For further information: Frank Tortorici, (212) 339-0231, [email protected]
The Conference Board
For Release Monday, August 17, 1998 at 6:30 PM Release #4432A
Immigration Driving Economic Growth Across U.S. Pacific Coast, East Coast, Southwest, Rockies Lead In Immigrant Gains
Immigration is an increasingly important source of economic growth in the face of low unemployment and tighter labor markets, according to a report released today by The Conference Board.
The report notes that 55% of the more than 4 million jobs added between 1995 and 1997 were accounted for by immigrants. "The expanding labor supply has helped grease the wheels of the current U.S. expansion, enabling the economy to reach its full productive capacity," says The Conference Board's latest Regional Economies and Markets.
Census bureau data indicate that the percent of the U.S. population that is foreign born has nearly doubled since 1970 and now stands at just under 10%. Since 1990, the foreign-born population has increased by 30.4%, compared with just 7.3% for the U.S.-born population. In addition, the working-age population now constitutes more than 11.4% of those 16 and older.
THE PACIFIC REGION: IMMIGRATION HEADQUARTERS
Immigrants in the U.S. are largely concentrated in six states: California (which is home to nearly a third of the nation's foreign-born population), New York (13.6%), Florida (9%), Texas (8.4%), New Jersey (4.7%), and Illinois (4.3%).
The largest increase in the immigrant share was in the Pacific region of the country. This was fueled by a surge in both legal and illegal immigration in California, whose share rose from 17% to 31%. Washington and Oregon's shares have each risen to about 9%.
The West South Central region (Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Texas) and Rocky Mountain region have nearly doubled their share of immigrants 16 and older, with especially large proportionate gains in Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, and Texas.
Only New England has experienced a fall in the share of working-age population comprised of immigrants since 1980.
Immigration has been most critical in the Middle Atlantic region (New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania) where more than 100% of the net new jobs can be attributed to immigrants. Other regions in which immigration has had an especially large share of total job growth include the South Atlantic (including Delaware, Florida, the Carolinas, Virginia, Washington, D.C.), West North Central (including Iowa, Kansas, Missouri and the Dakotas),
Rocky Mountain and Pacific.
EFFECTS ON AMERICAN-BORN WORKERS ARE MODEST
The rise in immigrants in the U.S.'s working population does not indicate that they are taking jobs away from American-born workers. Factors such as the mix of available jobs, the relative scarcity and skill levels of foreign-born and American-born workers, and the stage of the business cycle suggest that many jobs taken by immigrants would otherwise remain unfilled. In addition, there are "demand-side" effects in which immigration creates higher employment.
The source of foreign-born workers in the U.S. is in flux also. While the share of immigrants from Europe and the former Soviet Union has plummeted from 39% to 17%, Latin America's share has surged from 30% to 50% and Asia's from 15% to 23%.
The change in country-of-origin composition has brought new dimensions to the immigration issue in the U.S. One key concern is the educational background of newer immigrants. Mexican immigrants, for example, average less than 9 years of schooling, compared with an average of more than 12 years for European immigrants. As a result, regions with heavy concentrations of immigrants from countries with low average levels of education have experienced an influx of lower skilled and lower wage workers.
In 20 states, the average years of education of immigrants is actually higher than the comparable figure for American-born workers. Immigrants in the East South Central (Alabama, Kentucky, Mississippi, Tennessee)
region of the U.S. have significantly higher education levels than do American-born workers, while those in the West have substantially lower levels.
Although California is often a testing ground for how states deal with rising immigration, its population is unique, so the trends in the state are not necessarily a sign of things to come in the rest of the nation. Much of the U.S. is likely to experience far less difficulty coping with the changes that result from the latest wave of immigrants, according to the report. California has had to contend with a large share of illegal immigrants and many with not a great level of education.
-30-
Source: Regional Economies and Markets, Second Quarter 1998, The Conference Board
RSS