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The federal policy changes that Congress and the President will have to make as we approach the 21st century will be among the most far-reaching since the enactment of the New Deal. The scope of legislation before policymakers as they continue their efforts to balance the budget will be vast and many of its elements very technical. This new, highly accessible book examines the nature of the challenges confronting policymakers, the options that are available to address these challenges, and the ramifications of the various options. This new book, which continues Brookings' highly acclaimed and influential Setting National Priorities series, will serve as a guide for understanding and evaluating proposals of the next Congress and the new administration. It is also designed to inform the policy debate during the presidential election. Edited by Robert Reischauer, one of the nation's most noted budget experts, the book covers such critical issues as prospects for economic growth, how to reduce domestic discretionary spending, how to restructure Medicare; how much to lower the safety net, how to reshape national security for the post-Cold War world, whether to transform the tax system, and how to prepare for the retirement of the baby boom generation. This book will be extremely useful for citizens anxious to make sense out of the campaign rhetoric, journalists attempting to explain the issues at play, and students of public policy, public health, political science, and economics. In addition to Reischauer, the contributors include Henry J. Aaron, Barry Bosworth, Gary Burtless, David Cutler, William G. Gale, Thomas E. Mann, Charles L. Schultze, John D. Steinbruner, R. Kent Weaver, and Joshua M. Wiener.

The size and nature of recent immigration to the United States have raised the possibility that immigrants have diminished the labor market opportunities of low-skilled, native minority workers and, thereby, might have contributed to the emergence of the urban underclass. To the extent that immigrants and native workers are substitute factors of production, immigrants may reduce the wage rates of native labor, increase their unemployment, lower their labor force participation, undermine working conditions, and reduce rates of internal mobility. While casual empiricism would seem to support the notion that immigrants have depressed the opportunities of low-skilled native workers, careful and sophisticated analyses by a number of social scientists provide little evidence that immigrants have had any significant negative impacts on the employment situation of black Americans. Thus competition from unskilled immigrants should not be included on the list of factors that have facilitated the growth of the underclass.

The size & nature of recent immigration to the US have raised the possibility that immigrants have diminished the labor market opportunities of low-skilled, native minority workers &, thereby, might have contributed to the emergence of the urban underclass. To the extent that immigrants & native workers are substitute factors of production, immigrants may reduce the wage rates of native labor, increase their unemployment, lower their labor force participation, undermine working conditions, & reduce rates of internal mobility. While casual empiricism would seem to support the notion that immigrants have depressed the opportunities of low-skilled native workers, recent, careful & sophisticated analyses provide little evidence that immigrants have had any significant negative impacts on the employment situation of black Americans. Thus competition from unskilled immigrants should not be included on the list of factors that have facilitated the growth of the underclass. 1 Table. HA