Immigration Reform
The last time Congress updated our legal immigration system was November 1990, one month before the World Wide Web went online. We are long overdue for comprehensive immigration reform.
Through immigration reform, we can provide noncitizens with a system of justice that provides due process of law and a meaningful opportunity to be heard. Because it can be a contentious and wide-ranging issue, we aim to provide advocates with facts and work to move bipartisan solutions forward. Read more about topics like legalization for undocumented immigrants and border security below.
From Newcomers to Americans: An Integration Policy for a Nation of Immigrants
By Tomás R. Jiménez, Ph.D. The United States long has been a nation of immigrants, but its policies are out of step with this reality. Public policies with regard to the foreign-born must go beyond regulating who is admitted and under what circumstances. The nation needs an immigrant-integration policy that effectively addresses the challenges and harnesses the opportunities created by today’s large immigrant population. It is not in the best interests of the United States to make integration a more difficult, uncertain, or lengthy process than it need be. Facilitating the successful and rapid integration of immigrants into U.S. society minimizes conflicts and tensions between newcomers and the native-born, and enables immigrants to more quickly secure better jobs, earn higher incomes, and thus more fully contribute to the U.S. economy. Read More
Serving the Under-Served: Banking for Undocumented Immigrants
In recent years, there has been a great deal of controversy over the efforts of some banks to offer financial services to individuals without Social Security numbers, many of whom are undocumented immigrants. More and more banks now allow people to open checking and savings accounts and to apply for credit cards and home mortgages using an Individual Taxpayer Identification Number (ITIN) issued by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) or an identification card issued by a foreign consulate in the United States. In February of 2007, for instance, Bank of America announced a pilot program in Los Angeles offering credit cards to individuals who lack either a social security number or a credit history, provided that they have ITINs. Read More
Sometimes Imperfect Reform is Better than Perfect Deportation
I do a daily radio talk show on Radio Campesina in Phoenix and, clearly, since the November elections callers are once more allowing themselves to dream of the day their hard, hidden existence comes to an end. Their dreams are tentative and cautious, but nonetheless hope has been resurrected. Yet in Arizona hope is interspersed with anger. Four anti-immigrant referendums passed overwhelmingly, one of which, Proposition 300, will impose steep tuition increases for undocumented community-college and university students. Most legal observers believe it is constitutional. The only resolution lies now in the hands of Congress. Delay in passing comprehensive immigration reform, or at the very least the DREAM Act (which would provide a path to lawful permanent residence for hundreds of thousands of undocumented high-school graduates), will have immediate and tragic consequences for thousands of Latino kids in Arizona. Read More
Attracting the Best and the Brightest: The Promise and Pitfalls of a Skill-Based Immigration Policy
One question that recently received heightened attention from lawmakers is whether or not immigrants should be admitted to the United States less on the basis of family ties and more on the basis of the skills they can contribute to the U.S. economy. Although some of the practices associated with a point-based immigration system might benefit the U.S. economy, policymakers should be careful not to assume that such a system would be a panacea for the widespread dysfunction of U.S. immigration policies. Read More
Rethinking the Effects of Immigration on Wages: New Data and Analysis from 1990-2004
By Giovanni Peri, Ph.D.A crucial question in the current debate over immigration is what impact immigrants have on the wages of native-born workers. At first glance, it might seem that the simple economics of supply and demand provides the answer: immigrants increase the supply of labor; hence they should decrease the wages of native workers. However, the issue is more complicated than this for two reasons that have been largely overlooked. First, immigrants and natives tend to differ in their educational attainment, skill sets, and occupations, and they perform jobs that often are interdependent. As a result, immigrants do not compete with the majority of natives for the same jobs. Rather, they “complement” the native-born workforce—which increases the productivity, and therefore the wages, of natives. Second, the addition of new workers to the labor force stimulates investment as entrepreneurs seize the opportunity to organize these new workers in productive ways that generate profits. When these two factors are included in the analysis of immigration and wages, it becomes clear that immigration has a positive effect on the wages of most native-born workers. Read More
The Rush to Limit Judicial Review
Access to an independent judiciary with the power to hold the government accountable in its dealings with individuals is a founding principle of the United States. In contrast, imagine a system where there is no access to independent judgment; where, instead, the referee works for the opposing team. The House of Representatives took a step away from this founding principle by passing the Border Protection, Antiterrorism, and Illegal Immigration Control Act (H.R. 4437) on December 16, 2005. A provision of the bill would erode access to independent judgment by severely restricting access to the federal courts for individuals in removal (deportation) proceedings. This provision is part of a long string of efforts by proponents of restrictive immigration policies to limit the jurisdiction of the federal courts over immigration cases. Read More
Competing for Global Talent: The Race Begins with Foreign Students
By Jeanne Batalova, Ph.D. Read More
Building a Competitive Workforce: Immigration and the U.S. Manufacturing Sector
Shortages of skilled labor constitute the foremost challenge confronting U.S. manufacturers who face growing competition from manufacturers in Asia, Eastern Europe, and elsewhere. Demand for professionals with university degrees is rising as manufacturing becomes increasingly high tech. But the U.S. educational system is not producing enough highly educated native-born manufacturing workers to meet this growing demand. Read More
The Growth and Reach of Immigration: New Census Bureau Data Underscore Importance of Immigrants
New data from the 2005 American Community Survey (ACS), released by the Census Bureau on August 15, 2006, underscore the extent to which immigration continues to fuel the expansion of the U.S. labor force. Read More
Unequal Access: Immigrants and U.S. Health Care
By Sarita A. Mohanty, M.D., M.P.H.Despite the important role that immigrants play in the U.S. economy, they disproportionately lack health insurance and receive fewer health services than native-born Americans. Some policymakers have called for limits on immigrants’ access to health insurance, particularly Medicaid, which are even more stringent than those already in place. However, policies that restrict immigrants’ access to some health care services lead to the inefficient and costly use of other services (such as emergency room care) and negatively impact public health. The future economic success of the United States depends on a healthy workforce. Therefore, policies must be devised that improve, rather than restrict, immigrants’ access to quality health care. Read More
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