How Severe is Immigrants Impact on Employment?
URBAN PERSPECTIV.E • LARRY AUBRY
LOS ANGELES SENTINEL
Thursday, MARCH 29, 2007
A-7
OPINION
Immigration is a highly contentious, pivotal Issue and opinions range from locked against to strongly supportive. Though mixed, of course, Blacks' feelings are predominantly negative. The "new immigration" has obvious far-reaching ramifications for politics, the economy, public education and other key areas. (Black leaders were virtually silent concerning last year's immigrant rights national initiative.)
This column focuses on immigrant effects on employment-excerpts from a recent Public Policy Institute of California study, "How Immigrants Affect California Employment and Wages." It offers an opportunity to assess conservative-leaning researchers spin on immigration and its implications for Blacks.
"One of the most contentious issues about immigration is how it affects the wages and employment opportunities of u.s. natives. If immigrants hurt the labor market options of native workers, Californians should feel the most pain. California has a higher share of immigrants in its population and labor force than any other state, and by 2004, immigrants constituted one-third of the state's labor force and population.
The report analyzes the effect of immigration inflow on the employment, population and wages of U.S. natives in California. It compares the size, trends and estimates of California native workers' behavior and wages to national averages.
The major findings have implications for the national debate and California. First, there is no evidence that the inflow of immigrants over the period 1960-2004 worsened the employment opportunities of natives with similar education and experience. No association was found between the inflow of immigrants and the out-migration of natives within the same education and age group. Second, according to the study's calculations, during 1990-2004, immigration caused a 4 percent real wage increase for the average worker. Third, the results indicate that recent immigrants did lower the wages of previous immigrants. Wages of immigrants who entered California before 1990 were 17 to 20 percent lower in 2004 than they would have been absent any immigration between 1990 and 2004.
The supposedly dire labor market effect of immigration is one reason why some politicians called for tougher measures against illegal immigrants during the last Congress. Moreover, the new Congress is likely to revisit potential reforms such as introducing guest worker and visa programs.
In 2004, California was home to almost 30 percent of all foreign-born individuals working in the United States. Moreover, one-third of the state's 15 million workers and two-thirds of those without a high school diploma were foreign-born, making California the state with the largest share of foreign-born individuals in population and labor force. During 1990-2004 alone, new immigrants increased the size of the foreign-born population by over 40%. A very large number of those individuals were poorly educated Mexican laborers.
The study poses the question: What is the effect of immigrants on wages? Immigrants increase the supply of labor. Hence, they should decrease the wages of native workers, reduce their employment opportunities or push them to other states. The question, however, is more subtle than this because all workers are not the same: They differ by education, skills and occupation and perform jobs and productive tasks different from, and complementary to, each other.
Immigrants usually do not compete directly with the majority of natives for the same job. Rather, immigrants often complement native workers and this has the potential to increase the productivity of most groups of native workers, with potentially beneficial effects on their job opportunities and wages. An increase in migrants is likely to put native workers in jobs where they perform supervisory, managerial, training and, in general, interactive and coordinating tasks, which makes them more productive. (This is in no way Blacks' experience.)
If the nation's states were independent countries, California, with its 8.5 million foreign born residents, would be the second largest receiver of international migrants in the world. As a result of a burgeoning foreign born population, one might think that Califomians must have suffered to an extreme, the negative effects of this "immigration crisis" in their employment opportunities and wages.
This study says otherwise. Immigrants evidently do not increase the tendency of native Californians with similar skills to migrate out of state or to lose their jobs. And, they benefit because they are able to specialize in more productive work. Moreover, immigration had a much more negative effect on the wages of previous immigrants than on those of native workers."
This study should disseminated and discussed because of its ominous implications for Blacks.
Larry Aubry • can be contacted at e-mail: l.r.aubry [at] worldnet.att.net
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