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Economy of Immigration


By Tiffany Gilliam


Macroeconomics
Mr. Toney







Introduction
United states immigration and nearly tripled since the 1990’s. Although the countries population has more than doubles, the total number of immigrants including illegal immigrants is about the same as or less than the number then. The foreign-born population of the United States concludes 8.5 percent of the total population, which is drastically lower than the percentage--13 percent or higher--during the period from 1860 to 1930. Immigrants fail to increase the rate of unemployment among Native Americans, even among minority, female, and low-skill workers. The effect of immigration on wages is negative for some of these special groups and positive for others. With that said, the effect on employment is remains low. Total per capita government expenditures on immigrants are much lower than those for US natives, no matter how immigrants are classified. Narrowly defined welfare expenditures for immigrants are slightly more than for natives, but this has been true in the past, too. These welfare expenditures are only small fractions of total government expenditures on immigrants and natives. Schooling costs and payments to the elderly are the bulk of government expenditures; natives use more of these programs, especially Social Security and Medicare.
Immigrant Effects on Native Employment
Recent studies that take a national approach have estimated that immigration, given its make up, reduces the labor market opportunities of low-skilled US workers, but there is less competition among the higher skilled workers. If a goal of public policy is to improve the economic opportunities of less-skilled U.S. workers, the findings from the economy-wide approach suggest that one way to achieve it might be to change the skill of legal immigrants and to reduce the...