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Chutes or Ladders? A Longitudinal Analysis of Immigrant Earnings

Bibliographic Data

ID10181394
AuthorsDarren Lubotsky (0000-0003-2602-7220, Princeton University, corresponding author)
Year2007
Volume115
Issue5
Pages820-867
Publication date2007-10-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Political Economy (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0022-3808 • E-ISSN: 1537-534X
PublisherUniversity of Chicago Press (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1086/522871
OpenAlexW2743770206
LanguageEN
Citations received96
References cited22

I use longitudinal earnings data from Social Security records to study the effect of selective emigration on the measured progress of im-migrants to the United States. The immigrant-native earnings gap closes by 10–15 percent during immigrants ’ first 20 years in the United States, or about half as fast as typical estimates from repeated cross sections of the decennial census. The divergent results indicate that emigration by low-wage immigrants has systematically led past re-searchers to overestimate the wage progress of immigrants who remain in the United States. Selective back-and-forth migration also leads typical estimates to overstate the measured decline in earnings among successive immigrant arrival cohorts between 1960 and 1980. I

Census · Demographic economics · Earnings · Earnings growth · Economics · Geography · Immigration · Labour economics · Population · Social security · Sociology · Survey of Income and Program Participation · Wage · Accounting · Demography · Labor market dynamics and wage inequality · Migration and Labor Dynamics · Migration, Ethnicity, and Economy

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Unique citing works96
Citations per year6
Citation span2010 - 2026 (17)
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