The discussion over Mexican immigration today needs to include the economic and demographic benefits to the United States and address the current increase in border crossings within the broader context of changes taking place in the nation.
To explain the current rise in Mexican immigration, some observers point to the deteriorating conditions in Mexico, including the spread of narcoviolence, as driving factors. Others point to the Biden administration and argue that undocumented immigration is now entirely out of control. However, there is evidence to suggest that an alternative explanation also exists. According to the Cato Institute, the biggest explanation for the current increase in undocumented immigration from Mexico “is the attraction of the number of near‐record number of job openings in the United States.” According to this interpretation, the demands of the current labor market are not being met by domestic workers. Mexican immigrants, and other contemporary immigrants, are responding to this unmet need. It is further argued that:
There were 10.2 million private job openings in May 2022, slightly off a high of 10.8 million in March. The number of private job openings in May 2022 is 69 percent higher than the monthly average during the Trump administration (Figure 1). The wage gain for immigrants is already a 4‑fold to 10‐fold increase compared to mostly Latin American countries, which includes the higher cost of living in the United States. That wage premium combined with the hottest labor market in the history of the private job openings dataset likely explain why so many illegal immigrants are trying to come now (usual econometric caveats about spatial autocorrelation and omitted variable bias aside).
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The economic gains from working in the United States largely explain why immigrants want to come in the first place and the scarcity of visas explains why so many come illegally. There simply are not enough temporary work visas available in enough sectors of the U.S. economy for legal migrant workers to meet the demand of the U.S. labor market, so illegal migrant workers meet it.
This current increase reflects a reversal of a trend in recent years, in which Mexican immigration had declined, even reaching negative numbers as more Mexicans were returning to their home country than those crossing the border to the north.
As the national midterm electoral process unfolds and the 2024 election approaches, it will once again be common to find anti-immigrant vitriol emanating from candidates and media outlets.
Mexican Immigration Today: The Aging American Society and Labor Force
Contemporary American society is characterized by the rapid growth of the elderly population. This was clearly documented in the 2020 Census. Immigration, whether from Mexico or other parts of the world, will be increasingly necessary to ensure the ongoing competitiveness of the American economy.
According to the Census Bureau:
[T]he nation’s 65-and-older population has grown rapidly since 2010, driven by the aging of Baby Boomers born between 1946 and 1964. The 65-and-older population grew by over a third (34.2% or 13,787,044) during the past decade, and by 3.2% (1,688,924) from 2018 to 2019. The growth of this population contributed to an increase in the national median age from 37.2 years in 2010 to 38.4 in 2019, according to the Census Bureau’s 2019 Population Estimates.
The aging of contemporary American society is a demographic trend that cannot be easily or rapidly modified. As time passes, more baby boomers will exit the labor force, whether by choice or necessity. For example, in a study released by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, it is indicated that there were “3.3 million or 7% more retirees as of October 2021 than in January 2020.” The study indicated that the increase is largely among those aged 65-74 and that the rate of retirement exceeds what would be predicted of baby boomer retirement trends. But retirement trends are not uniform across different social groups. More detailed findings of the study included the following:
- Male workers were less likely to be retired than their female counterparts. This difference was far more pronounced among workers ages 65 to 74.
- Black, Hispanic and Native American workers were less likely to be retired than their white peers of similar ages. However, there was no difference in the likelihood of retirement between Native American and white workers age 75 and older. Asian workers were slightly more likely to be retired than white workers of similar ages.
- Workers who were married or widowed were more likely to be retired than their never-married, single peers.
- Findings were more complicated among workers who were separated or divorced. These workers were more likely to be retired among those 75 and older, but at younger ages there was no meaningful difference.
- Workers with at least some college education were less likely to be retired than their peers with a high school diploma or less education.
- Results by income (not displayed here) show a declining likelihood of retirement as household income increases.
- Veterans were more likely to be retired versus nonveterans, especially among those workers ages 65 to 74.
The aging of the American population and workforce brings about a series of consequence. One of them is the rise in the demand for the care of the elderly. One study points out that the number of Americans over the age of 85 will double to 14.5 million by 2040. Moreover, “a substantial fraction of those will have some type of disability.” Even while most American elders might prefer to remain in their homes, many of these older Americans will require professional assistance. The study argues that over “800,000 Americans are already on waiting lists for formal home-based care and other supports for ageing in place.” Mexican immigrants are among those who are employed to provide home-based care and also in institutional settings.
Another national study has documented the extent to which the health care and direct care industry relies on immigrant labor:
Using nationally representative data, we found that in 2017 immigrants accounted for 18.2 percent of health care workers and 23.5 percent of formal and nonformal long-term care sector workers. More than one-quarter (27.5 percent) of direct care workers and 30.3 percent of nursing home housekeeping and maintenance workers were immigrants. Although legal noncitizen immigrants accounted for 5.2 percent of the US population, they made up 9.0 percent of direct care workers. Naturalized citizens, 6.8 percent of the US population, accounted for 13.9 percent of direct care workers. In light of the current and projected shortage of health care and direct care workers, our finding that immigrants fill a disproportionate share of such jobs suggests that policies curtailing immigration will likely compromise the availability of care for elderly and disabled Americans.
Occupational Characteristics of Mexican Immigrants
Mexican immigrant workers are not evenly represented throughout the labor market. According to the Migration Policy Institute, when compared to all foreign-born workers and U.S-born workers, Mexican immigrants “were more likely to be employed in the following occupations: service; natural resources, construction, and maintenance; and production, transportation, and material moving.” As the chart below illustrates, Mexican immigrants are less likely to be employed in Management, Business, Science and Arts Occupation, as well as in Sales and Office Occupations.
Mexican Immigrants Can Help Fight Inflation
The post-Covid recovery of the American economy has included inflationary problems, some of which are due to the breakdowns in the supply chain, such as the limited availability of chips needed for automobile production, while others might be due to economic and fiscal policies adopted since 2020, or the opportunities to profiteer, the consequences of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, or a combination of factors, as in the case of oil companies, which are accused of raising gasoline prices beyond what would have been expected as a consequence of Russia’s military expansion. In a May 2022 national survey, the PEW Research Center found that inflation was identified as the biggest problem facing the nation.
In this context, entities such as the American Chamber of Commerce argue that increased immigration can help in the fight against inflation.
“We need more workers. We should welcome people who want to come here, go to school and stay,” Chamber of Commerce CEO Suzanne Clark told reporters during a press conference on Tuesday. “That is a place the government could be particularly helpful and we do believe it would be anti-inflationary.”
Clark added that ramping up immigration would help to ease the supply chain disruptions that are at the heart of the inflation spike, including the shortage of truck drivers.
“If we can alleviate the worker shortage, it might be the fastest thing to do to impact inflation,” Clark said
The Chamber of Commerce further argues that the number of jobs being created far surpasses the availability of domestic workers.
We hear every day from our member companies—of every size and industry, across nearly every state—they’re facing unprecedented challenges trying to find enough workers to fill open jobs. Right now, the latest data shows that we have over 11 million job openings in the U.S.—but only 6 million unemployed workers.
We have a lot of jobs, but not enough workers to fill them. If every unemployed person in the country found a job, we would still have 5.4 million open jobs.
To date, the pleas for immigration reform made by the employers represented by entities like the American Chamber of Commerce have fallen on deaf ears in Congress.
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