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Immigration and Unemployment

Broken Levees, Broken Promises: New Orleans

Covers the exploitation of migrant workers doing backbreaking and dangerous clean-up work in New Orleans.

Published On: Wed, Aug 23, 2006 | Download File

The Growth and Reach of Immigration: New Census Bureau Data Underscore Importance of Immigrants

New data from the 2005 American Community Survey (ACS), released by the Census Bureau on August 15, 2006, underscore the extent to which immigration continues to fuel the expansion of the U.S. labor force.

Published On: Tue, Aug 01, 2006 | Download File

Building a Competitive Workforce: Immigration and the U.S. Manufacturing Sector

Shortages of skilled labor constitute the foremost challenge confronting U.S. manufacturers who face growing competition from manufacturers in Asia, Eastern Europe, and elsewhere. Demand for professionals with university degrees is rising as manufacturing becomes increasingly high tech. But the U.S. educational system is not producing enough highly educated native-born manufacturing workers to meet this growing demand.

Published On: Mon, Jul 31, 2006 | Download File

Beneath the Pines: Stories of Migrant Tree Planters

The stories of migrant workers who are brought to the United States from Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras to plant trees, thin forests and apply herbicides for timber contractors.

Published On: Fri, May 19, 2006 | Download File

Immigration Adds Billions of Dollars to U.S. Economic Growth Every Year

IPC Research Fellow Dan Siciliano told the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee that immigration is directly responsible for billions of dollars annually in U.S. economic growth. Siciliano, who also is Executive Director of the Program in Law, Economics and Business at Stanford Law School, explained to the Committee that "if the United States were to reform the immigration system to better address the demand for foreign-born labor, the economic benefits of immigration could be even greater than what we have already experienced."

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Published On: Sun, Apr 16, 2006 | Download File

Immigrants, Skills, and Wages: Measuring the Economic Gains from Immigration

Foreign-born workers do not substitute perfectly for, and therefore do not compete with, most native-born workers. Rather, the complementary nature of the skills, occupations, and abilities of foreign-born workers increases the productivity of natives, stimulates investment, and enhances the choices available to consumers.

Published On: Mon, Mar 13, 2006 | Download File

No Way In: U.S. Immigration Policy Leaves Few Legal Options for Mexican Workers

Current immigration policies are completely out of sync with the U.S. economy’s demand for workers who fill less-skilled jobs, especially in the case of Mexican workers. While U.S. immigration policies present a wide array of avenues for immigrants to enter the United States, very few of these avenues are tailored to workers in less-skilled occupations. It should come as no surprise, then, that immigrants come to or remain in the United States without proper documentation in response to the strong economic demand for less-skilled labor.

Published On: Fri, Jul 01, 2005 | Download File

Ties that Bind: Immigration Reform Should be Tailored to Families, Not Just Individuals

Given the extent to which undocumented immigrants already living in the United States are part of U.S.-based families, comprehensive immigration reform must include more than just a new temporary worker program.

Published On: Mon, May 02, 2005 | Download File

The Economics of Necessity: Economic Report of the President Underscores Importance of Immigration

Although immigration is crucial to the growth of the U.S. labor force and yields a net fiscal benefit to the U.S. economy, current immigration policies fail to respond to actual labor demand.

Published On: Sun, May 01, 2005 | Download File

Essential Workers: Immigrants are a Needed Supplement to the Native-Born Labor Force

An analysis of data from the 2000 census reveals that employment in about one-third of all U.S. job categories would have contracted during the 1990s in the absence of recently arrived, noncitizen immigrant workers.

Published On: Tue, Mar 01, 2005 | Download File