View Research by Author - Harriet Orcutt Duleep

Citation URL: http://www.urban.org/HarrietOrcuttDuleep

This paper summarizes our research on the relationship between immigrant entry earnings and earnings growth. Using 1960-1990 decennial census data, we find that for cohorts from the same country of origin, education group, and age group, there is a systematic inverse relationship between initial earnings and subsequent earnings growth. With regard to the effect of greater admissions on the basis of kinship, we find that declines in occupational skills admissions and corresponding increases in family admissions are associated with both a decrease in initial earnings and an increase in earnings growth. We further find that the earnings of demographically comparable immigrants, regardless of country of origin, converge with time in the United States. All of these findings suggest that immigrant entry earnings and earnings growth are jointly determined and inversely related.

A number of hypotheses have been advanced to explain recent declines in the education-adjusted entry earnings of immigrants. One hypothesis suggests that the decline has been caused by the immigration of lower ability immigrants—a result of the relatively unequal income distributions of the source countries currently dominating U.S. immigration. Another hypothesis is that the decline in immigrant entry earnings reflects a change in the extent to which immigrant skills are transferred to the United States. The methodology for this study involved measuring the earnings growth of immigrant cohorts across the 1960–80 censuses to examine these two hypotheses.

This report introduces a new technique for measuring immigrant earnings growth. The authors exploited a longitudinal feature of the Current Population Survey by which the same households were reinterviewed. Survey samples were matched so that the wages of individual immigrant and native-born men could be followed for one year. The report correlates entry earnings and earnings growth for immigrant and native-born populations.

Using Immigration and Naturalization Service data on admissions criteria matched to 1990 census data, this study examines the effect of family admissions on immigrant education, self-employment, and earnings. Also studied is the effect of one of the family-based admissions categories recommended for elimination—the preference category that admits siblings of U.S. citizens. The report adds to basic knowledge about the complex interactions of admission categories, human capital investment, and earnings growth.

This paper explores to what extent occupational experience is responsible for the effect of low income and education on mortality. Using Current Population Survey data on education and disability matched to Social Security data on earnings, disability, and mortality, this question is pursued by examining if and how the estimated effects of income and education change once occupational experience is included in the mortality model.

This report reviews previous empirical research and discusses theoretical expectations concerning the relationship between entry earnings and earnings growth of immigrants. Projected wage growth is compared to actual wage growth following individuals over a yearlong period. The association between the entry earnings of country/age/education cohorts and earnings growth is examined using 1970 and 1980 census data and then 1960–80 census data.

In contrast to their relative standing in today's labor market, in 1960 American-born men in all Asian groups earned substantially less than comparable Whites. This paper analyzes the large relative gain in the earnings of American-born Asian men by exploring plausible explanations for this progress, namely Asian/White differences in schooling, labor force participation, entrepreneurial and agricultural employment, English language proficiency, and foreign-born parentage.

The focus of this report is to contrast how lower-income African Americans and Hispanics fared before and during the civil rights era compared to lower-income, non-Hispanic Whites. This report uses Social Security longitudinal earnings records matched to Current Population Survey data to examine changes in relative earnings of the study groups from 1952 to 1975. One analysis follows the relative earnings of African American and Hispanic men as measured by the ratio of minority earnings to non-Hispanic-White earnings at specific points in the earnings distributions. A separate approach was used to track a longitudinal sample of individuals who were in the labor market before and after the passage of the Civil Rights Act.

This study examines the effect of legal immigration admissions criteria on earnings profiles of immigrants in the United States. It is based on 1980 census data matched to Immigration and Naturalization Service information. The authors examine the theoretical and empirical effects on immigrants' earnings on the basis of the criterion for admission—either occupational skills or kinship. The study focuses on immigrants' entire life-cycle earnings after entering the United States rather than solely on their initial or average earnings.

This study examines how country-of-origin effects on the earnings of immigrant men change with the number of years immigrants have been in the United States. It uses two complementary methodologies: one examines the relationship between the country of origin (as a determinant of immigrant earnings) and immigrant time in the United States; the other examines whether the dispersion of earnings of demographically comparable immigrants, across different countries of origin, decreased over time. Both methodologies involved following sample cohorts across decennial censuses and are sensitive to biases caused by emigration. The study concludes with an examination of whether important results from these methodologies would support taking emigration into account.

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