The industrial division of labor among immigrants and internal migrants to the Los Angeles economy

This study examined the industrial division of labor among immigrants and in-migrants in the Los Angeles, California, metropolitan area. It addresses debates about channeling of new arrivals into jobs among similar ethnic groups and human capital views. Data were obtained from the 1990 Census on resident native-born, resident foreign-born, in-migrants, and recent immigrants who arrived during 1985-90. Light and Rosenstein's (1995) concepts of groups and their resources were used to organize ideas about ethnic networks and their effectiveness in channeling migrant workers into 15 industrial sectors. Sectoral differences were revealed with the familiarity index of dissimilarity. Findings reveal that social networks were the strongest for Koreans, who supplied work for recent arrivals in the same sectors as Korean-born residents, regardless of education. Mexican new arrivals were less likely to work in the same sectors as their resident Mexican counterparts. Mexican networks placed new arrivals in durable manufacturing in the 1960s and 1970s when it was a key source of employment. By the 1980s and 1990s, the economy shifted and employment went down in durable manufacturing. Mexicans thus found employment elsewhere. Native White and Black in-migrants had the strongest channeling into same sector jobs. This is attributed to the small streams, the ability of the labor market to absorb these workers, and the availability of job vacancies among native out-migrants. Filipino migrants had similar patterns as Whites and Blacks. Mexican and Central American residents had more inter-ethnic competition over jobs than Whites or Blacks.     

Migration from Latin American countries to the United States: the economic,social and reproductive lives of Hispanic female immigrants, 1980

The authors describe the socioeconomic characteristics and fertility patterns of female immigrants from Latin America to the United States, with a focus on reasons for fertility differentials. "Using the one per cent public use sample from the 1970 and 1980 United States census, we first compare changes in socio economic characteristics from 1970 to 1980, and then examine the determinants of fertility of female immigrants to the United States, aged 16-49, from four Latin American areas or countries of birth.... The findings...suggest that there are direct effects of demographic, assimilation, and socioeconomic variables beyond those mediated by the variables in each of these sets. Further, regardless of the model, the effect of the clusters of demographic characteristics is most apparent. Age categories and marital status are the strongest indexed determinants of immigrant fertility.... The effect of education and employment is strong. Among assimilation variables, duration of residence and language ability are significant determinants of Hispanic immigrant fertility." (SUMMARY IN FRE AND SPA)     

The Marital Status of Recent Mexican Immigrants in the United States in 1980 and 19901

Using Public Use Microdata Samples, we analyze the temporal marriage patterns of recent Mexican immigrants in the United States, and relate these patterns to socioeconomic and political events, such as U.S. immigration reform, increasing returns to skill, and rising incentives for unattached Mexicans to migrate during the 1980s. Our findings indicate that recent Mexican immigrants (particularly men) were less likely to be married within five years of migrating in 1990 than their counterparts had been in 1980. An empirical extension further suggests that the relative endogamy odds among Mexican immigrants who migrated to the United States by 1980 increased during the next decade. Such demographic changes may affect policies involving issues such as education, welfare and retirement.     

Potential labor force supply and replacement in Mexico and the states of the Mexican Cession and Texas: 1980-2000

"The purpose of this article is to carry forward the examination of potential labor force supply and replacement of men in Mexico into the 1980-1990 and 1990-2000 decades so that the possible future course of international migration between that country and the United States may be better anticipated. In addition, to provide a degree of developmental perspective, trends in potential labor force supply and replacement in Mexico since 1930-40 are presented." As a contrast, "ratios of potential labor force supply and replacement in the southwestern United States--the states of the Mexican Cession and Texas, which were formerly part of Mexico--also are shown for the 1980-1990 and 1990-2000 intervals." The results suggest that "in Mexico, the projected number of males entering the labor force ages will be about 48 percent larger in the 1980s than in the 1970s.... Fertility declined significantly in Mexico in the 1970s, and therefore the number of new entrants to the labor force ages in the 1990s will decline...." The implications for international migration between Mexico and the United States are considered.     

Assessing the differences in distance of interstate migration, 1980

"This study examines distance of 1975-80 interstate migration [in the United States] and several explanations for the relations between distance and characteristic of migrants and locations.... Observations are individual records from the 1980 one-in-ten-thousand PUMS files. The sample is restricted to nonblack, noninstitutionalized head of households, age 25 to 64 in 1980.... We find outmigration is shaped by characteristics of individuals; however, distance of migration is shaped by characteristics at locations. Findings lend support to an interpretation of distance reflecting psychic costs and information and are consistent with a cost/benefit view of factors contributing to distance of migration."     

Current trends and patterns of female migration: evidence from Mexico

"This study uses a new source of data to assess trends and patterns of female migration from Mexico. Data were collected from migrants interviewed in ten Mexican communities from 1987 through 1990, as well as from outmigrants from those communities who were later located in the United States. The first part of the analysis examines changes in migrant behavior throughout the 1980s by estimating trends in the probability of first-time and repeat migration and by assessing the impact of the Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) on these trends.... The study then considers the determinants of female Mexican-U.S. migration by examining whether and how women's recent moves reflect their personal characteristics, the resources in their households, or a process of family reunification." This paper was originally presented at the 1992 Annual Meeting of the Population Association of America.     

Race,Gender, and Class in the Persistence of the Mariel Stigma Twenty Years after the Exodus from Cuba

The study examines the mediating effects of gender, race, and class in the Mariel Cuban immigrant adaptation process. It explores the significance of the Mariel identity by comparing the experiences of pre‐1980 arrivals with those of the Mariel cohort (1980–1981) and post‐Mariel arrivals (1982–1990, 1990–2000). The central question of the study is the extent to which the Marielitos’ experience as a group with stigmatization and being labeled as “different” and pathological has persisted in having a different effect on their adaptation to the U.S. from that of other Cuban arrivals before and after Mariel. This study bases its definition of stigma on sociologically grounded theoretical orientation of the construction of a social identity in which a dominant group(s) attribute an undesired difference from what was anticipated to an out‐group such that it leads to varieties of discrimination that reduce one's life chances.     

Chinese Immigrants in the U.S. Labor Market: Effects of Post‐Tiananmen Immigration Policy1

The Tiananmen Square protests in 1989 and ensuing government crackdown affected Chinese nationals not only at home but also around the world. The U.S. government responded to the events in China by enacting multiple measures to protect Chinese nationals present in the United States. It first suspended all forced departures among Chinese nationals present in the country as of June 1989 and later gave them authorization to work legally. The Chinese Student Protection Act, passed in October 1992, made those Chinese nationals eligible for lawful permanent resident status. These actions applied to about 80,000 Chinese nationals residing in the United States on student or other temporary visas or illegally. Receiving permission to work legally and then a green card is likely to have affected recipients’ labor market outcomes. This study uses 1990 and 2000 census data to examine employment and earnings among Chinese immigrants who were likely beneficiaries of the U.S. government’s actions. Relative to immigrants from Hong Kong, Taiwan, and South Korea – countries not covered by the post‐Tiananmen immigration policy measures – highly educated immigrants from mainland China experienced significant employment and earnings gains during the 1990s. Chinese immigrants who arrived in the U.S in time to benefit from the measures also had higher relative earnings in 2000 than Chinese immigrants who arrived too late to benefit. The results suggest that getting legal work status and then a green card has a significant positive effect on skilled migrants’ labor market outcomes.     

Negotiating multiple boundaries: diasporic Hong Kong identities in the United States

The 1997 return of the British colony Hong Kong to mainland China has prompted the largest exodus of Hong Kong migrants to western countries such as Australia, Canada and the United States in the 1980s and 1990s. While the transnational capital accumulation and life strategies of Hong Kong business elites has been well documented, little has been written on pre-1997 Hong Kong immigrants who are from non-elite backgrounds. Based on ethnographic research in Chicago, this article explores the flexibility and multifarious nature of identity construction among two generations of Hong Kong immigrants: those who arrived in the United States during the 1960s-1970s and those who did during the 1980s -1990s. I identify class positioning in the Chinese disaporic community and racialization experience in the larger U.S. society as two important factors in mediating the boundary making strategies of different groups of Hong Kong immigrants.     

Military Brides and Refugees: Vietnamese American Wives and Shifting Links to the Military, 1980 – 2000

Since the immigration legislation of 1965, marriage to American citizens and resident aliens has been one of the primary paths for migration to the United States. Despite the rapid growth of the Asian American population over the course of the late twentieth century, Asian Americans had still reached only 3 per cent of all Americans by 2000, meaning that Asian marriage migration to the United States has been largely through marriage to non‐Asians. In this study, we look at exogamy among Vietnamese Americans using U. S. Census data (1980, 1990, and 2000) from 5 per cent PUMS sets made available through the IPUMS project. We ask: (1) What are the predictors of exogamy among Vietnamese Americans? (2) How do the rates of exogamy of Vietnamese American women compare to those of Vietnamese American men? (3) How have the predictors of exogamy and the apparent characteristics of the exogamously married changed over the decades of refugee movement from Vietnam to North America? We review data from the years 1980, 1990, and 2000. In the assimilationist view of immigration associated with the classic work of Milton M. Gordon, exogamy is the final stage of immigrant incorporation into a host country. Migration through marriage, which has become a major source of immigration to the United States since the Immigration Act of 1965, reverses this assimilationist pattern, placing marriage before immigration and incorporation, or at the earliest stages of immigration and incorporation. Our findings are relevant to understanding the specific Vietnamese experience in the United States. They highlight the continuing but declining importance of the Vietnam War in creating close connections between Vietnamese and other people in the United States, even after the war had ended. The findings also suggest how these connections changed as a result of Vietnamese mass migration to America.     

Employment predictors among Indochinese refugees

"The influx of Indochinese refugees into the United States since 1975 has forced policy development in various resettlement areas. Considerable emphasis has been placed on employment and employment barriers. This article investigates the refugee employment process. A multivariate model is used to distinguish employed from unemployed refugees. Early arrivals, recent arrivals, and each of the four major ethnic groups are investigated separately."     

Undocumented residents in the United States in 1990: issues of uncertainty in quantification

"Uncertainties are abundant about the measurement of net undocumented migration [to the United States] and change over the past two decades. This analysis presents possible upper and lower boundaries on components for estimating legal migration in 1980-1989 and on the foreign-born population in 1990. Positing ranges for net undocumented immigration, between 2 million and 4 million undocumented residents may have been counted in the 1990 census. The total number of undocumented residents may have been as high as 6 million."     

Chicano return migration to the Southwest: an integrated human capital approach

"This study uses an integrated human capital framework to examine the relationship between human capital, employment and ethnic factors and return migration to the Southwest [United States] among Chicanos. The sample used in the study is derived from the 1980 Public Use Microdata Samples and contains 1,926 Chicano householders between the ages of 25 and 64 who were born in one of five southwest states, lived outside of this region in 1975, and worked in the civilian labor force at any time between 1975 and 1980. The results suggest that various human capital, employment and ethnic composition variables are important predictors of Chicano return migration."     

Consequences of return migrant status for employment in Puerto Rico

"At the aggregate level, return migrants in Puerto Rico in 1970 and 1980 faced greater employment-related difficulties, as compared with nonmigrants. This article explores the individual-level relationship of return migrant status to employment outcomes. The conceptual framework takes into consideration local and regional contextual factors, particularly the employment conditions prevailing in Puerto Rico during this period. Within this framework, specific hypotheses suggest a negative influence of return migrant status.... The findings substantiate the hypotheses for both census years and indicate the importance of the duration of residence in the United States and the timing of the return move as mediating factors."     

The immigration of Asian professionals to the United States: 1988-1990

"This article examines recent flows of Asian professionals to the United States based on the Immigration and Naturalization Service data for the fiscal years 1988-1990. Three specific dimensions of the Asian migration stream were investigated, namely, size, composition and mode of entry. The results show that Asians emerge as a dominant group in the immigration of all professionals. An examination of mode of entry indicates an existing demand for foreign professionals of certain occupational backgrounds in the U.S. labor market.... The argument that the outflow of the highly trained Asians is simply a matter of migration and education is not fully supported by the data."     

The internal migration patterns of the foreign-born and native-born populations in the United States: 1975-80 and 1985-90

"The focus of this article is on an examination of the influence of birthplace on the internal migration and spatial redistribution patterns of the foreign-born and native-born populations in the United States during the 1975-80 and 1985-90 periods. The analyses presented here consider the following principal questions: (1) What are the internal migration patterns of the foreign-born population in the United States, and how do they differ from those of the native-born population? (2) How do the relocation choices of various birthplace-specific foreign-born and native-born subpopulations differ from each other? (3) Are the internal migration patterns generating an increased or a decreased geographical concentration of such birthplace-specific subgroups?"     

Measures of Assimilation in the Marriage Market: Mexican Americans 1970–1990

In 1965 the United States rewrote its immigration laws, and immigration increased sharply as a result. The immigrants and the children of immigrants from the post‐1965 period are slowly becoming more influential in U.S. life; the largest of these groups are the Mexican immigrants and the Mexican Americans. The rapid growth of Hispanic and Asian populations in the United States has led to a renewed interest in the question of assimilation; that is, will the new groups assimilate, and if so how long will it take? Will they become part of White America? Will some groups assimilate into the Black‐dominated urban underclass (a process Portes called segmented assimilation)? Will some groups remain permanently separate and socially isolated? In this article, I examine the behavior of Mexican Americans and Mexican immigrants in the U.S. marriage market, using census data from 1970, 1980, and 1990. The findings are that Mexican Americans are assimilating with non‐Hispanic Whites over time, and the evidence tends to reject the segmented assimilation hypothesis. The interplay between intermarriage and endogamy is studied with log linear models; some variations by geography and U.S. nativity are noted.     

Geographic distribution of undocumented immigrants: estimates of undocumented aliens counted in the 1980 census by state

"This article presents estimates of the number of undocumented aliens counted in the 1980 [U.S.] census for each state and the District of Columbia. The estimates, which indicate that 2.06 million undocumented aliens were counted in the 1980 census, are not based on individual records, but are aggregate estimates derived by a residual technique. The census count of aliens (modified somewhat to account for deficiencies in the data) is compared with estimates of the legally resident alien population based on data collected by the Immigration and Naturalization Service in January 1980." Estimates are provided "for each of the states for selected countries of birth and for age, sex, and period of entry categories.... The origins of the undocumented alien population [are described], as well as some of their demographic characteristics. Some of the implications of the numbers and distribution of undocumented aliens are also discussed." This paper was originally presented at the 1984 Annual Meeting of the Population Association of America (see Population Index, Vol. 50, No. 3, Fall 1984, p. 435).     

Transnationalism and American Exports in an English‐Speaking World1

Investigating the relationship between immigration, middleman minority status, transnationalism, and U.S. foreign trade, the authors assembled a census‐based data file that contains aggregate‐level variables for 88 foreign‐born groups by national origin between 1980 and 1990. They regressed immigrant characteristics and immigration volume upon time‐lagged import/export statistics from the same 88 nations between 1985 and 1995. Results show the independent influence on exports of immigrant entrepreneurship, transnationalism, and middleman minority status. But these variables, exhaustively derived from the existing literature, had no effect on U.S. imports; they only affected exports. The authors propose that the discrepancy between imports and exports arises because of the dominance of English as a world business language. In this situation, foreigners need no help from immigrants when they export to the United States; but native‐born, monolingual Americans need the help of bicultural immigrants when they export. The empirical results suggest that immigrant entrepreneurs enhance the United States' exports and thus reduce the United States' balance of payments deficit.     

Sponsors,sponsorship rates and the immigration multiplier

"This article reviews the evidence pertaining to the extent to which U.S. immigrants actually make use of the family reunification entitlements of United States immigration laws, examining the two available studies which are based on probability samples of immigrant entry cohorts. It then provides new estimates of the characteristics of the U.S. citizen sponsors of immigrant spouses and parents.... With respect to the characteristics of sponsors, analysis of the information in the GAO [General Accounting Office] report indicates that 80 percent of the persons who immigrated in FY 1985 as the spouses of U.S. citizens were sponsored by native born U.S. citizens. In contrast, native born U.S. citizens sponsored only five percent of the parent immigrants. Additional findings on the country of origin and sex of the sponsored immigrants are presented."