Christián Zlolniski, El Colegio de la Frontera Norte
Introduction: Silicon Valley is internationally known as the heart of the high-technology industry and a paradigmatic example of the new economy that many other regions in the U.S. and abroad want to emulate. The region also is well-know for the high concentration of foreign-born computer engineers, programmers, scientists and other highly educated technical workers whose labor critically contributes to the vitality and success of the high-tech industry (Alarcon, 1999). Less known is the important concentration of low-skilled Mexican immigrant workers who live in the region and are employed in a large diversity of …

Rafael Alarcón, El Colegio de la Frontera Norte
Introduction: Skilled migrants are less restricted than unskilled migrants to participate in U.S. labor markets. Immigration policy, corporate power and their own class resources allow them to cross borders with greater ease than low skilled migrants. This privileged position stems from the fact that these professionals seem to be vital to corporations that are involved in global production processes and markets. Many of the foreign-born engineers and scientists working in the United States are employed in the information technology industry.
There are four main avenues through which highly skilled migrants coming from developing countries …

AnnaLee Saxenian, University of California, Santa Cruz
Summary: This study examines the entrepreneurial contribution of highly skilled immigrants–in this case immigrant scientists and engineers–to the Silicon Valley economy. It has four goals. First, it quantifies immigrant engineers’ and entrepreneurs’ presence in and contribution to the Silicon Valley economy. Second, the study examines the extent to which foreign-born engineers are organizing ethnic networks in the region like those found in traditional immigrant enterprises to support the often risky process of starting new technology businesses. Third, it analyzes how these skilled immigrants build long-distance social and economic networks back to their home countries …

Monica Boyd, Florida State University
Summary: Asian-born engineers appear to be important components of this foreign born labor. This is suggested by research in the United States which focuses on the experience of Asian engineers, particularly those in California’s “silicon valley” (Alarcon, 1999; Fernandez, 1998; Lim, Waldinger and Borogmehr, 1998; Tang, 1993a, 1993b, 1995). However, research also indicates that the skills of these workers are not always well matched to their jobs, finding evidence for under-employment or blocked mobility. Asian (and Mexican) foreign born engineers in the United States are more likely than their white American born counterparts to be employed …

Magnus Lofstrom, Institute for the Study of Labor, Bonn
Abstract: This paper uses data from the 1980 and 1990 U.S. Censuses to analyze the labor market experience of high-skilled immigrants relative to high-skilled natives. Immigrants are found to be more likely to be working in one of the high-skilled occupations than natives, but the gap between the two groups decreased in the 1980’s. Given the high selfemployment rates of this group of workers, about 20 percent, it is important to study this aspect of the labor market experience. High-skilled natives are more likely to be selfemployed than high-skilled immigrants. Models of …

B. Lindsay Lowell, Georgetown University
Summary: This paper describes the historical and legislative background of the H-1B visa. It goes on to describe changes in the origins and occupational composition of that population. The major task of the paper is to present demographic estimates and forecasts of the H-1B population, i.e., the size of the workforce that is here in any given year. Integral to those figures are equally important estimates of the population adjusting to permanent status and of that remaining at the end of the visa stay.
Working Paper #12»

Margaret L. Usdansky, Princeton University
Thomas J. Espenshade, Princeton University
Summary: In this paper, we trace the history of U.S. legislation regarding employment-based immigration and the admission of foreign-born temporary workers. Because many pieces of legislation address and distinguish between high- and low-skill workers, we examine the evolution of U.S. policy toward both groups. We cover the period from the middle of the 19th century to the end of the 20th century. We conclude that concern about both skilled and unskilled immigration has played a greater role in U.S. federal immigration policy since the 1850s than is commonly recognized.
Working Paper #11»
 

Marc Rosenblum, University of California – San Diego
Summary: I investigate four predictions about immigration policy-making in this chapter. First, I expect, in general, that the president and migrant-sending states actively seek to influence U.S. immigration policy. Second, to the extent that presidential and sending states preferences conflict with Congress’s, I expect that the president and sending states will be more influential when immigration is central to bilateral relations and bilateral relations are central to U.S. foreign policy goals (i.e., the foreign policy value of immigration is high), and that Congress will have more influence when the domestic salience of immigration …

Cynthia Cranford, University of Southern California
Introduction: The move toward a service-based economy has forced the American labor movement to change. The growing low-wage service sector is characterized by “flexible’ production resulting in contract, temporary, part-time or other casualized work. Labor law drafted in the pre-war era is ineffective protection for these new, casualized service-sector jobs; and labor protections were eroded in the Reagan decade. Restructuring has been achieved through processes of racialization as recently arrived immigrant women and men were recruited to the downgraded jobs. At the same time their work is made invisible through a gendered, anti-immigrant discourse that …

Jeffrey Lesser, Connecticut College
Summary: Today I will examine the processes by which ethnic identities and perceptions were constructed in the twenties, thirties and forties, and how these function as a kind of mirror in which national identity confronted itself. These were decades of enormous demographic change, massive economic growth, and authoritarian rule. They were also years when what it meant in a public sense to be a “Brazilian” was widely contested. By examining similar strategies used by Syrian-Lebanese (the term used to describe those of middle eastern descent) and nikkei (which describes those of Japanese descent) I will show how …