Title: Immigrants Contribute Greatly to U.S. Economy, Despite Administration’s “Public Charge” Rule Rationale | Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
Headings: Immigrants Contribute Greatly to U.S. Economy, Despite Administration’s “Public Charge” Rule Rationale
Immigrants Contribute Greatly to U.S. Economy, Despite Administration’s “Public Charge” Rule Rationale
Immigrants Work at High Rates in Jobs That Are Important to Our Economy and Communities
Immigrants Who Receive Assistance Have High Employment Rates
Immigrants Help Support the Aging U.S. Population
Immigrants’ Children Show Significant Upward Mobility
Rule Undermines Supports That Help Strengthen America’s Next Generation
End Notes
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Content: and a fertility rate below the replacement rate for the U.S.-born…. In other words, immigrants appear to be taking low-skilled jobs that natives are either not available or unwilling to take. [ 3] (Emphasis added.) Research has also shown that immigrants contribute to native workers’ jobs and wages in sometimes hidden ways. For example, immigrants tend to be unusually mobile workers, quicker than their native-born peers to move around the country in response to shortages that appear in local labor markets. This helps native-born workers by filling gaps that could otherwise make their jobs impossible or reduce their productivity and lower their wages. George Borjas — a Harvard economist that immigration critics often cite — has argued that “immigration improves labor market efficiency. Moreover, it turns out that part of this efficiency gain accrues to natives, suggesting that existing estimates of the benefits from immigration may be ignoring a potentially important source of these benefits.” “ Back-of-the-envelope” calculations suggest efficiency gains for native-born workers of “between $5 billion and $10 billion annually,” Borjas writes, noting that “the estimates of the efficiency gain roughly double the measured benefits from immigration.” [ 4] Other researchers have reached similar conclusions. [