How Does Immigration Influence the US Economy?

[rootX]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-12810828
This tells that African immigrants are finding their home countries better than America. A simple observation linking immigration to the economic cycle is something really interesting.

There is not data in that article however, I noticed that illegal immigration also dropped:

http://www.usnews.com/opinion/artic...-immigration-stabilizes-after-a-two-year-drop

I just found something from 2003:

The pace of recent U.S. economic
growth would have been impossible
without immigration. Since 1990, immigrants
have contributed to job growth in
three main ways: They fill an increasing
share of jobs overall, they take jobs in
labor-scarce regions, and they fill the
types of jobs native workers often shun.
The foreign-born make up only 11.3 percent
of the U.S. population and 14 percent
of the labor force. But amazingly,
the flow of foreign-born is so large that
immigrants currently account for a larger
share of labor force growth than natives

When employment is not growing—
largely the case since early 2001—immigration
naturally slows. The foreign-born
are both less apt to come and more
likely to leave when the U.S. economy is
doing poorly. Current Population Survey
data indicate that while the immigrant
population increased 6.1 percent between
2000 and 2001, it rose only 2
percent between 2001 and 2002.

http://www.dallasfed.org/research/swe/2003/swe0306a.pdf

It seems like we are seeing similar behavior now.

Few of things I was mainly interested in is how economy gets affected when immigration slows down during poor economic growth, how fast immigration jumps when there is positive growth. Do government immigration policies consider these immigration cycles? I read today in some article that all presidents believe that immigration policies are outdated however there hasn't been significant overhaul.

 

[Pengwuino]

It makes sense to be honest. When times are bad, an American who is born and raised here pretty much has to stay. Someone who legally immigrated from another country far away has more options. If things don't work here, might as well go back home and see how that works out. It's an especially easy decision when you have family back in another country.

The drop in illegal immigration is probably coming from Mexican immigrants. It's getting harder and more dangerous to cross the border and jobs in America are hard to come by so it has probably gotten to the point that it's not worth it for many to try to come to America to send money back home.

 

[rootX]

It makes sense to be honest. When times are bad, an American who is born and raised here pretty much has to stay. Someone who legally immigrated from another country far away has more options. If things don't work here, might as well go back home and see how that works out. It's an especially easy decision when you have family back in another country.

The drop in illegal immigration is probably coming from Mexican immigrants. It's getting harder and more dangerous to cross the border and jobs in America are hard to come by so it has probably gotten to the point that it's not worth it for many to try to come to America to send money back home.

I think high level of mobility is not only good for people themselves but also for everyone else as those people don't strain the system. Immigrants are also more flexible with what kind of jobs offered to them than natural citizens. I am not familiar with the US immigration policies but from very limited reading it seems like immigration policies are not taking much advantage of immigrant behaviors.

While natural Americans will have less options but there are people who migrate between states and more likely to adjust to the economic cycles than those who don't move at all.

 

[rootX]

I also came across Dubai immigration problems about a year ago:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/7985361.stm
These conditions aren't any different from the US.