Suchergebnisse

AbstractPast scholars find that there is a public consensus in the United States on the traits of ideal immigrants. Nevertheless, is there also a consensus on the perceived traits of actual immigrants living in the country? Further, are these perceptions attitudinally consequential? We find no consensus among whites on the composition of the immigrant population in the United States. Further, the immigrant traits they perceive are correlated in specific stereotypical patterns we label "immigrant archetypes." Using latent class analysis, we find five archetypes. Two of them are extreme—one represents a high-status, documented non-Latino immigrant, which is associated with the most positive immigration attitudes. The other extreme represents a low-status, undocumented Latino man, which is associated with the most restrictionist immigration views. Nevertheless, a second Latino archetype, a better-educated and documented Latina woman working to support her family, is correlated with more positive attitudes than her male counterpart. Archetypes do not seem entirely rooted in objective reality and are stronger predictors of immigration attitudes than most other independent variables. Their existence has significant implications for public opinion dynamics. When researchers, politicians, or journalists reference a single immigrant trait, they may knowingly or unknowingly conjure up entire archetypes in people's minds.

The essay discusses the experimental forms of visual representation in the work of the Argentinean photographer Seba Kurtis. His work portrays several migrations from the southern to northern hemispheres using "flawed" devices and other heterodox resources that extend the limits of the concepts of record and representation, and their relation with technology. The technical device and security "device", seen from a biopolitical perspective intertwine in Kurtis´ photographic works, recording what we define as flawed experience and people without identity, which constitute the illegal immigrant condition. Photography becomes a form of resistance and necessarily veiled memory of a diaspora marked by its growing illegalization, in opposition to the record and control of the state devices.

AbstractThis paper studies housing market outcomes of undocumented immigrants in the U.S. and explores the mechanisms behind the differential prices that immigrants pay for shelter. I show that undocumented renters pay a premium for housing relative to observably similar, documented, immigrant renters occupying similar housing. Building on theory and suggestive evidence that the premium is the result of search frictions driven by fear of deportation, I employ a triple‐differences strategy to evaluate the impacts of sanctuary city policies on housing market outcomes of undocumented immigrants. I find that sanctuary city policies, which limit immigration enforcement, reduce housing costs of undocumented renters, suggesting such policies mitigate search frictions for this group.

Abstract
This article considers how legal status affects agricultural labor market outcomes and food prices. Using both propensity score matching and treatment effects regression analysis, undocumented immigrants are found to make 5 to 6% less on average and to have significantly lower probabilities of aid program participation than their documented immigrant counterparts. Magnitudes of differences depend on the permanence of legal status, with naturalized citizens and green card holders benefiting more from their legal status than those with other forms of work authorization. Results suggest that a new program granting amnesty to undocumented immigrant farmworkers, reminiscent of the Seasonal Agricultural Worker program under the Immigration Reform and Control Act, would have minimal effects on farmworker outcomes especially in the short term, and that if employers pass labor cost increases to consumers via food prices, effects on consumers would be similarly minimal.

We analyze the effect of immigrants' legal status on their consumption behavior using unique survey data that samples both documented and undocumented immigrants. To address the problem of sorting into legal status, we propose two alternative identification strategies as exogenous source of variation for current legal status: First, transitory income shocks in the home country, measured as rainfall shocks at the time of emigration. Second, amnesty quotas that grant legal residence status to undocumented immigrants. Both sources of variation create a strong first stage, and-although very different in nature-lead to similar estimates of the effects of illegal status on consumption, with undocumented immigrants consuming about 40% less than documented immigrants, conditional on background characteristics. Roughly one quarter of this decrease is explained by undocumented immigrants having lower incomes than documented immigrants. Our findings imply that legalization programs may have a potentially important effect on immigrants' consumption behavior, with consequences for both the source and host countries.