American Economic Journal:
Applied Economics
ISSN 1945-7782 (Print) | ISSN 1945-7790 (Online)
Task Specialization, Immigration, and Wages
American Economic Journal: Applied Economics
vol. 1,
no. 3, July 2009
(pp. 135–69)
Abstract
Large inflows of less educated immigrants may reduce wages paid to comparably-educated, native-born workers. However, if less educated foreign- and native-born workers specialize in different production tasks, because of different abilities, immigration will cause natives to reallocate their task supply, thereby reducing downward wage pressure. Using occupational task-intensity data from the O*NET dataset and individual US census data, we demonstrate that foreign-born workers specialize in occupations intensive in manual-physical labor skills while natives pursue jobs more intensive in communication-language tasks. This mechanism can explain why economic analyses find only modest wage consequences of immigration for less educated native-born workers. (JEL J24, J31, J61)Citation
Peri, Giovanni, and Chad Sparber. 2009. "Task Specialization, Immigration, and Wages." American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 1 (3): 135–69. DOI: 10.1257/app.1.3.135Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- J24 Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
- J31 Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials
- J61 Geographic Labor Mobility; Immigrant Workers
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