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Title: Honey, Robots Shrunk My Wage! Native-Immigrant Wage Gaps and Skill Biased Technological Change

Citation Type: Miscellaneous

Publication Year: 2016

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Abstract: The gap between native and immigrant wages in the U.S. has increased significantly since the 1980s. While part of this may be attributable to declines in the relative quality of immigrant labor, this paper explores whether skill price changes induced by skill biased technological progress also played a role. Using historical routine employment share to measure cities likely technology adoption, I show that local labor markets that specialized in routine tasks experienced differential increases in native-immigrant wage gaps. This is consistent with the hypothesis that native workers have better labor market outcomes because they have a comparative advantage in U.S.-specific social skills, and the returns to these skills have increased as a result of technological development. Results do not seem to be driven by selective migration between cities but are strongly related to immigrants English language abilities as well as other measures of their social assimilation.

Url: http://taosong.me/docs/Job Market Paper - Tao Song.pdf

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Authors: Song, Tao

Publisher: University of Connecticut

Data Collections: IPUMS USA

Topics: Labor Force and Occupational Structure, Migration and Immigration

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