Public policy and the labor market adjustment of new immigrants to Australia

Two separate cohorts of immigrants to Australia are compared in order to assess the potential role of immigrant selection criteria, labor market conditions, and income-support policy in facilitating the labor market adjustment of new arrivals. Although these two cohorts entered Australia only five years apart, their initial labor market outcomes varied dramatically. The results indicate that changes in immigration policy may have led to increased human capital endowments that in turn resulted in higher participation rates and reduced unemployment. At the same time, improvement in Australian labor market conditions and changes in income-support policy over the 1990s – which most likely altered the returns to human capital – were probably instrumental in reinforcing the effects of tighter immigrant selection criteria. As much as half of the fall in unemployment rates among women and one third the decline among men appears to have occurred as the result of changes in the returns to demographic and human capital characteristics. Responsible editor:Christoph M. Schmidt     

Immigrant quality and assimilation: a review of the U.S. literature

Empirical research on US immigrants is reviewed: their productivity and assimilation; their contribution and use of public services; and their impact on native Americans. I discuss the characteristics of cohorts of immigrants that enter the United States at different times, and then quantify the assimilation of immigrants, typically in terms of economic productivity of immigrants compared with natives. Few have found quantifiable negative effects of immigrants on native wages or unemployment in local labor markets, but a more general equilibrium approach than has been empirically implemented may be needed to draw any conclusions regarding the distributional consequences of immigration. Received: 22 September 1995 / Accepted: 2 March 1997     

The unemployment insurance compensation experience of immigrants in Canada, 1980-1988

This paper utilizes a new data set, compiled by Citizenship and Immigration Canada, Revenue Canada and Statistics Canada, to examine the unemployment experience of Canadian immigrant cohorts over the time period 1980 to 1988. Using the records of unemployment insurance benefits of persons who immigrated to Canada in those years and who filed income tax returns, the unemployment experiences of those people are compared by landing year, gender, level of education, language ability, and country of last permanent residence. The determinants of the proportion of each immigrant cohort that received unemployment insurance benefits are estimated by relating the proportions to landing year, duration of time in Canada, and labour market conditions. Briefly, we find no obvious influences on UI receipt behaviour following the immigration reforms of 1982. However, the recession of 1981–82 had a major impact on incomes which did not recover until 5 or 6 years later. Nevertheless, more generous UI benefits did raise slightly the likelihood of UI receipts. Received: 5 December 1995 / Accepted: 14 August 1996     

The educational attainment of second-generation immigrants in The Netherland

Since the mid-1960s the Netherlands has had a positive net immigration, mainly because of man power recruitment from Turkey and Morocco and immigration from the former Dutch colony of Surinam. Immigrants havea weak labor market position, which is related to their educational leveland language skills. Children and grandchildren of immigrants are expected to have a better chance of integration into Dutch society. In this paper we investigate whether this is true with respect to the educational attainment of second-generation immigrants from Turkey, Morocco, Surinam and the Dutch Antilles.The authors thank an anonymous referee and both editors for helpful comments. Responsible editors: David Card and Christoph M. Schmidt.     

Should the US have locked heaven��s door?

This paper examines the economic impact of the second great immigration wave (1945–2000) on the US economy. Our analysis relies on a computable general equilibrium model combining the major interactions between immigrants and natives (labor market impact, fiscal impact, capital deepening, endogenous education, endogenous inequality). Contrary to recent studies, we show that immigration induced important net gains and small redistributive effects among natives. According to our simulations, the postwar US immigration is beneficial for all natives cohorts and all skill groups. Nevertheless, the gains would have been larger if the US had conducted a more selective immigration policy.     

Do immigrants displace young native workers: The Austrian experience

This paper studies the effect of increased immigration in Austria on the unemployment risk of young natives. Austria experienced a dramatic rise in the share of alien workers as a result of the breakdown of the former communist regimes (especially from former Yugoslavia). We concentrate on unemployment entry of young male workers, who are supposed to compete most heavily with new immigrants. Our results indicate that the detrimental impact – if it exists at all – is only minor. This is irrespective of the analyzed proxy for competition: The share of foreign workers in an industry or in a region. Received: 7 March 1996/Accepted: 20 March 1998     

Asian-born scientists and engineers: their immigration flow and labor market adjustment

"This paper examines the flow of Asian-born scientists and engineers and their labor market adjustment. First, main elements to affect their immigration flow are described: supply, demand, and institution....The scarcity of domestic workers is the most important factor affecting demand of immigration. Institution, such as immigration policies, is another element to influence the immigration flow....Second, by using the 1980 U.S. Census data set, their labor market adjustment is explored in terms of hourly wages. Compared to the native-born white, there is no evidence that Asian-born scientists and engineers receive lower wages or lower return on human capital."     

负担还是红利：新疆人口迁入与经济增长关系的量化研究

针对新疆人口净迁入急剧减少、人才流失加剧、劳动力出现有限供给,政府劳动力政策出现偏差等现象,分别从贡献率与边际效应两个视角对人口迁入与经济增长的关系进行了量化研究。根据改进后的经济增长率分解法测算了人口迁入对经济增长的贡献率后发现,1978-2013年,人口净迁入使新疆经济年均增长1个百分点。根据新古典经济增长核算理论与拓展的C-D生产函数测算了劳动力对经济增长的边际效应后发现,人口净迁移率每提高1个百分点,经济增长率可以提高0.24个百分点。量化研究的结果表明,新疆一直以来是我国主要的人口迁入地区,人口迁入并不构成新疆经济发展的负担,反而为经济发展带来了红利。     

Labor immigration and long-run welfare in a growth model with heterogenous agents and endogenous labor supply

This paper examines the consequences of labor immigration in an OLG economy in which agents have an elastic labor supply and differ with respect to degrees of altruism and rates of time preference. It focuses on three substantive questions. First, how do immigrants influence the bequest motive of altruistic natives? Second, what impact do immigrants have on the labor supply of natives? Finally, how does immigration affect the long-run welfare of both altruistic and non altruistic natives? Received: 25 November 1999/Accepted: 07 April 2000     

Immigration,assimilation and growth

This paper analyzes the welfare effects of immigration and its subsequent effect on ethnic diversity in a model featuring human capital spillovers which depend on the degree of ethnic heterogeneity, variation rates of time preference across individuals and endogenous levels of immigration and assimilation. In the model, an increase in ethnic diversity reduces the spillovers effect for the majority. Nonetheless, immigration can be welfare improving for the majority ethnic group even if it increases the degree of diversity as long as it raises the average human capital level and/or growth rate by increasing the proportion of people with low rates of time preference. However, if an economy is too homogenous, it will not be able to attract immigrants. Finally, if the level of immigration is not too high, then immigration also raises the net benefits to assimilation which leads to a more homogenous economy. Received: 18 February 1997 / Accepted: 16 July 1997     

Male-female differences in labor market outcomes during the early transition to market: The cases of Estonia and Slovenia

Changes in women's relative wages and employment are analyzed, using social security data from Slovenia (1987–1992) and a retrospective labor force survey in Estonia (1989–1994). Estonia adopted liberal labor market policies. Slovenia took an interventionist approach. Nevertheless, relative wages for women rose in both countries. Factors favoring women included: returns to human capital rose in transition, benefiting women; relative labor demand shifted toward predominantly female sectors; low-wage women had a disproportionate incentive to exit the labor market, especially in Estonia. However, women were less mobile across jobs in both countries, so men disproportionately filled new jobs in expanding sectors. Received: 27 November 1997/Accepted: 20 December 1998     

Hebrew language usage: determinants and effects on earnings among immigrants in Israel

This paper uses the 1983 Census of Israel to analyze Hebrew speaking skills and the effects of Hebrew fluency on the earnings of adult male immigrants. Hebrew fluency increases with a longer duration in Israel, the presence of children in the household, marrying after immigration, living in an area in which a smaller proportion speak one‘s mother tongue, a younger age at migration, a higher level of schooling and varies by country of birth. Earnings increase monotonically with the use of Hebrew. Speaking English as a second language is associated with higher earnings, even when country of origin is held constant. Received: 9 June 1997/Accepted: 6 November 1997     

Norwegian cohort emigration

This paper introduces a counterfactual technique to estimate net emigration from Norwegian birth cohorts from 1846 to 1900. A main finding is that despite strong fluctuations in annual emigration, the percentage reduction of each cohort due to emigration was surprisingly stable for all cohorts from 1846 to 1886, with net emigration of about 30% for males and about 20% for females. Estimating an econometric model of annual male gross emigration by single years of age 15–60 in the period 1870–1914, we find that previous net emigration from a cohort reduces later gross emigration from the same cohort. The estimations also give some justification for attributing this to selectivity of emigration, in the sense that only a certain proportion of each cohort were potential migrants. Received: 1 October 1997/Accepted: 23 March 2000     

Settlement policies and the economic success of immigrants

Many countries use settlement policies to direct the inflow of immigrants away from immigrant dense areas. We evaluate a reform of Swedish immigration policy that featured the dispersion of refugee immigrants, but also a change in the approach to labor market integration. We focus on how immigrants fared because of the policy. The evaluation indicates that immigrants experienced substantial long run losses. The bulk of the effect stems from a common component that affected immigrants regardless of location. We interpret the common component as being related to a shift in policy focus, from labor market assimilation to income support.All correspondence to Per-Anders Edin. We thank two anonymous referees, Magnus Löfström, seminar participants at the Institute for Labour Market Policy Evaluation (IFAU), Uppsala University, Stockholm University, the Swedish Institute for Social Research (SOFI), the Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IUI), and the CEPR conference on Marginal Labour Markets in Metropolitan Areas for valuable comments and Lisa Fredriksson for expert data assistance. We are also grateful to Sven Hjelmskog, Roland Jansson, Stig Kattilakoski, Christina Lindblom, Anders Nilsson, Kristina Sterne, and Lena Axelsson of the Immigration Board, and Anna Gralberg of the Ministry of Culture, who generously found time to answer our questions. This research has been partly financed through a grant from the Swedish Council for Work Life Research (RALF). Responsible editor: Christoph M. Schmidt.     

Net immigration of gainful workers into the united states, 1870–1930

This paper presents a socioeconomic occupational grouping of the foreign-born gainful workers of the United States at each census from 1870 through 1930. This series is then used to estimate the net immigration of gainful workers into the United States during each of the six decades from 1870 to 1930 cross classified by occupational group and sex. The following three conclusions are then drawn from the above two series. First, the socioeconomic position of the foreign-born population of the United States remained relatively stable from 1870 to 1910 but then increased appreciably from 1910 to 1930. Second, although most of the contribution that immigration made to the United States labor force was in the form of semiskilled and unskilled workers, the relative importance of professional, clerical, and skilled workers increased almost continuously from 1870 to 1930. Third, the “new immigration” was not less skilled than the “old immigration”. On the contrary it was actually more skilled than the “old immigration”.     

Wages, employment and economic shocks: Evidence from Indonesia

After over a quarter century of sustained economic growth, Indonesia was struck by a large and unanticipated crisis at the end of the 20th Century. Real GDP declined by about 12% in 1998. Using 13 years of annual labor force data in conjunction with two waves of a household panel, the Indonesia Family Life Survey (IFLS), this paper examines the impact of the crisis on labor market outcomes. Received: 31 December 1999/Accepted: 3 August 2000     

Brain drain or brain gain: A revisit

Recent literature has turned to the brain gain effect, instead of the brain drain effect, that emigration may bring to a source country. This paper, however, suggests brain drain remains a likely outcome. Suppose that foreign language skill affects an individual productivity when working abroad. A brain drain may occur when the (exogenously or endogenously determined) probability of immigration is large. We also consider the case that the probability of immigration is determined by a signal, and provide a condition under which the individual will under-invest in education, which results in a brain drain for the source country.All correspondence to Donald Lien. The authors acknowledge three anonymous referees for helpful comments and suggestions. Responsible editor: Klaus F. Zimmermann     

International migration and labor force participation of married women

A focal issue in international immigration research has been immigration adaptation and assimilation and especially absorption and integration of immigrants into labor force roles. Nevertheless, such research has largely been focused on immigrant men, neglecting the systematic examination of labor force participation among immigrant women. This research is focused on the correlates of economic activity among immigrant and native born Jewish, urban, married females aged 18–54 in Israel. The specific objectives of the investigation are: (1) the impact of education, socioeconomic status, familial child care burdens, and ethnic background on the economic activity of native-born and immigrant, married women; and (2) to evaluate the extent to which the above patterns vary by veterancy and age. The data for this analysis are drawn from Israel's quarterly labor force survey of 6,000 families for 1970 and 1971. Education, socioeconomic status, ethnic origin, and child care burden were all found to have some effect on women's labor force participation; however, the pattern of effect was different for younger and older women and varied by veterancy status. Indications can be found in the data that age at immigration, or in other words the point in the women's life cycle at which immigration occurs, makes a difference in the type and strength of effect of immigration on labor force participation.Requests for reprints should be directed to Moshe Hartman, Department of Sociology, Population Research Laboratory, Utah State University, Logan, Utah 84322.     

International labor migration and domestic labor supply

Prominent among the variety of issues raised by the immigration of labor are its effects on domestic wage rates and labor supply. In contrast to the existing literature, this paper constructs a dynamic, general equilibrium framework to study the relationship between international labor migration and domestic labor supply. The general equilibrium nature of the model enables us to endogenize the pattern of labor migration. The effect of labor migration on domestic wage rates and labor supply is shown to depend on the pattern of labor migration. If the substitution effect dominates the income effect in labor supply, the domestic supply of labor necessarily decreases in response to an inflow of migrants. This happens even if immigrants, through their savings behavior, cause an increase in the domestic capital-labor ratio and wage rate. Similarly, if the dominant effect is the income effect, the immigration of labor necessarily increases the domestic supply of labor.I wish to thank Oded Galor, Harl Ryder, Kalpana Kochhar and two referees for valuable comments. The opinions expressed in this paper are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views of Joel Popkin and Company.     

Skill premium effects on fertility and female labor force supply

In the last twenty years the United States has seen a positive relationship between female labor supply and total fertility rates, which differs from the pattern observed over the preceding years. We construct a general equilibrium overlapping generations model capable of generating this changing relationship between fertility and female labor supply. We argue that skilled biased technological change in recent decades has increased the skill premium and has therefore decreased the relative cost of (unskilled) child care services. The positive effect of the increase in female mean wages on fertility rates, and the inducement for labor force participation provided by the reduction in the relative cost of child care services, generated the positive relationship between fertility rates and female labor force participation in the last two decades.All correspondence to Amaia Iza. This paper has benefited particularly from comments by Juan Carlos Conesa, Pedro Mira and Sara de la Rica. We also acknowledge countless conversations with María Paz Espinosa and useful comments from Jaime Alonso, Jose María Da-Rocha, Tim Kehoe, José Victor Rios-Rull, when the paper was presented at the IV Workshop of Dynamic Macroeconomics held in Vigo (Spain, July 1999) and in Universidade de Vigo (October, 2000). We also thank an anonymous referee whose comments enabled us to improve the paper considerably. Financial support from Universidad del País Vasco 9UPV 00035.321-13511/2001, Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia PB097-0620, MCYT BEC2000/1394 and Instituto de la mujer (Ministerio de Trabajo y Asuntos Sociales) MTAS 33/00 is gratefully acknowledged. Any remaining errors are the authors responsibility. Responsible editor: Junsen Zhang.