Socio-Economic Performance of Immigrants: The Social Capital Factor The research on socioeconomic performance of immigrants experienced a theoretical watershed during the 1990s, as a result of the employment of the concept of social capital (referring to the resources one can have access to, by virtue of being a part of a social network). The topics of interest in this new research stream have been quite diverse, from examining the impact of social capital on the initiation and perpetuation of migratory flows, to its effect on the settlement of immigrants, their economic performance, and the educational attainment of their younger generations. Most such studies, however, have been American and, to a lesser extent, European. The study proposed here is an attempt to put Canada on this research map, by surveying a sample of 200 immigrants residing in 5 Prairie CMAs, with the use of a ‘social capital questionnaire’. The study has significant potential policy implications, particularly for those aimed at facilitating the immigrants’ upward mobility. Most of the existing research on economic achievements of immigrants tends to attribute the variance unexplained by factors such as human capital endowments and assimilation effects to discrimination, with the obvious result of promoting the formation of anti-discrimination measures. The study proposed here is based on the premise that a portion of this unexplained variance may be the result of the differences in the stocks of social capital among various immigrants and immigrant groups. Such a possibility, if confirmed through research, would indicated that the effect of discrimination may have been overestimated in the previous research and, therefore, some of the resources currently in use for promoting anti-discrimination measures may be re-directed to empowering immigrant communities. This, however, by no means, should be taken as implying the non-existence of discrimination against immigrants or downplaying its significance; rather, this is simply a step toward further refining of the theoretical frameworks currently in use in research on socioeconomic performance of immigrants and their children (second generation immigrants). |
Final Reports AVAILABLE Kazemipur, A. (2006). The Market Value of Friendship: Social Networks of Immigrant. Canadian Ethnic Studies, 38, 47-71. Kazemipur, A. (2006). A Canadian Exceptionalism? Trust and Diversity in Canadian Cities. Journal of International Migration and Integration, 7(2), 219-240. Kazemipur, A. (2006). Social Trust, Ethnic Diversity, and Immigrants: The Case of Canada (PMC Working Paper Series No. 06-05). Edmonton, AB: Prairie Metropolis Centre. Kazemipur, A. (2004). Social Capital of Immigrants in Canada (PMC Working Paper Series No. 04-04). Edmonton, AB: Prairie Metropolis Centre. |
The economic integration of immigrants - that is, the economic performance of the foreign born relative to the native born - has been studied widely. Previous studies have used either one of a series of cross sections, principally census microdata. While such studies are useful, they suffer from important biases arising from data limitations and from unobserved influences on economic performance. This project will use a recently released panel data set of Canadian households, the Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics, to investigate biases resulting from conventional estimates on cross-sectional data and those resulting from limitations in the measurement of work experience. We access the credibility of previous estimates of immigrant economic integration, which constitute our conventional wisdom. |
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Economists have not extensively studied the assimilation of second generation immigrants, but arguably, the performance of the second generation may be taken as the ultimate measure of successful economic assimilation in "the long run". Early sociological work can be characterized as "straight-line" assimilation, not that assimilation proceeds linearly across generations, but only that it proceeds monotonically. That is, the second generation is more successful than the first, and the third generation (the grandchildren of immigrants) is more successful still. The rival overachievement model also maintains the latter’s generally optimistic tenor. According to this alternative, the second generation will be more successful than either the first or the third generation. Unlike the first generation, it will not suffer from a lack of host-country-specific human capital, and unlike the third generation, it will benefit from the immigrant experience and high motivation of its parents. |
Final Report AVAILABLE Short-term, Medium-term and Long-term Economic Performance of Immigrants - Economic Domain Report. Final Report PMC |
There have been serious policy concerns over the apparent earnings erosion of recent immigrants. Such concerns are largely premised on findings based on tax data which show that skilled workers who immigrated to Canada prior to 1989 earned more and recent immigrants earned less that the average earnings of Canadian tax filers one year after landing. Several studies also noted that immigrants who came in the late 1960s and early 1970s performed much better that those who came later. However, policy considerations and academic research thus far tend not to distinguish between short-term and long-term economic performance of immigrants. In this project, immigrants’ economic performance is conceptualized in four stages: settlement period up to 3 years after landing; medium term from 3 to 10 years; long term extending beyond 10 years; and 2nd generation. The research question is as follows: What are the factors and barriers that affect the short-term, medium-term and long-term performance of immigrants. Researchers in this project use different data and methods to address this question, focusing on different stages of the process. The study would help to explain how different factors may affect immigrants’ performance in different stages, and to clarify the policy efficacy of investing in "immigrant settlement" versus "immigrant selection". |
Final Report AVAILABLE Short-term, Medium-term and Long-term Economic Performance of Immigrants - Economic Domain Report. Final Report PMC |
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A central issue in Canada’s immigration policy discourse has to do with the value of immigrants to the receiving country. In the past, economists have tried to measure immigrants’ economic value in terms of whether they enrich the resident population, compete with the resident population for jobs or provide a level of efficiency to the aggregate economy. The purpose of this project is to take the demographic forces into account to assess the economic and demographic effects of immigration to Canada since the 1970s, with a view to project the future. Specifically, the research project examines the following questions: What has been the effect of immigration on Canada’s population and economy? How would the volume and composition of immigration change Canada’s future? |
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George et al (2001) argue that even if Canada accepts annual migration of 225,000 and attains life expectancy of 80 years for males and 84 years for females by 2026, Canada will experience a net annual loss in population on the magnitude of about 10,000 persons by 2025/26 because of more deaths over births. The population loss will intensify, reaching about 120,000 persons by 2035/36 and about 197,000 by 2050/51 (George et al., 2001). In his recent book, Li (2003) makes a strong case for Canada to expand the annual intake of immigrants, since immigration would be the only source from which Canada’s population and labour force can continue to grow. The ultimate question is not whether Canada has much to gain in expanding immigration but whether Canada can afford the loss of not increasing immigration? Does Canada want to continue down a path of population decline? To understand the full impact of such a loss or gain requires simulations and projections made under varying assumptions, in order to capture more accurately the impact of immigration on sensitive indicators such as such as the average age of the population, the proportions of children, persons retirement age, and the numbers of people at ages of entry/departure from the labor force. The thrust of this component is to analyze the role of international migration (net, immigration, emigration) on population change (size, age, sex composition, provincial distribution) in Canada’s future. The study will examine factors that contribute to the relative labor force involvement and unemployment of immigration groups. |
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Those who arrived to North America during the first major wave of immigration (1890-1930) shared a common European background. They were all absorbed and gradually became part of the dominant WASP community. In three or four generations, the children of immigrants moved from ‘proletarian to plumber to professional’. The recent experience of immigrants and their children does not completely corroborate the above observations. Hence, the questions arise: why is that the second generation upward mobility of the past not applicable to all recent immigrants? So why is it that there are some differences within and between groups of immigrants? The current study is attempting to investigate these questions. More specifically, it is proposed to investigate the question of the educational and economic performance of both immigrant children and second generation, compared to that of children whose parents were born in Canada. The focus will be lent to the role played by ethnic or national origin. |
Final Report AVAILABLE Short-term, Medium-term and Long-term Economic Performance of Immigrants - Economic Domain Report. Final Report PMC |
Richard Wanner, University of Calgary A central issue in Canada’s immigration policy discourse has to do with the value of immigrants to the receiving country. In the past, economists have tried to measure immigrants’ economic value in terms of whether they enrich the resident population, compete with the resident population for jobs or provide a level of efficiency to the aggregate economy. The purpose of this project is to take the demographic forces into account to assess the economic and demographic effects of immigration to Canada since the 1970s, with a view to project the future. Specifically, the research project examines the following questions: What has been the effect of immigration on Canada’s population and economy? How would the volume and composition of immigration change Canada’s future? |
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This component of the Economic Domain Team Project will complement that of Professor Li by addressing a similar set of issues using separate databases. Specifically, I will use data from four censuses of Canada, 1981, 1986, 1991, and 1996, that have been linked into a single file to explore the question of how the individual characteristics of immigrants, along with characteristics of their entry cohorts, social structural factors and macroeconomic conditions, influence their earnings in the settlement period, the middle term and the long term. Although the census does not track individuals over time as would a prospective panel design, the use of cohorts methods does permit us to study changes in immigrant entry cohorts over time. The analysis will estimate a series of earnings models separately for men and women that permit the effects of education and language ability to vary over time. Also incorporated in these models will be a set of dummy variables indexing country of origin and their interaction with the education and language ability trends. Subsequent models will also take account of differences over time in the entry class composition of immigrant cohorts and macroeconomic conditions in Canada during their period of arrival. In the final stage of the analysis measures of "ethnic capital" will be incorporated in a series of multilevel models, including the mean earnings of ethnic groups, the rate of welfare dependency characteristic of the ethnic group, and the level of development of the ethnic group’s country of origin. |
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This project examines the effect of gender and race and occupational structures on the earning outcomes of immigrant women in Canada and the US. Evidence from several studies in both countries indicates that earnings equations differ for immigrant women and men, but few studies attempt to compare the differences crossnationally. Findings from the few comparative studies available suggest that immigrant women in the US, with some exceptions, suffer greater economic disparities that their counterparts in Canada. This research will investigate the extent to which this trend continues today. It is an assessment of how country of arrival (Canada or US) may differentially influence economic outcomes for immigrant women. Variables such as fertility rate, number of children under age 6, and marital status, along with standard human capital variables such as education and work experience, are used to model their employment wages. The crossnational comparison uses four Census datasets from 1990/91 and 2000/01. The findings will apply to Metropolis Policy Priorities Number 6 and 11. The proposed project is part of a Prairie Centre Economic Domain project, headed by Peter Li including Richard Wanner and Shiva Halli. |
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This project attempts to identify the factors that influence the short-term, medium-term, and long-term labour market adjustment of immigrant women in Canada and the United States. Several aspects of this project are innovative and would generate various policy implications. First, an important aspect missing from much of the existing literature is the identification of the stages of economic integration. While it is well known that immigrants "catch up" to the earnings of the native-born over a period of time, the process of integration is not understood. By examining the short-term (less that three years), medium-term (3-9 years), and long-term (more than ten years) stages of economic integration, we can identify factors that influence labour market experiences at each stage of integration. Second, much of the research on immigrant women applies statistical models originally designed for men. The typical conclusion is that the model does not fit as well for immigrant women. This research is an attempt to address this issue with the objective to design a statistical analysis that takes into account the various unique factors that influence immigrant women’s participation in the labour market. Third, the international comparison can highlight how policies may differentially impact immigrant women given the variation in economic climate and their unique characteristics. |
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