Human Services News

From Urban Institute:

As Congress debates the fate of more than 10 million unauthorized immigrants living in the United States, their impact on the U.S. low-skilled labor force is an important consideration.

In 2005, immigrants overall represented more than a fifth of low-wage workers---those earning less than twice the minimum wage---and almost half of workers without a high school education.

This report, underwritten by the Hitachi Foundation, describes recent trends in the immigrant labor force and their implications for the U.S. economy.

Immigrants are playing an increasingly important role in the U.S. labor force---at both the lower-skilled and higher-skilled ends (Kaushal and Fix 2006).

Much of the debate around illegal immigration and comprehensive immigration reform during the past few years has centered on lower-skilled immigration and its effect on the U.S. economy.

Some economists have attributed rising unemployment rates and stagnating wages among lower-skilled native workers to immigration, but there is no consensus about the extent of the impact (Borjas 2006; Borjas and Katz 2005; Card 2005; for literature review, see Murray, Batalova, and Fix 2006).

For instance, Borjas (2003) found that wages of native workers declined by 3 percent between 1980 and 2000, and by 9 percent among the least educated workers, due to immigration.

In contrast, Ottaviano and Peri (2006) found that wages of native workers actually rose by 1.8 percent between 1990 and 2004, while the least educated workers experienced a much smaller decline of 1.1 percent (Ottaviano and Peri 2006).

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