ABSTRACT
Summary: This chapter explains how economists estimate the labor market effects of immigration. It introduces four empirical approaches: spatial correlations, natural experiments, skill cells and structural estimation. Differing methodologies may—and often do—result in conflicting evidence. The chapter examines these methodologies and evidence reached using them in order to understand why research on the labor market effects of immigration sometimes reaches differing conclusions. In addition to examining the evidence on wage and employment effects found by studies using those four approaches, the chapter discusses evidence on skill and occupational upgrading; changes in production technology and output mix; and productivity gains from immigration. At the end, it provides an appendix with the goal of identifying a causal relationship between variables.
