Ezra Klein
By Ezra Klein
Everything you know about immigration — unauthorised immigration — is wrong. So says Princeton University’s Doug Massey.
Massey is one of the pre-eminent immigration scholars and thinks we’ve wasted a lot of money on immigration policy and are about to waste a lot more.
Massey slices the history of Mexico-to-US migration into five periods. Early in the 20th century, there was the era of “the hook,” when Japan stopped sending workers to the US and the mining, agriculture and railroad industries begged Mexican labourers to replace them.
It’s called “the hook” because labourers were recruited with promises of high wages, signing bonuses, transportation and lodging, most of which never materialised or were deducted from their pay.
During the Roaring Twenties, came the “flood tide” — almost 650,000 Mexican workers came legally, causing the number of Mexicans in the US to reach almost 750,000 in 1929, from 100,000 in 1900.
The Great Depression ended that. Jobless Americans took out their anger on jobless Mexicans and the “era of deportations” began. From 1929 to 1939, 469,000 Mexicans were expelled; by 1940, the Mexican-born population fell to 377,000.
Enter the Second World War. With so many Americans fighting overseas, Mexican labour was again in high demand. The US and Mexico negotiated the Bracero Programme, which gave Mexican workers access to temporary US visas. That started the “Bracero era.” In 1945, the programme brought in 50,000 Mexican workers. By 1956, it was up to 445,000. Mexico was freed from quota limitations on legal immigration, so by 1963, more than 50,000 were immigrating each year. With so many legal ways to enter the country, illegal immigration was virtually unknown.
In 1965, the US ended the programme and began to limit Mexican immigration. The number of guest-worker permits dropped to 1,725 in 1979, from more than 400,000 in 1959. The number of residence visas declined to 20,000. But the demand for Mexican labour remained strong. So the “era of undocumented migration” began. Border apprehensions rose to 1.7 million in 1986, from 55,000 in 1965. Even as millions of Mexicans arrived illegally, millions also returned to Mexico. About 85 percent of new entries were offset by departures. So the growth of the undocumented population was slow.
After a comprehensive immigration law in 1986, the US began militarising the border with Mexico even as the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade and later the North American Free Trade Agreement strengthened ties with Mexico. From 1986 to 2000, trade with increased eight-fold.
Until this point, there isn’t much to dispute in Massey’s narrative. But here his immigration story takes a turn that confounds Washington’s conventional wisdom and makes a mockery of the current debate.
According to Massey, the rise of large undocumented population is a direct result of the militarisation of the border. While undocumented workers once travelled back and forth from Mexico with ease, after the border was garrisoned, immigrants crossed the border and stayed.
“Migrants rationally responded to the increased costs and risks by minimising the number of times they crossed the border,” Massey wrote in his 2007 paper ‘Understanding America’s Immigration Crisis.’
“But they achieved this goal not by remaining in Mexico and abandoning their intention to migrate to the US, but by hunkering down and staying once they had run the gantlet at the border and made it to their final destination.”
The data support Massey’s thesis: In 1980, 46 percent of undocumented migrants returned to Mexico in 12 months. By 2007, that was down to 7 percent. As a result, the permanent undocumented population exploded.
The militarisation had another unintended consequence: It dispersed the undocumented population. Before 1986, about 85 percent of Mexicans settled in California, Texas or Illinois, and more than two-thirds entered through the San Diego-Tijuana or the El Paso-Juarez entry point. As the US blockaded these areas, undocumented migrants found new ways in — and new places to settle. By 2002, two-thirds of undocumented migrants were entering at a non-San Diego-El Paso entry point and settling in a “nontraditional” state.
In recent years, the inflow of new undocumented immigrants from Mexico has fallen to zero partly due to the US recession and a falloff in construction, which employed a lot of migrant. But some is due to an improving economy in Mexico, where unemployment is 5 percent and wages have been rising. “I think the huge boom in Mexican immigration is over,” Massey said.
The political debate over immigration is stuck in 1985. Congress is focused on how to further militarise an already-militarised border — despite the fact that doubling the size of the Border Patrol since 2004 and installing hundreds of miles of barriers and surveillance equipment appear to have been counterproductive. At any rate, the flow of unauthorised immigration has slowed dramatically. “Listening to the Republicans, you’d think waves of people are crossing the border. But illegal migration stopped four years ago and has been zero since,” ,” Massey said.
The debate is backward as Republicans are focused on militarising the border against people who are no longer crossing it, and loath to do anything about undocumented immigrants who are the legacy of the last build-up.
At best, we can hope to waste tens of billions of dollars on further enforcement in return for a lengthy and complicated path to citizenship. At worst, we’ll do nothing — in which case this will be known as the era of wasted opportunity.
WP-BLOOMBERG
By Ezra Klein
Everything you know about immigration — unauthorised immigration — is wrong. So says Princeton University’s Doug Massey.
Massey is one of the pre-eminent immigration scholars and thinks we’ve wasted a lot of money on immigration policy and are about to waste a lot more.
Massey slices the history of Mexico-to-US migration into five periods. Early in the 20th century, there was the era of “the hook,” when Japan stopped sending workers to the US and the mining, agriculture and railroad industries begged Mexican labourers to replace them.
It’s called “the hook” because labourers were recruited with promises of high wages, signing bonuses, transportation and lodging, most of which never materialised or were deducted from their pay.
During the Roaring Twenties, came the “flood tide” — almost 650,000 Mexican workers came legally, causing the number of Mexicans in the US to reach almost 750,000 in 1929, from 100,000 in 1900.
The Great Depression ended that. Jobless Americans took out their anger on jobless Mexicans and the “era of deportations” began. From 1929 to 1939, 469,000 Mexicans were expelled; by 1940, the Mexican-born population fell to 377,000.
Enter the Second World War. With so many Americans fighting overseas, Mexican labour was again in high demand. The US and Mexico negotiated the Bracero Programme, which gave Mexican workers access to temporary US visas. That started the “Bracero era.” In 1945, the programme brought in 50,000 Mexican workers. By 1956, it was up to 445,000. Mexico was freed from quota limitations on legal immigration, so by 1963, more than 50,000 were immigrating each year. With so many legal ways to enter the country, illegal immigration was virtually unknown.
In 1965, the US ended the programme and began to limit Mexican immigration. The number of guest-worker permits dropped to 1,725 in 1979, from more than 400,000 in 1959. The number of residence visas declined to 20,000. But the demand for Mexican labour remained strong. So the “era of undocumented migration” began. Border apprehensions rose to 1.7 million in 1986, from 55,000 in 1965. Even as millions of Mexicans arrived illegally, millions also returned to Mexico. About 85 percent of new entries were offset by departures. So the growth of the undocumented population was slow.
After a comprehensive immigration law in 1986, the US began militarising the border with Mexico even as the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade and later the North American Free Trade Agreement strengthened ties with Mexico. From 1986 to 2000, trade with increased eight-fold.
Until this point, there isn’t much to dispute in Massey’s narrative. But here his immigration story takes a turn that confounds Washington’s conventional wisdom and makes a mockery of the current debate.
According to Massey, the rise of large undocumented population is a direct result of the militarisation of the border. While undocumented workers once travelled back and forth from Mexico with ease, after the border was garrisoned, immigrants crossed the border and stayed.
“Migrants rationally responded to the increased costs and risks by minimising the number of times they crossed the border,” Massey wrote in his 2007 paper ‘Understanding America’s Immigration Crisis.’
“But they achieved this goal not by remaining in Mexico and abandoning their intention to migrate to the US, but by hunkering down and staying once they had run the gantlet at the border and made it to their final destination.”
The data support Massey’s thesis: In 1980, 46 percent of undocumented migrants returned to Mexico in 12 months. By 2007, that was down to 7 percent. As a result, the permanent undocumented population exploded.
The militarisation had another unintended consequence: It dispersed the undocumented population. Before 1986, about 85 percent of Mexicans settled in California, Texas or Illinois, and more than two-thirds entered through the San Diego-Tijuana or the El Paso-Juarez entry point. As the US blockaded these areas, undocumented migrants found new ways in — and new places to settle. By 2002, two-thirds of undocumented migrants were entering at a non-San Diego-El Paso entry point and settling in a “nontraditional” state.
In recent years, the inflow of new undocumented immigrants from Mexico has fallen to zero partly due to the US recession and a falloff in construction, which employed a lot of migrant. But some is due to an improving economy in Mexico, where unemployment is 5 percent and wages have been rising. “I think the huge boom in Mexican immigration is over,” Massey said.
The political debate over immigration is stuck in 1985. Congress is focused on how to further militarise an already-militarised border — despite the fact that doubling the size of the Border Patrol since 2004 and installing hundreds of miles of barriers and surveillance equipment appear to have been counterproductive. At any rate, the flow of unauthorised immigration has slowed dramatically. “Listening to the Republicans, you’d think waves of people are crossing the border. But illegal migration stopped four years ago and has been zero since,” ,” Massey said.
The debate is backward as Republicans are focused on militarising the border against people who are no longer crossing it, and loath to do anything about undocumented immigrants who are the legacy of the last build-up.
At best, we can hope to waste tens of billions of dollars on further enforcement in return for a lengthy and complicated path to citizenship. At worst, we’ll do nothing — in which case this will be known as the era of wasted opportunity.
WP-BLOOMBERG
