Study: "Immigration is actually good for employment, wages and productivity"

[pampango]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/31/immigration-good-for-us-e_n_700699.html

Champions of strict immigration reform, be warned: there may be an economic consequence to tightening America's borders.

Immigration is actually good for employment, wages and productivity, according to a new study from the San Francisco Fed.

States that have had a large influx of immigrants tended to produce more, hire more and pay workers more than states that have few new foreign-born workers, the study shows. For every one percent increase in employment from immigration, the study finds, a state will see a .4 to .5 percent increase in income per worker.

Peri concludes that immigration boosted states' output, income and employment because the economies " immigrants by expanding job opportunities rather than by displacing workers born in the United States." Further, the results of the study support the theory that U.S.-born workers and immigrants tend to take different occupations, says Peri.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The study's finding are at http://www.nber.org/digest/mar10/w15507.html .

[LostInAnomie]

1. What a load of shit.

[Posteritatis]

2. Truly a shattering riposte. (nt)

[LostInAnomie]

3. Fine. You want something more in depth...

Take a look at the last paragraph in the link (I'd post it but I don't want to violate copyright). It is nothing but apologetics for the importation of cheap labor. To paraphrase, the author of the study thinks illegal immigration is great because it provides companies that profit from cheap labor with extra profits. This allows the company to expand, so they might hire back one or two of the Americans (that lost their jobs to the cheap labor of illegal immigrants) to supervise the illegal immigrants. This in-turn allows the company to hire more illegal immigrants. It's a win/win for everyone!!!

The problem is that "As young immigrants with low schooling levels take manually intensive construction jobs", low schooling level American citizens that are here legally don't get the manually intensive construction jobs because they can't compete with the race to the bottom wages. I doubt many people really doubted that hiring illegal immigration is profitable. The problem with it is that it steals jobs from the people that are here legally that need them.

[Posteritatis]

4. So you consider immigration and illegal immigration synonymous. Classy. (nt)

[LostInAnomie]

7. Did you even read the article?

My guess is that you didn't or just really have poor reading comprehension. The author of the study and the article take careful steps to avoid saying "illegal" but the implication is obvious. Why else would they include this line: "Champions of strict immigration reform, be warned: there may be an economic consequence to tightening America's borders." Is there really any concern about a flood of legal immigrants coming over to take low education manual skill jobs? Or, why would the author of the study include lines like "In terms of geography, proximity to the Mexican border is associated with high net immigration because border states tend to get more immigrants. Historical migration patterns also are a factor because immigrants are drawn to areas with established immigrant communities.", and then talk about the difference between states like California and Virginia?

[Hello_Kitty]

5. Are there any truly objective studies on immigration and wages?

It's either racist bullshit or bullshit from the Chamber of Commerce like this piece.

[Caliman73]

6. Probably not.

The issue of immigration is complex and would need to address it from different angles not just its impact on American jobs and services. We would need to address why people come to the US which would need to examine the role of US foreign policy and intervention in other countries and the like.

Most people just want to hear that is is all bad or all good.