Title: What Immigration Means For U.S. Employment and Wages
Headings: What Immigration Means For U.S. Employment and Wages
What Immigration Means For U.S. Employment and Wages
The Impact of Immigrants on Employment and Earnings
A Path Forward with An Economic Approach to Immigration Reform
The April Jobs Gap
Conclusion
Brookings on Job Numbers

Content: Cortes 2008 ). One reason for this effect is that immigrants and U.S.-born workers generally do not compete for the same jobs; instead, many immigrants complement the work of U.S. employees and increase their productivity. For example, low-skilled immigrant laborers allow U.S.-born farmers, contractors, and craftsmen to expand agricultural production or to build more homes—thereby expanding employment possibilities and incomes for U.S. workers. Another way in which immigrants help U.S. workers is that businesses adjust to new immigrants by opening stores, restaurants, or production facilities to take advantage of the added supply of workers; more workers translate into more business. Because of these factors, economists have found that immigrants slightly raise the average wages of all U.S.-born workers. As illustrated by the right-most set of bars in the chart below, estimates from opposite ends of the academic literature arrive at this same conclusion, and point to small but positive wage gains of between 0.1 and 0.6 percent for American workers. But while immigration improves living standards on average, the economic literature is divided about whether immigration reduces wages for certain groups of workers. In particular, some estimates suggest that immigration has reduced the wages of low-skilled workers and college graduates.