Securing the Future: U.S. Immigrant Integration Policy, A Reader

At a time when most of the growth in the U.S. labor force will have to come from immigration, and more than one in five U.S. children live in immigrant families, federal policymakers are giving little thought to the integration of these newcomers or to their community impacts. Further, their arrival occurs as the influence of many of the most important institutions that have promoted immigrant integration in the past—urban schools, unions, and political parties—is declining.

Securing the Future seeks to define what policymakers and scholars mean by integration while attempting to sketch the contours of U.S. integration policy. The volume reviews evidence of immigrants’ integration by examining the progress of the second generation, as well as trends in education, health, the workforce, and citizenship. The book concludes by discussing key elements of a national integration policy, noting several issues raised by current debates over immigration reform.

The volume is a synthesis of research prepared for the Independent Task Force on Immigration and America’s Future, convened by MPI in cooperation with the Manhattan Institute and the Division of United States Studies and the Mexico Institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. 

The volume is also the first publication for MPI’s National Center on Immigrant Integration Policy.