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Immigration and the Work Force

Economic Consequences for the United States and Source Areas

Since the 1970s, the striking increase in immigration to the United States has been accompanied by a marked change in the composition of the immigrant community, with a much higher percentage of foreign-born workers coming from Latin America and Asia and a dramatically lower percentage from Europe.

This timely study is unique in presenting new data sets on the labor force, wage rates, and demographic conditions of both the U.S. and source-area economies through the 1980s. The contributors analyze the economic effects of immigration on the United States and selected source areas, with a focus on Puerto Rico and El Salvador. They examine the education and job performance of foreign-born workers; assimilation, fertility, and wage rates; and the impact of remittances by immigrants to family members on the overall gross domestic product of source areas.

A revealing and original examination of a topic of growing importance, this book will stand as a guide for further research on immigration and on the economies of developing countries.

Table of Contents

Introduction and Summary, George J. Borjas and Richard B. Freeman
1 National Origin and the Skills of Immigrants in the Postwar Period
George J. Borjas
2 Out-Migration and Return Migration of Puerto Ricans
Fernando A. Ramos
3 The Assimilation of Immigrants in the U.S. Labor Market
Robert J. LaLonde and Robert H. Topel
4 The Fertility of Immigrant Women: Evidence from High-Fertility Source Countries
Francine D. Blau
5 Mass Emigration, Remittances, and Economic Adjustment: The Case of El Salvador in the Late 1980s
Edward Funkhouser
6 When the Minimum Wage Really Bites: The Effect of the U.S.-Level Minimum on Puerto Rico
Alida J. Castillo-Freeman and Richard B. Freeman
7 On the Labor Market Effects of Immigration and Trade
George J. Borjas, Richard B. Freeman, and Lawrence F. Katz
8 The Effect of Immigrant Arrivals on Migratory Patterns of Native Workers
Randall K. Filer

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