Sectoral Employment

Certain labor market sectors experience greater concentrations of foreign-born workers—whether in construction, hospitality, manufacturing, or particular occupations in health care and services. The research collected here examines sectoral employment by nativity; how immigrant workers fare compared to their native-born peers in sectors such as agriculture, construction, health care, and IT; and their trajectories within these sectors.

Recent Activity

Commentaries March 2020 A Race Against the Clock: Meeting Seasonal Labor Needs in the Age of COVID-19 By Kate Hooper and Camille Le Coz	Fact Sheets March 2020 Immigrant Workers: Vital to the U.S. COVID-19 Response, Disproportionately Vulnerable By Julia Gelatt
Articles February 20, 2020 Japan’s Labor Migration Reforms: Breaking with the Past? By Deborah J. Milly	Policy Briefs February 2020 Seasonal Worker Programs in Europe: Promising Practices and Ongoing Challenges By Kate Hooper and Camille Le Coz
Articles February 14, 2020 Frequently Requested Statistics on Immigrants and Immigration in the United States By Jeanne Batalova, Brittany Blizzard, and Jessica Bolter	Commentaries January 2020 Brexit Day—Is This the Dawning of the Age of Immobility? By Meghan Benton
Articles January 23, 2020 Global Demand for Medical Professionals Drives Indians Abroad Despite Acute Domestic Health-Care Worker Shortages By Margaret Walton-Roberts and S. Irudaya Rajan	Reports January 2020 Rebuilding Community after Crisis: Striking a New Social Contract for Diverse Societies (Transatlantic Council Statement) By Demetrios G. Papademetriou and Meghan Benton

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Reports July 2014 Moving Up or Standing Still? Access to Middle-Skilled Work for Newly Arrived Migrants in the European Union By Meghan Benton, Susan Fratzke and Madeleine Sumption	Reports June 2014 A Work in Progress: Prospects for Upward Mobility Among New Immigrants in Germany By Nadia Granato
Books May 2014 Migration of Health Workers: The WHO Code of Practice and the Global Economic Crisis	Reports May 2014 Moving Up the Ladder? Labor Market Outcomes in the United Kingdom amid Rising Immigration By Tommaso Frattini
Fact Sheets May 2014 Brain Waste in the Workforce: Select U.S. and State Characteristics of College-Educated Native-Born and Immigrant Adults By Margie McHugh, Jeanne Batalova and Madeleine Morawski	Reports May 2014 Slow Motion: The Labor Market Integration of New Immigrants in France By Patrick Simon and Elsa Steichen
Reports April 2014 Catching Up: The Labor Market Outcomes of New Immigrants in Sweden By Pieter Bevelander and Nahikari Irastorza	Reports March 2014 A Precarious Position: The Labor Market Integration of New Immigrants in Spain By Núria Rodríguez-Planas and Natalia Nollenberger

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Spotlight

April 14, 2016

Frequently Requested Statistics on Immigrants and Immigration in the United States

Get all the latest and historical facts and figures on immigrants and immigration in the United States in this handy resource. With immigration often surfacing in public and political debates, learn the answers to such questions as: How do current immigration flows compare to earlier ones? How many unauthorized immigrants live in the United States? How many refugees are admitted annually? And get answers to many more questions.

NicaraguanCoffeePickers IngmarZahorsky Flickr

Feature

August 26, 2015

Business as Usual? Regularizing Foreign Labor in Costa Rica

With the growing urbanization and consolidation of Nicaraguan immigrants in sectors such as construction and domestic service, Costa Rica has shifted its focus from immigration enforcement to integration. Tension has emerged between the government and private sector as a new mechanism for regularizing unauthorized immigrant workers has failed to gain traction.

Profile

May 28, 2015

Revolution and Political Transition in Tunisia: A Migration Game Changer?

With a history of encouraging workers to emigrate to relieve unemployment at home, Tunisia now has 11 percent of its population living abroad. The factors underlying the 2011 revolution that sparked the Arab Spring have also fueled emigration desires for many Tunisians. This country profile explores historical and current trends in Tunisia from colonial settlement to the aftermath of the Arab Spring, and the new focus on migrant rights at home and abroad.

Spotlight

May 6, 2015

Indian Immigrants in the United States

Indian immigrants represent the second-largest origin group in the United States, accounting for 4.7 percent of the total foreign-born population. Generally high-skilled and highly educated, more than half of Indian immigrants have arrived since 2000 and largely attain green cards through employment-based pathways. Indians account for 70 percent of H-1B petitions and are the second-largest group of international students in the United States.

Policy Beat

April 23, 2015

Recent Court Decisions Put a Sharp Spotlight on U.S. H-2B Temporary Worker Visa Program

The H-2B visa allows U.S. employers to bring in foreign workers to temporarily fill low-skill nonagricultural jobs across a wide range of states and industries. A series of recent legal challenges has exposed the presence of fraud and abuse, while stripping the program of its regulations and raising uncertainty about its future. This Policy Beat examines the implications in the debate surrounding temporary worker programs.

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Commentaries

March 2020

A Race Against the Clock: Meeting Seasonal Labor Needs in the Age of COVID-19

As governments have reacted to the coronavirus pandemic by closing borders, seasonal workers have been kept out, raising a pressing question: who is going to produce the food amid agricultural labor shortages? Policymakers in the Asia Pacific, Europe, and North America have responded by seeking to recruit residents, lengthen stays for already present seasonal workers, and find ways to continue admitting foreign seasonal labor, as this commentary explores.

Fact Sheets

March 2020

Immigrant Workers: Vital to the U.S. COVID-19 Response, Disproportionately Vulnerable

Six million immigrant workers are at the frontlines of keeping U.S. residents healthy and fed during the COVID-19 pandemic, representing disproportionate shares of physicians, home health aides, and retail-store pharmacists, for example. They also are over-represented in sectors most immediately devastated by mass layoffs, yet many will have limited access to safety-net systems and to federal relief, as this fact sheet details.

Articles

February 20, 2020

Japan’s Labor Migration Reforms: Breaking with the Past?

Japan is hoping to bring in as many as 350,000 medium-skilled foreign workers over five years to fill labor market gaps in its rapidly aging society. Yet does this system of Specified Skilled Workers represent an effort to secure a workforce without making long-term settlement possible? And considering its linkage to a Technical Intern Training Program much criticized for abusive practices, does this change represent real reform? This article examines these and other issues.

Policy Briefs

February 2020

Seasonal Worker Programs in Europe: Promising Practices and Ongoing Challenges

Seasonal worker programs in the European Union have a long history, but have yet to find the sweet spot of working for migrants, employers, and countries of destination and origin alike. This policy brief explores some of the challenges common to these programs—drawing on examples in Europe, Australia, and New Zealand—and highlights promising practices.

Articles

February 14, 2020

Frequently Requested Statistics on Immigrants and Immigration in the United States

Interested in answers to some of the most frequently asked questions about immigration and immigrants in the United States? This incredible resource collects in one place top statistics from authoritative government and nongovernmental sources, offering a snapshot of the immigrant population, visa and enforcement statistics, and data on emerging trends, including the slowing of growth of the foreign-born population, changing origins, and increasing educational levels.

Commentaries

January 2020

Brexit Day—Is This the Dawning of the Age of Immobility?

Brexit Day, on January 31, 2020, marks a dramatic turn for the United Kingdom as it leaves the European Union, in significant measure because it wants to control its immigration destiny. But it remains unclear whether Brexit will allow the United Kingdom to cast a net wider for the global workers it seeks or will deepen the moat around the island. Either way, Brexit is likely to spark new forms of mobility—and immobility.

Articles

January 23, 2020

Global Demand for Medical Professionals Drives Indians Abroad Despite Acute Domestic Health-Care Worker Shortages

India is the world's largest source for immigrant physicians, and for Indian-trained doctors and nurses the allure of working abroad is strong despite an acute domestic shortage of health-care workers. Against this pull, the Indian government has enacted a number of policies to limit and regulate the emigration of health-care professionals, though these have been more ad hoc in nature and not part of a fully realized strategy.

Reports

January 2020

Rebuilding Community after Crisis: Striking a New Social Contract for Diverse Societies (Transatlantic Council Statement)

Addressing the deep-rooted integration challenges unearthed by large-scale migration and rapid social change will require a combination of strategies. Governments in Europe and North America must create a new social contract for increasingly diverse societies that are confronting cycles of disruption. This report sketches a blueprint for an adaptive process oriented by skill needs rather than national origins.

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