The hidden majority/minority consensus: Minorities show similar preference patterns of immigrant support as the majority population

The acceptance of new arrivals has become an important topic regarding the social cohesion of the receiving countries. However, previous studies focused only on the native population's drivers of attitudes towards immigrants, disregarding that immigrant-origin inhabitants now form a considerable part of the population. To test whether the drivers for the willingness to support immigrants are the same for natives and immigrants and their descendants, we rely on a vignette study conducted in a representative German online panel (N = 3149) which contains an overrepresentation of immigrant-origin respondents. We presented participants with three vignettes of potential immigrants, varying, amongst other factors, economic prospects, safe and war-ridden countries of origin (to capture deservingness), as well as religious identity. While we find that minority members are generally slightly more welcoming towards immigrants than majority members, at their core are the same factors that drive attitudes to immigrants in both groups: economic cost, cultural similarity, and deservingness. However, we observe differences at the margins: Immigrant-origin respondents take into account economic prospects to a lesser degree than majority members do, and by trend, they are less likely to distinguish between immigrants from war-ridden and safe countries of origin. Furthermore, we can show that the preference for immigrants with the same religious identities not only occurs among majority members but also among minority members.     

Nationality Policies in the Books and in Practice: Comparing Immigrant Naturalisation across Europe

This article explores whether differences in the implementation of nationality laws explain gaps between nationality laws and nationality acquisition across Europe. Previous research confirms that nationality acquisition among the foreign-born in Western European countries is largely determined by the inclusiveness of nationality policies and the characteristics of the immigrant population. Drawing on recent data on nationality procedures across Europe, this article argues that, regardless of the nationality laws in place, nationality procedures create major obstacles for different types of immigrants. This article uses data from the European Social Survey to conduct multi-level analysis of nationality acquisition in 17 European countries among long-settled foreign-born adult arrivals, controlling for their individual, origin and destination country characteristics. The analysis finds that nationality procedures are as important as nationality laws for nationality acquisition among most immigrants living in Europe today, especially for immigrants who are most likely to benefit and apply: immigrants from developing countries.     

Muslim religious accommodations in Western Europe: Do multicultural policies impact religiosity levels among Muslims,Catholics and Protestants?

How do religious accommodations for Muslim minorities shape religiosity levels among Muslims minorities? Answering this question is critical in the contemporary period, as Western European countries have experienced greater diversity in religious affiliations due to immigration. In this article, we address this question by analysing individual data across multiple waves of the European Social Survey (ESS). Our analysis improves on existing studies in that it (1) incorporates a greater number of countries than prior studies, (2) covers a historically novel period of religious accommodations for Muslim minorities and (3) more effectively controls for unmeasured country and time‐invariant processes than previous research. We find that in countries that have instituted greater religious accommodations, Muslim respondents generally report higher levels of religiosity. Interestingly, we also find that the greater institutionalization of religious accommodations for Muslims also impacts the subjective religiosity levels of Protestant majorities. We find no effect for Catholic respondents.     

The impact of generation and country of origin on the mental health of children of immigrants

The authors reexamine the study of generational differences in adjustment among the children of immigrants by arguing that the country of origin defines and shapes the adaptation process across generations. Using a sample of children in Toronto, the authors demonstrate that generational differences in the mental health of children occur only in families from countries of origin at the lowest levels of economic development. Among those at the lowest levels of economic development, a mental health advantage in the first generation evolves to a disadvantage in the 2.5 generation relative to third or later generational children. Children from backgrounds characterized by higher economic development show no initial or eventual differences from the native born. Using data from the Toronto Study of Intact Families, the authors are able to explain differences among children from low economic development backgrounds specifically in terms of increasing family conflict and decreasing school involvement across generations.     

Immigrants' health in Europe: a cross-classified multilevel approach to examine origin country, destination country, and community effects

In this study, we examined origin, destination, and community effects on first- and second-generation immigrants' health in Europe. We used information from the European Social Surveys (2002–2008) on 19,210 immigrants from 123 countries of origin, living in 31 European countries. Cross-classified multilevel regression analyses reveal that political suppression in the origin country and living in countries with large numbers of immigrant peers have a detrimental influence on immigrants' health. Originating from predominantly Islamic countries and good average health among natives in the destination country appear to be beneficial. Additionally, the results point toward health selection mechanisms into migration.     

Does Poverty Among Immigrants Adapt to Country of Residence? Turks in Germany and Denmark

We use data on Turkish immigrants in two European welfare states, Denmark and Germany, and data on Turks at home. Unlike in most studies of immigrant poverty, we thus control for the differences in immigrant composition. Denmark and Germany have different welfare state types, labour market structure and institutions. We find that in both countries Turkish immigrants have much higher poverty rates than natives. We perform Fairlie decompositions to find that in Denmark, compared to Germany, a larger part of the native‐immigrant poverty difference is explained by market valuation of characteristics and by unobservables. Finally, we decompose poverty by subgroups and find that certain immigrant subgroups (such as families with children and the elderly) are especially vulnerable in both countries and that not much has changed in the two countries between 2008 and 2013 in terms of the vulnerability of these sub‐groups to poverty risk.     

The Canada-United States joint immigration study: issues in data comparability

The Canada-US immigration project is an attempt to assess carefully the flows, trends, and characteristics of immigrants between the 2 countries. The primary focus for data is the census information derived from the 1980 US and 1981 Canadian censuses. Some observations of the comparison follow. 1) US-born immigrants tend to migrate later. 2) Immigrants have an older age structure than the total population. 3) The sex ratio pattern is similar with older migrants having lower ratios. 4) Immigration of elderly/retired is not a common pattern. 5) Changes in regional destinations is a basic feature of immigration flows. The destination of US immigrants shifted over time from northern states to southern states. Destinations of Canadian immigrants shifted over time from Quebec and prairie provinces to Ontario and British Columbia. 6) A higher proportion of US immigrants ever married and were widowed; higher proportions of Canadian immigrants divorced, and lower proportions separated. These aspects reflect age structure. 7) US immigrants' fertility is similar to the US population in general; Canadian immigrants' fertility is similar to the Canadian population in general. 8) US immigrants born in Canada have a considerably higher attainment. 9) Males aged 16-64 among US immigrants born in Canada have a consistently higher labor force participation rate. 10) Professional specialty occupations increase in importance in the 1975-1980 period in both countries. 11) Incomes of recent immigrants who were full-time, year-round workers from Canada or the US were well above the incomes of the native populations of either country. Comparability had to be examined in light of the variations built into the 2 censuses. Some of these issues are: 1) differences in sampling and collection methods, 2) differences in under/over-enumeration, 3) misreporting of country of birth, 4) differences in questions used, 5) different editing and imputation procedures applied, 6) variations in residence rules, and 7) the exclusion or inclusion of certain groups in the national census counts.     

Earning Disparities between Immigrants and Native‐born Canadians*

La contribution économique des immigrants est mesurée par l'am‐pleur de leurs salaires. Plus on diminue l'écart des salaires, plus les immigrants sont sensés se doter du capital humain. En utilisant les données du recensement de 1996, cet article compare des groupes d'immigrants avec des Canadiens de naissance de même sexe et de même origine raciale à quatre niveaux de la région métropolitaine de recensement, définie par la taille de la population. Les résultats indiquent que les immigrants de même sexe et de même origine raciale gagnent soit le même salaire sinon plus que leurs homologues canadiens. Cependant, en prenant en considération les variations dans le capital humain, l'expérience, les différences dans l'échelle urbaine, la taille de la population immigrante et le taux de chômage, tout groupe d'immigrants gagne moins que son homologue canadien. L'ampleur des salaires nets entre les immigrants et les Canadiens de naissance varie selon le sexe, l'origine raciale et moins ainsi selon le niveau de la région metropolitaine de recensement. Plusieurs fac‐teurs, dont les possibilités d'emploi inégales, touchent le salaire des immigrants. II n'est pas du tout évident de supposer que la teneur du capital humain des immigrants est inférieure alors qu'elle est déduite de la disparité de salaires. The economic contribution of immigrants is often measured by their earnings in that the closer they are to the earnings of native‐born Canadians and the more quickly immigrants can bridge the income gap, the more immigrants are assumed to be endowed with human capital. Using microdata of the 1996 census, this paper compares immigrant groups with native‐born Canadians of the same gender and racial origin at four levels of Census Metropolitan Area defined by population size. The findings indicate that immigrants of the same gender and racial origin earned either the same or more than their native‐born counterparts. However, when variations in human capital, experience, and other individual differences in work‐related characteristics and immigrant experience are taken into account, along with differences in urban scale, immigrant population size and unemployment rate, all immigrant groups earned less than their native‐born counterparts. The magnitude of net earning disparities between immigrants and native‐born Canadians varies, depending on gender, racial origin and less so on CMA level. The study suggests that many factors, including unequal opportunities, affect the earnings of immigrants, and that the assumption of immigrants' inferior human capital content inferred from earning disparities is tenuous at best.     

The Second Generation in Europe

The study of integration processes has now reached a crucial stage in most Western European countries with the emergence of the second generation. The oldest children born to postwar immigrants on European soil have recently entered the job market, and we can now investigate their performance in both education and employment. This opens a unique opportunity to compare the situations of second generation migrants across countries. Ostensibly the children all have the same starting position, being born in the country of settlement. The intriguing question is how differences between immigrant groups, and also differences in national contexts, work to the benefit or detriment of the second generation. We discuss the first issue briefly, confining ourselves here to Turkish and Moroccan immigrants. In addressing the issue of national contexts, we focus primarily on policies and practices rather than on broad‐reaching national integration models. We examine in detail the integration process itself in the context of vital institutional arrangements such as the education system and the mechanisms for transition to the labor market. How do such arrangements differ between countries, and how do they affect the outcomes for the second generation?     

Modernization and the gender gap in religiosity: Evidence from cross-national European surveys

The tendency of women to be more religious than men has been widely observed. Many theories have been offered to account for this difference, with explanations ranging from the biological to the sociological; no consensus on the explanation has been reached. Using data from the European Social Survey, the European Values Study and the International Social Survey Programme, in conjunction with a new method for measuring the gender gap, we compare different countries, generations and periods in Europe to address three key questions: (1) How much do the differences between men and women depend on what indicator of religiosity (e.g. affiliation, attendance, prayer, belief) is being considered? (2) Is there an association at the national level between the size of the gender gap and the degree of secularization or gender equality? (3) Is there a convergence in the religiosity of men and women across generations or over time? There is some evidence for such a narrowing of the gap in Europe—most noticeably in southern and Eastern Europe—but substantial differences persist. Even in countries that are comparatively secular and where gender inequality has been much reduced, women are considerably more likely than men to identify with a religion, to call themselves religious, and to participate in public and private religious activities.     

Fertility variation among the U.S. foreign stock population in 1900

In the late 19th century, the US population included a large number of 1st and 2nd generation immigrants from European countries, often with relatively high fertility levels. This article investigates the degree to which fertility behavior changed as a result of social structural characteristics of the environment such as urbanization and children's role, the diffusion of fertility values and information from the native population, and the role of cultural values or resistance to change. By 1900 nationality groups within urban and rural environments in the US were showing amazingly similar degrees of adaptation in fertility patterns. Distinctive fertility patterns were being maintained over generations, but there appeared to be little inherence in the national culture or mentalities of the various European populations which retarded the speed of reproductive change, or even the legitimacy of smaller families. The clear continuing variations by nationality in fertility were geared to reflect social structural differences such as agricultural background and the functional role of children, rather than unique cultural outlooks. Even within the 1st generation, fertility variation across states responded in a regular manner to social structural factors, such as the agricultural orientation of the population and the importance of child labor. Other evidence suggests that some diffusion of fertility values must have been occurring from the native white to the foreign born population, especially within the urban parts of the US where greater contact was probably facilitated. The foreign born seemed particularly resistant to adoption of low fertility behavior in rural states where they comprised a significant segment of the population, and thus were probably able to isolate themselves more easily. These results do not support the notion of relative unique cultural adaptation. It may be that studies of the European transition have placed too much emphasis on cultural mentalities within various populations as a cause of different reproductive trends.     

The demographic and socio-economic characteristics of post-1965 immigrants to New York City: a comparative analysis by national origin

This article analyses and compares the demographic and socio‐economic characteristics of persons born abroad who immigrated to New York City after 1965 and still lived in the City in 1990. Using data from the 1990 Census, we classify persons into the twenty four largest national origin groups and compare their demographic and socio‐economic characteristics (sex, age, educational attainment, labour force participation, unemployment, occupation, income, and poverty). We pose and answer three empirical questions. The first question is: what are some of the main differences by national origin in the composition of persons immigrating to New York City after 1965? The second question is: what are some of the main differences in the location of post‐1965 immigrants in New York's socio‐economic structure? The third question is: what are some of the main differences in the economic rewards received by persons who immigrated to New York City since 1965? We find that immigrants with less than a high school education have higher labour force participation rates than the US‐born population in the same educational category and also have slightly higher earnings. Immigrants with a high school degree have labour force participation rates close to (or slightly higher than) the average for the US‐born population but their incomes are slightly lower than the average income for the US‐born population. Immigrants with a college degree have participation rates similar or slightly lower that those of the US‐born population while their earnings are significantly lower that those of US‐born college graduates.     

The Great Recession and the Allure of New Immigrant Destinations in the United States

In the 1990s, the immigrant population in the United States dispersed to non‐traditional settlement locations (what have become known as “new immigrant destinations”). This paper examines whether the allure of new destinations persisted in the 2000s with a particular focus on the internal migration of the foreign‐born during the recent deep recessionary period and its aftermath. Three specific questions motivate the analysis. First, are immigrants, much like the U.S.‐born population, becoming less migratory within the country over time? Second, is immigrant dispersal from traditional gateways via internal migration continuing despite considerable economic contraction in many new destination metropolitan areas? Third, is immigration from aboard a substitute for what appears to be declining immigrant internal migration to new destinations? The findings reveal a close correlation between the declining internal migration propensity of the U.S.‐born and immigrants in the last two decades. We also observe parallels between the geographies of migration of native‐ and foreign‐born populations with both groups moving to similar metropolitan areas in the 1990s. This redistributive association, however, weakened in the subsequent decade as new destination metropolitan areas lost their appeal for both groups, especially immigrants. There is no evidence to suggest that immigration from abroad is substituting for the decline in immigrant redistribution through internal migration to new destinations. Across destination types, the relationship between immigration from abroad and the internal migration of the foreign‐born remained the same during and after the Great Recession as in the period immediately before it.     

Are immigrants and natives perfect substitutes in production?

This article discusses whether immigrant and native labor are perfect substitutes in production when conventional measures of skill and demographic characteristics are held constant. The ratio of immigrant to native labor and the ratio of immigrant to native earnings are studied in 5 major immigrant receiving countries with other variables held constant. Countries included are 1) the US and Britian, where the foreign born are only about 5% to 6% of the adult male labor force; 2) Canada and Australia, where they are about 20% and 30%, respectively; and 3) Israel, where the foreign born are about 3/4 of the Jewish adult male labor force. The relative earnings of adult male immigrants and the adult male native-born sons of immigrants are found to be lower when the labor supply of immigrants is greater. The estimated elasticity of substitution between immigrant and native labor is high, but significantly less than infinity. Workers who are relatively more intensively in the favorable self selection characteristics of immigrants are not perfect substitutes for workers relatively more intensive in country-specific skills. As immigrants increase in the labor force, their relative earnings tend to fall, although the decline is small. Economies have sufficiently flexible markets and develop institutional arrangements to mitigate the relative fail in immigrant earnings as their relative supply increase.     

When in Rome,Do as the Romans Do: The Acculturation of Generalized Trust among Immigrants in Western Europe

The purpose of the article is to examine whether an acculturation of trust takes place among non-western immigrants upon migrating to Western Europe and whether inclusionary integration policies have an effect on this process. Building on the second and third wave of the European Social Survey (ESS) we show that an acculturation of trust does take place, but that integration policy does not affect this process. In spite of some variation across destination countries, we also find that second generation immigrants tend to adapt more to the level of trust of natives in the destination country than first generation immigrants do. This indicates that the acculturation of trust is strengthened with the second generation in the country. The results hold up when controlling for confounding variables including the trust in the country of origin of immigrants.     

Global economic restructuring and international migration: some observations based on the Mexican and Central American experience

"The purpose of this article is to explore the relationship between processes of global economic restructuring and international migration through an examination of Mexican and Central American immigration to the U.S. and the experiences of Central American and Mexican immigrants in the U.S. This relationship is analysed as one of mutual causation: on the one hand, global restructuring affects conditions in both sending and receiving countries (it is not only a factor in emigration but also in the economic and political receptivity to immigrants at their point of destination); on the other, international migration in turn has an important impact on countries of origin, receiving countries, and the relationship between them." (SUMMARY IN FRE AND SPA)     

The Human Capital Characteristics and Household Living Standards of Returning International Migrants in Eastern and Southern Africa

Africa’s experience with return migration is not new. However, few empirical studies have examined the social and economic characteristics of returning migrants within the continent. In this study, the human capital endowments and household living standards of returning migrants in Uganda and South Africa are examined using recently available data. The study compares returnees in both countries with immigrants as well as the native‐born population with no international migration experience. It also investigates how factors such as previous country of residence, year of arrival, and other demographic factors predict levels of education and living standards among returning migrants. In Uganda, the results show that recently arrived returning migrants had better educational endowments than both immigrants and non‐migrants. Migrants who returned to Uganda following the fall of Idi Amin’s regime had the lowest educational levels and lowest living standards compared to other returnees. Furthermore, the results indicate that previous residence in countries in the West was associated with four additional years of schooling while returning migrants arriving from other African countries had the lowest levels of schooling among returning migrants. In South Africa, the study finds that returnees arriving almost immediately following the end of Apartheid had the highest levels of education compared to either immigrants or non‐migrants. Returnees on average also had the highest household living standards in South Africa. Among South African immigrants, the results indicate that those arriving towards the end of the century had lower educational endowments compared to immigrants who arrived in the country two to four years after the end of Apartheid.     

Immigrant unemployment: the Australian experience

"Between 1980 and 1996 both male and female immigrants experienced higher unemployment rates than Australia-born workers....A multivariate analysis is used in this article to examine unemployment rate differentials between Australia-born and immigrants from English-speaking countries and immigrants from non-English-speaking countries. A feature of the analysis is decomposition of unemployment rate differences between birthplace groups into a component attributable to the different characteristics of the birthplace groups (e.g. different mean levels of education) and a part that is viewed as an impact associated simply with being foreign born." (EXCERPT)     

The Cost of Not Being Christian: Hindus,Sikhs and Muslims in Britain and Canada

This article compares foreign born Hindus, Sikhs and Muslims to native born white Christians on four economic outcomes in two nations: Britain and Canada. For Canada, our data come from the 1991 Census, for Britain from the Fourth National Survey of Ethnic Minorities (1994). Theory and research lead us to predict that, ceteris paribus, non‐Christians will fare better in Canada on three of the four outcomes. In the main, however, this expectation does not hold up. Compared to their British counterparts, Canada's Muslims fare less well on labor force participation and Canada's Hindus and Sikhs less well on unemployment. Compared to their Canadian counterparts, British Muslims fare less well on unemployment. On occupation and earnings, we detect no cross‐national differences. To explain the paucity of cross‐national disparities, we draw on Reitz's argument that Canada's reputation as an attractive immigrant destination has been exaggerated. To explain the few differences we do find, we emphasize cross‐national differences in religious discrimination and our inability to control adequately for differences in sending countries.