Immigration and native migration in New York City, 1985–1990

The 1990 Public Use Micro Sample is used to analyze the relationship between immigration and outmigration of the native born in New York City. The study population is limited to native born males who lived in the five boroughs in 1985. The relationship between immigration and the probability of various kinds of moves is assessed using logistic regression. Results suggest that immigration has an insignificant effect on migratory behavior, with the exception of inter-borough migration. Unlike prior work, this study examines a single metro area, and does not limit itself to inter-state migration. These results are consistent with more recent work (Card 2001; Kritz et al. 2001), which has failed to find a positive labor market level effect of immigration on native migratory behavior. The inter-borough finding is consistent with the occurrence of voluntary residential segregation within the city, in which the native born move away from areas of immigrant concentration but do not leave the labor market, yet there is no direct evidence that this process occurred.