Immigrant Performance In The Labour Market

"To what extent can different forms of social capital help immigrants make headway on the labour market? An answer to this pressing question begins here. Taking the Netherlands and Germany as case studies, the book identifies two forms of social capital that may work to increase employment, income and occupational status and, conversely, decrease unemployment. New insights into the concepts of bonding and bridging arise through quantitative research methods, using longitudinal and crosssectional data. Referring to a dense network with 'thick' trust, bonding is measured as family ties, co-ethnic ties and trust in the family. Bridging is seen in terms of interethnic ties, thus implying a crosscutting network with 'thin' trust. Immigrant Performance in the Labour Market reveals that although bonding allows immigrants to get by, bridging enables them to get ahead"--Publisher's description.

To what extent can different forms of social capital help immigrants make headway on the labour market? An answer to this pressing question begins here. Taking the Netherlands and Germany as case studies, the book identifies two forms of social capital that may work to increase employment, income and occupational status and, conversely, decrease unemployment. New insights into the concepts of bonding and bridging arise through quantitative research methods, using longitudinal and crosssectional data. Referring to a dense network with 'thick' trust, bonding is measured as family ties, co-ethnic ties and trust in the family. Bridging is seen in terms of interethnic ties, thus implying a crosscutting network with 'thin' trust. Immigrant Performance in the Labour Market reveals that although bonding allows immigrants to get by, bridging enables them to get ahead.

This book examines the role that institutional characteristics of host countries play in labour market integration of immigrants in the European Union. Drawing on existing research, it develops a comprehensive conceptual framework of factors and underlying mechanisms which affect immigrant integration in the fifteen nations that comprise the European Union. The author analyzes selected EU countries in depth, investigating the extent to which immigrants have succeeded or failed in different institutional contexts.

First, Canada's primary source for immigrants has shifted dramatically from the United Kingdom and Europe to countries outside Europe. Second there has been a remarkable transformation in the nature of work: Canada's economy has changed from relying on resource extraction to an emphasis on manufacturing, and presently is emerging as post-industrial and knowledge-based. Pendakur combines an analysis of parliamentary debates on immigration issues with an evaluation of the regulatory and policy changes that resulted from these discussions and an analysis of how the work of immigrants changed over a five-decade. He then provides both a political and quantitative analysis by looking at issues that affect not only immigrants but minorities born in Canada in order to assess the degree to which labour market discrimination exists and whether employment equity programs are needed.

The paper uses a large survey (GSOEP) to analyze the labor market performance of immigrants in Germany. It finds that new immigrant workers earn on average 20 percent less than native workers with otherwise identical characteristics. The gap is smaller for immigrants from advanced countries, with good German language skills, and with a German degree, and larger for others. The gap declines gradually over time. Less success in obtaining jobs with higher occupational autonomy explains half of the wage gap. Immigrants are also initially less likely to participate in the labor market and more likely to be unemployed. While participation fully converges after 20 years, immigrants always remain more likely to be unemployed than the native labor force.

This book is the first to present a detailed analysis of economic integration of immigrants in smaller areas of their host nations. It uses Atlantic Canada as a case in point and uses unpublished data based on several databases of Statistics Canada and Citizenship and Immigration, Canada. It identifies best policy practices that can also be used in other countries to address demographic challenges similar to those facing Canada, for example population ageing and youth out-migration from smaller regions to larger regions, through immigration. Economic integration of immigrants in Atlantic Canada is faster and better than it is nationally. An overarching result is that an analysis of regional data can lead to very different policy conclusions than the analysis of national data, which means that it can be risky to devise immigration policy based only on national data. A clear message is that economic benefits from immigration can be enhanced by facilitating a broader geographic distribution of immigrants, rather than maintaining their concentration in a few larger urban regions. A must read for immigration and population policy makers, immigrant settlement agencies and academic researchers.

This book provides a brief historical overview of Europe's migration experience since World War II, and presents a simple economic model that shows how immigration can affect the host countries' economies.

A study examined international differences in how immigrants perform in the labor market of their chosen country of residence. The empirical analysis used five census data sets from the three host countries to document the labor market performance of foreign-born persons in Australia, Canada, and the United States. Among the major empirical findings were the following: (1) prior to the mid-1960s, the United States and Canada attracted migrants who performed quite well in the labor market, whereas Australia attracted migrants who were not relatively successful in the Australian labor market; (2) these rankings were reversed during the 1970s, with migrants to Australia performing very well, whereas those choosing the United States had very low earnings; (3) changes in immigration policy initiated by the 1965 Amendments to the U.S. Immigration and Nationality Act induced a structural decline in the quality of immigrant cohorts who chose the United States as their destination; (4) U.S. citizens who emigrated to Canada had very low earnings despite their relatively high education level. The study concluded that economic theory suggests that much more can be learned about the selection process if immigrants are compared to persons from the same country of origin who chose not to migrate and if immigrants in any given host country are compared to migrants who chose other host countries as their destination. (The document includes a 43-item bibliography, 23 tables, 5 figures, and an index.) (CML)