the 1990s immigration exceeded 9 million. With that influx came a reinvigorated immigration debate. In the arguments for restriction, immigration from Asia and especially Latin America now substitutes for that from southern and eastern Europe. Francis A. Walker (1840–97) had a distinguished career as a Union officer in the Civil War, reaching the rank of brigadier-general, as a civil servant in the federal government, and, most notably, as an economist and educator. He was superintendent of the 1870 and 1880 US censuses and served as professor of political economy at Yale (1872–80), president of the American Statistical Association (1882–96), first president of the American Economic Association (1885–92), and president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1881–96).     

Immigration and environmental emissions: A U.S. county-level analysis

This paper investigates the immigration–environment association using U.S. county-level data, for a subset of counties (N = ~200), and a model inspired by the STIRPAT approach. The analysis makes use of U.S. census data for the year 2000 reflecting U.S.-born and foreign-born populations, combined with county-level data reflecting emissions of CO₂, NO₂, PM₁₀, and SO₂. With a focus on approximately 200 primarily urban counties for which complete data are available, and after controlling for income, employment in the utilities and manufacturing sectors, and coal consumption for SO₂ estimations, few statistically significant associations emerge between population composition and emissions. Counties with a relatively larger U.S.-born population have higher NO₂ and SO₂ emissions. On the other hand, counties with a relatively higher number or share of foreign-born residents have lower SO₂ emissions. Although limited to cross-sectional analyses, the results provide a foundation for future longitudinal research on this important and controversial topic.     

The Quality of Life Among U.S. States

Categories of Schwartz and Mukherjee are used to select twelve measures with direct or indirect influence on QoL of the 50 States and the D.C. Included are such recognized indicators as health, housing, longevity, a toxic-free environment, crime, etc. From a factor analysis of these data, four factors emerge, identified as Security, Mastery, Harmony and Autonomy. Three partially-independent measures provide verification of the QoL measures: the KIDS COUNT Index, the Southern Regional Council QoL of workers Index and a state-by-state Stress Index. I then test hypotheses relating to QoL: the economic hypothesis that the production of wealth enhances welfare (QoL), a demographic hypotheses concerning migration and urbanization, an hypothesis that religious adherents influence QoL, and psychological hypothesis that a better QoL generates less stress, and others.     

Environmental Quality in the U.S. States

This analysis of data on environmental quality differentials in the U.S. states shows, first, that the many physical measures of the environment in the U. S. states form two coherent factors: pollution (which became the criterion variable for the study) and waste management. Likewise, budget allocations for the environment reduce to 'contemporary' and 'traditional' expenditures. The former type, along with per capita miles driven and the proportion of the population in metropolitan centers, were used as control variables in tests of three explanatory models: 'industrial capitalism', 'sectoral political economy' and 'sociological structuralism.' No one of these explanations was completely supported by the regression analyses. Therefore, a factor analysis of 16 measures of structure and environmental policy characteristics was run that generated three types of state structure: industrial, high-change and commercial. The first and third types proved to be strong predictors, positive and negative respectively, of pollution level. The major implication of these findings is that social structure, policy and pollution levels are inextricably intertwined.     

Divergent Paths of Immigration Politics in the United States and Australia

The United States and Australia converged by the mid‐1980s on receptive and expan sive immigration policies reflecting “client” politics. Australia has since pursued a more restrictive and selective course while the United States has resisted pressures toward such a stance. The authors account for these differences by assessing the theoretical perspectives of interests, rights, and states. Conflicts among groups with direct interests in policy outcomes are the principal source of immigration politics, but a comparison of the roles of rights and state institutions helps explain peculiarities of the two cases. The distinctive Australian policy trajectory is shaped by greater volatility of public opinion about immigration and multiculturalism, and by political institutions that are more responsive to popular sentiment.     

The impact of U.S. immigration upon internal migration

The potential adverse effect of immigrants on job opportunities for natives continues to influence debate about immigration policy in the United States. Many studies have examined wage and employment outcomes; by contrast, we examine internal migration. We ask whether or not natives are more likely to depart from or less likely to move to metropolitan areas with high concentrations of immigrants. After controlling for other influences on migration, we find that metropolitan areas with higher concentrations of immigrants have only slightly lower rates of inmigration of natives. Such metropolitan areas also exhibit slightly lower rates of out-migration, contrary to expectation. These results suggest that the effect of immigrants on labor market redistribution of natives is modest.Research reported here was supported by a grant from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. We would like to thank Kofi Benefo for helpful comments.     

70年代以来美国国内人口迁移态势与成因分析

美国人口密度相对较小 ,自然增长缓慢 ,机械变动大 ,外来人口补充了其劳动力资源。 90年代以来 ,美国国内的人口迁移呈下降趋势 ,迁移规律表现为 :1 向西部、向南部向阳光地带流动 ;2 向大都市区流动 ;3 由城市向市郊转移 ,向乡间转移。其迁移规律表现为 :短距离迁移者多 ,租房户迁移多 ,2 0 - 30岁的年轻人迁移者多。形成这一态势的原因有三 :市场结构性的变化、经济利益的驱动和文化生态因素     

Guestworker programs: Evidence from Europe and the United States and some implications for U.S. policy

Mounting concern in the United States over increased illegal migration from Mexico during the past decade has generated a heated policy debate and led to a number of proposals as to how the U.S. government should deal with the problem. Among these has been a call for a temporary worker program similar to the U.S.-sponsored Bracero Program (1942–1964) in which over 4 million Mexican workers were recruited to perform temporary agricultural labor in the southwestern United States. This article considers the implications of such a program by examining the social and economic effects of previous guestworker programs in the United States and western Europe from the perspective of both sending and receiving societies. Particular attention is paid to the efficacy of these programs in promoting temporary as opposed to long-term immigration of foreign workers as well as their developmental impact on sending countries.Now at 2405 Rayburn House Office Building, U.S. House of Representatives, Washington DC 20515.     

Immigration and males' earnings inequality in the regions of the United States

In this paper I investigate the impact of recent immigration on males' earnings distributions in the major regions of the United States. I use six counterfactual scenarios to describe alternative regional skill distributions and wage structures for the population of natives and long-term immigrants in the absence of recent immigration. I find that immigration over the last three decades can account for a substantial portion of the variation in inequality across the regions. Recent immigration has contributed moderately to national growth in males' earnings inequality, primarily by changing the composition of the population.     

The Dual Role of Race and Immigration Among Ascending Neighborhoods in U.S. Metropolitan Areas

Population Research and Policy Review - The racial/ethnic and socioeconomic diversity of immigrants to the United States has grown since the 1990s, along with growing neighborhood socioeconomic...     

Immigration policies and trends: A comparison of Canada and the United States

This paper discusses recent migration to North America with reference to the 1962 and 1967 Canadian immigration regulations and the 1965 United States Immigration and Nationality Act. Despite the similar emphasis on manpower and kinship criteria as the basis for the admission of immigrants, differences between Canada and the United States exist with respect to the importance of immigration for the respective economies, the organization of immigration, the formal regulations, and the size and composition of migrant streams. After an examination of the volume, origin, and occupational composition of immigration to Canada and the United States, flows between the two countries are studied. The paper concludes with a scrutiny of changes in immigration regulations which are pending in both countries.     

On the auspices of female migration from Mexico to the United States

In this paper we examine the circumstances and determinants of female migration between Mexico and the United States. Using data from the Mexican Migration Project, we considered the relative timing of males' and females' moves northward. We then estimated logit and probit models to study the determinants of male and female out-migration; among women we also estimated a multinomial logit model to uncover differences in the process of migration for work versus not for work. We found that women almost always followed other family members, either the husband or a parent; only a tiny minority initiated migration independently. Although males also are quite likely to be introduced to migration by a parent, nearly half of all male migrants left for the United States before or without a wife or a parent. Estimates of the determinants of migration suggested that males move for employment, whereas wives generally are motivated by family reasons. Daughters, however, display a greater propensity to move for work, and the determinants of their work-related moves closely resemble those of sons and fathers.     

Beyond the Border and Into the Heartland: Spatial Patterning of U.S. Immigration Detention

The expansion of U.S. immigration enforcement from the borders into the interior of the country and the fivefold increase in immigration detentions and deportations since 1995 raise important questions about how the enforcement of immigration law is spatially patterned across American communities. Focusing on the practice of immigration detention, the present study analyzes the records of all 717,160 noncitizens detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in 2008 and 2009—a period when interior enforcement was at its peak—to estimate states’ detention rates and examine geographic variation in detention outcomes, net of individual characteristics. Findings reveal substantial state heterogeneity in immigration detention rates, which range from approximately 350 detentions per 100,000 noncitizens in Connecticut to more than 6,700 detentions per 100,000 noncitizens in Wyoming. After detainment, individuals’ detention outcomes are geographically stratified, especially for detainees eligible for pretrial release. These disparities indicate the important role that geography plays in shaping individuals’ chances of experiencing immigration detention and deportation.