Career Trajectories
The Effects of U.S. Immigration on the Career
Trajectories of Native Workers, 1979–20041
Jeremy Pais
University of Connecticut
While earlier work primarily examines the point-in-time effects of immigration on the earnings of native workers, this article focuses more broadly on the effects of immigration on native workers’ career trajectories. Cross-classified multilevel growth-curve models are applied to 1979 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth and U.S. Census Bureau data to demonstrate how people adjust to changing local labor market conditions throughout their careers. The key findings indicate that substitution and complementary effects depend on the stage of the worker’s career. At entry into the labor market, high levels of immigration …show more content…
Addressing this issue continues to be a serious challenge because researchers focus extensively on the contemporaneous effects of immigration—that is, researchers tend to rely on cross-sectional local labor market data to estimate the pointin-time effects of immigrant population concentration on native worker employment outcomes.
There is an obvious and immediate problem with this point-in-time approach. Trying to assess the impact of immigration is hindered by the fact that native workers may respond to foreign-born competition by finding work in another industry, by taking up another occupation, or by moving to another local labor market altogether ðSmith and Edmonston 1997, pp. 225–30; Borjas 1999, pp. 73–82Þ. It is now widely recognized that this unobserved selectivity among the population—that is, unmeasured individuallevel behaviors or attributes that are associated with local labor market characteristics and employment outcomes—will bias the observed impact of immigration because those native workers who are most likely to compete
36
Effects of Immigration on Career Trajectories of Native …show more content…
However, we simply do not know whether high levels of immigration affect entry positions for young adults in ways that influence their career trajectories over the long run.
Employers of many lower-paying, physical, dirty, dangerous, and menial jobs—jobs at the bottom of the job ladder—seek laborers that are not only hardworking and reliable but are also acquiescent and expendable. Immigrant labor fills these requirements for many employers of the least desirable jobs in advanced capitalist societies ðPiore 1979; Johnson-Webb
2002; Kandel and Parrado 2005; Zamudio and Lichter 2008; Orrenius and
Zavodny 2009Þ. In fact, over the past several decades a progression has left some industries virtually dependent on immigrant labor. When an employer prefers immigrants to do the work he or she believes native workers will not do, or not do as well, and native workers find employment avenues blocked through mechanisms of social closure enacted by immigrant networks ðWaldinger and Lichter 2003Þ, then native workers could be adversely affected, not only in the short term, but throughout the course
Trajectories of Native Workers, 1979–20041
Jeremy Pais
University of Connecticut
While earlier work primarily examines the point-in-time effects of immigration on the earnings of native workers, this article focuses more broadly on the effects of immigration on native workers’ career trajectories. Cross-classified multilevel growth-curve models are applied to 1979 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth and U.S. Census Bureau data to demonstrate how people adjust to changing local labor market conditions throughout their careers. The key findings indicate that substitution and complementary effects depend on the stage of the worker’s career. At entry into the labor market, high levels of immigration …show more content…
Addressing this issue continues to be a serious challenge because researchers focus extensively on the contemporaneous effects of immigration—that is, researchers tend to rely on cross-sectional local labor market data to estimate the pointin-time effects of immigrant population concentration on native worker employment outcomes.
There is an obvious and immediate problem with this point-in-time approach. Trying to assess the impact of immigration is hindered by the fact that native workers may respond to foreign-born competition by finding work in another industry, by taking up another occupation, or by moving to another local labor market altogether ðSmith and Edmonston 1997, pp. 225–30; Borjas 1999, pp. 73–82Þ. It is now widely recognized that this unobserved selectivity among the population—that is, unmeasured individuallevel behaviors or attributes that are associated with local labor market characteristics and employment outcomes—will bias the observed impact of immigration because those native workers who are most likely to compete
36
Effects of Immigration on Career Trajectories of Native …show more content…
However, we simply do not know whether high levels of immigration affect entry positions for young adults in ways that influence their career trajectories over the long run.
Employers of many lower-paying, physical, dirty, dangerous, and menial jobs—jobs at the bottom of the job ladder—seek laborers that are not only hardworking and reliable but are also acquiescent and expendable. Immigrant labor fills these requirements for many employers of the least desirable jobs in advanced capitalist societies ðPiore 1979; Johnson-Webb
2002; Kandel and Parrado 2005; Zamudio and Lichter 2008; Orrenius and
Zavodny 2009Þ. In fact, over the past several decades a progression has left some industries virtually dependent on immigrant labor. When an employer prefers immigrants to do the work he or she believes native workers will not do, or not do as well, and native workers find employment avenues blocked through mechanisms of social closure enacted by immigrant networks ðWaldinger and Lichter 2003Þ, then native workers could be adversely affected, not only in the short term, but throughout the course