ABSTRACT
Studies of the economic impacts of immigration on receiving coun tries have focused primarily on the labor-market consequences of immigrants. For example, how are the wages and employment oppor tunities of native-born Americans affected by the growing presence of foreign workers in local area labor markets? Much of the available research has concentrated on identifying potential adverse impacts for native minority workers (including women, blacks, and Latinos) and quantifying the change in either native workers’ wages or their employment prospects (Abowd and Freeman 1991; Borjas 1994; Borjas and Freeman 1992). Considerably less effort has been expended by economists to estimate the fiscal impacts of immigrants or to evaluate how these effects compare with the governmental benefits received and taxes paid by the native-born population. Indeed, these issues are barely mentioned in two recent reviews by Friedberg and Hunt (1995, 1996).
