New study suggests boosting economic migrants to the US
New study suggests boosting economic migrants to the US
Family-based immigration and enforcement spending are also vital
A cliche critique of the US immigration system is that it admits too many family-based migrants. Other countries, this story goes, focus on economic immigrants, and the US needs to do the same. Our new research paper suggests that this thinking is only half right.
Historically, the US has been a beacon for family-based immigrants, matching countries like Australia and Canada in numbers when adjusted for population size. Yet, when we dive deeper into the intricacies of immigration patterns, as revealed by economist Armando R. Lopez-Velasco's latest research, we encounter a more nuanced narrative—especially concerning economic migrants.
Before diving into the new paper, a key point of context is that the US family-based immigration system is less of an oddball in family-based migration than people assume. Once you adjust for population size, the US doesn’t stick out on family-based immigration.
A 2018 Migration Policy Institute report finds that Australia, Canada, and the US admit roughly the same number of people through family migrants. The US admits 2.1 family immigrants per 1,000 people. For comparison, Australia admits 2.6 and Canada 2.0.
The real story of the US immigration system is that we are far behind on economic migrants. Canada admits 9 times more, and Australia admits 11 times. The US system is peculiar not for the number of family-based immigrants, but for lacking economic migrant flows.
This is the big-picture point that Lopez-Velasco’s research emphasizes. The new study presents a comprehensive model for optimizing US immigration policy. It identifies a crucial balance between skill-based, family-based, and unauthorized immigration that maximizes benefits to US natives. He concludes that the US needs to boost its flows of economic migrants.
By taking a snapshot of the immigration flows in the US from 2000 to 2019, Lopez-Velasco illustrates that approximately two out of three of all the permanent resident permits were designated for family-based immigration. That is an average of 680,000 permits per year. In contrast, only 154,000 permits were given out in a skills-based category. Concretely, that means about one in ten visas given were from existing skills-based pathways.
In this light, the real problem, as Velasco-Lopez concludes, is that many workers need a pathway to work legally in the country. Based on these statistics and the project’s model, a better policy would be expanding skill-based or guestworker programs while maintaining the current level of family-based immigration. Investing additional resources in immigration enforcement is likely to make these temporary and employer-driven rather than family-driven pathways even more effective.
Here's what Velasco-Lopez’s new research tells us:
Optimal Immigration Policy: The model demonstrates that the best outcomes for US residents stem from sustaining current family-based immigration levels, expanding skill-based admissions, and strengthening enforcement. This approach echoes the mid-90s to early 2000s reforms focused on guestworker programs and border enforcement.
Holistic Benefits: The proposed immigration quotas are finely tuned to enhance the natives' welfare, factoring in fiscal transfers, the scale of family immigration, and the provision of public goods. The study highlights skill-based immigration as a dynamic tool that compensates for the fiscal effects of other immigration types and adapts to economic and demographic shifts.
Applying the Framework: Lopez-Velasco's findings suggest a significant rise in skill-based immigration, maintaining the status quo for family-based admissions, and increasing enforcement spending. This strategic allocation aims to forge a policy responsive to various long-term socio-economic trends.
Policymakers should remember the value of families in the long-run success of new Americans. From helping their relatives migrate legally to finding English-language classes and more, families help them Americanize. In addition to cultural assimilation, family-based immigrants have rapid earnings growth on their journey toward the American dream. Today’s limits on family-based immigration create barriers for individuals based on their home country and other limits. The US immigration system is not so strange in recognizing these values. But it could do more to match our peers by recruiting additional talented people from abroad.
The US is on par with its counterparts regarding family immigration rates but lags in admitting economic migrants—a gap that, if bridged, would create mutual prosperity for both the immigrants and Americans.