By Heather Rolfe, Sunder Katwala and Steve Ballinger

The Ipsos MORI immigration attitudes tracker offers one of the most authoritative and rigorous sources on what the public thinks about immigration, conducted in 12 waves to date across the last seven years. This latest wave of the tracker was a nationally representative survey of 4,000 adults across Great Britain aged 18+, conducted online between 18 June and 10 July 2021. It examines public attitudes across a range of issues, with some questions having been asked in each wave of research since 2015 to enable comparison. Immigration attitudes have softened significantly over the last seven years, with public sentiment becoming more positive after the 2016 EU referendum and sustaining at that level ever since. The public is now more likely to see the contribution of immigration as positive (46%) than negative (28%) overall, in a reversal of the pattern when this tracker series began in 2015. There is an opportunity for more light and less heat in the immigration debate, though different political challenges remain for both sides of the political spectrum. Anyone seeking to affect change will need to engage with the politics and attitudes of immigration as they are now in 2021, in this new context, and this tracker report offers useful insight. A changing debate The latest Ipsos MORI Issues Index, which measures the issues of greatest concern to the UK public, found that immigration had slid to eighth position as of August 2021. Only 12% of people now regard it as a key issue of concern, but salience has been falling steadily over the last four years. Around four in ten people (42%), however, still feel that we don’t talk about immigration enough. A quarter (25%) feel that it’s discussed the right amount, and 17% say we talk about it too much. Since the immigration attitudes tracker began in 2015, it has asked respondents to give a 0-10 score to indicate whether they feel immigration has had a positive or negative impact on Britain. The scores in this latest wave continue a trend of positive sentiment, with 47% giving a positive score of 6-10, compared to the 28% who give a negative score of 0-4. The survey taken at the time of the May 2015 general election, by comparison, found only 35% were positive and 42% were negative. Respondents to each wave of the survey have also been asked if they would prefer immigration to the UK to be increased, decreased or to remain the same. Reflecting these gradually warming attitudes, this latest survey found the lowest ever support for reducing immigration and the highest ever support for immigration to be increased. While 45% would still prefer reductions in immigration, some 29% would prefer it to stay at the current levels and 17% would like it to increase  Public satisfaction with the current Government’s performance on immigration remains very low, with only 1 in 8 (12%) saying they are satisfied with how the Government is dealing with immigration – the same proportion as in November 2020 (and a similar level of satisfaction to that of the two previous governments). More than half the public (55%) say they are dissatisfied. The immigration debate over the last few parliaments was focused on numbers, with repeated failures to meet the government’s net migration target. With that target now dropped there is an opportunity to move the debate on. Our survey asked whether people would prefer an immigration system that prioritises control, regardless of whether numbers go up or down; or whether they would prefer an approach that focuses on reducing immigration numbers. It found that people were almost twice as likely to prioritise control (44%) over reducing numbers (24%). Survey respondents were also asked about the EU Settled Status scheme, which was put in place allow European citizens, who arrived before December 31st 2020, to continue to live and work in the UK post-Brexit. The deadline for applications for Settled Status lapsed at the end of July this year. Almost half (48%) of respondents say that eligible EU citizens should be allowed to make a late application, while just under a third (32%) would not support late applications being accepted.  

Lonson: British Future, 2021. 47p.

By Sunder Katwala, Steve Ballinger, Heather Rolfe and Jake Puddle

Conducted straight after the general election, this report examines shifting public attitudes to immigration and asylum, including the differences in attitudes between Labour, Conservative, Lib Dem and Reform voters and what that means for the politics of immigration in the new parliament.

The research also examines public attitudes on a series of key issues:

• The role of immigration in the 2024 general election.

• Public priorities for the new government.

• Public trust in the main political parties on immigration, and trust in leading politicians on the issue.

• Public perceptions of immigration: do people think net migration will fall or increase? Which flows do people think make up most immigration to the UK?

• Public satisfaction with the government’s handling of immigration.

• Do people want immigration numbers to reduce, increase or stay the same?

• Attitudes to migration to fill different roles: would people cut the numbers of doctors, care workers, lorry drivers or hospitality staff coming to the UK?

• Asylum, Channel crossings and legal routes

London: British Future, 2024. 74p.

MAY COTAIN MARKUP

By Prof. Ben-Ami Scharfstein

From a short story,Fragments on Method By Graeme R. Newman:“Once a meat carver was about to eat an orange, when an outrageous question beset him: What is an orange? Hisinstant inclination was to cut the orange up, which he did, dividing it into three parts. It so happened that one of the parts was much bigger than the other two. The meat carver was delighted, and proceeded to slice the large piece into 6 pieces, whereas the other two parts could be sliced into only two pieces each.

An apprentice had watched this enterprise from the beginning, and was fascinated by the meat carver's obvious satisfaction. "What pleases you so?" asked the apprentice."I now know not only why this is an orange, but also, this larger piece tells me much more about the orange than the other two pieces combined."

609 pages

MAY COTAIN MARKUP

Edited by Hemdat Libi Israeli

Introduction and OverviewThe book is dedicated to Shlomo Giora Shoham, celebrating his interdisciplinary contributions. It includes essays from various scholars, reflecting on creativity from multiple perspectives.

Criminology and CreativitySentencing Reform and the Role of the Criminologist: Discusses the evolution of criminology and sentencing reforms over fifty years, emphasizing the need for criminologists to adapt to new legislative frameworks.Evolution,Development, and Comparative Criminology: Explores how evolutionary and developmental theories can inform comparative criminology,suggesting that understanding crime requires a multidisciplinary approach.

Philosophical Perspectives Martin Buber: His Place in Twentieth-Century Philosophy: Analyzes Buber Philosophical contributions, particularly his ideas on human relations and the significance of dialogue.Rethinking Turing Test: Identity, Learning, and Self-Improvement: Examines the limitations of theTuring Test in assessing machine intelligence, arguing for a more nuanced understanding of identity and learning.

Psychological InsightsEmotional Morphology and Mythology: Investigates the relationship between emotions and mythological thinking, highlighting how myths shape emotional responses and cognitive processes.The Years of Extermination: A Plea for an Integrated History of the Holocaust:Calls for a comprehensive history of the Holocaust that includes the perspectives of both perpetrators and victims, emphasizing the complexity of human behavior during this period.

Art and CreativityPictures at an Exhibition: Art Galleries, the Academy, and Anti-Israel Polemics:Discusses how art exhibitions can be used to advance political agendas, using examples from Chicago to illustrate the intersection of art and politics.Jerusalem against Athens: Towards a Biblical Psychology: Contrasts Greek andBiblical views on psychology, suggesting that Biblical narratives offer a more hopeful and transformative perspective on human behavior.

Reflections on CreativityThe essays collectively argue that creativity is a multifaceted phenomenon that cannot be fully understood through a single disciplinary lens.They emphasize the importance of interdisciplinary approaches in exploring the depths of human creativity and its impact on various fields.

Overall,“The Fortitudes of Creativity” provides a rich and diverse exploration of creativity honoring Shoham’s legacy by bringing together insights from criminology, philosophy, psychology, and art.

Israel, 2010, 264 pages

By: Jennifer Vallentine, Roberto Forin, and Bram Frouws  

Migrant-receiving countries are increasingly focusing on return and reintegration as central elements of migration management. This briefing paper outlines key messages from research MMC has carried out on the experience of returning migrants in Asia, Africa, Latin America, the Middle East, and Europe, since 2017

Geneva: Mixed Migration Centre, 2024. 8p.

By The American Immigration Council

In recent months, leading politicians and policymakers have renewed calls for mass deportations of immigrants from the United States. While similar promises have been made in the past without coming to fruition—during the 2016 presidential campaign, for example, Donald Trump pledged to create a “deportation force” to round up undocumented immigrants —mass deportation now occupies a standing role in the rhetoric of leading immigration hawks. To cite just one example, former U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) director Tom Homan has promised “a historic deportation operation” should a hawkish administration return to power. While some plans have envisioned a one-time, massive operation designed to round up, detain, and deport the undocumented population en masse, others have envisioned starting from a baseline of one million deportations per year. Given that in the modern immigration enforcement era the United States has never deported more than half a million immigrants per year—and many of those have been migrants apprehended trying to enter the U.S., not just those already living here—any mass deportation proposal raises obvious questions: how, exactly, would the United States possibly carry out the largest law enforcement operation in world history? And at what cost? Using data from the American Community Survey (ACS) along with publicly available data about the current costs of immigration enforcement, this report aims to provide an estimation of what the fiscal and economic cost to the United States would be should the government deport a population of roughly 11 million people who as of 2022 lacked permanent legal status and faced the possibility of removal. We consider this both in terms of the direct budgetary costs—the expenses associated with arrest, detention, legal processing, and removal—that the federal government would have to pay, and in terms of the impact on the United States economy and tax base should these people be removed from the labor force and consumer market. In terms of fiscal costs, we also include an estimate of the impact of deporting an additional 2.3 million people who have crossed the U.S. southern border without legal immigration status and were released by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) from January 2023 through April 2024. We consider these fiscal costs separately because we don’t have more recent ACS data necessary to estimate the total net changes in the undocumented population past 2022, or the larger impact on the economy and tax base of removing those people, an impact that is therefore not reflected in this report. In total, we find that the cost of a one-time mass deportation operation aimed at both those populations—an estimated total of at least $315 billion. We wish to emphasize that this figure is a highly conservative estimate. It does not take into account the long-term costs of a sustained mass deportation operation or the incalculable additional costs necessary to acquire the institutional capacity to remove over 13 million people in a short period—incalculable because there is simply no reality in which such a singular operation is possible. For one thing, there would be no way to accomplish this mission without mass detention as an interim step. To put the scale of detaining over 13 million undocumented immigrants into context, the entire U.S. prison and jail population in 2022, comprising every person held in local, county, state, and federal prisons and jails, was 1.9 million people. To estimate the costs of a longer-term mass deportation operation, we calculated the cost of a program aiming to arrest, detain, process, and deport one million people per year—paralleling the more conservative proposals made by mass deportation proponents. Even assuming that 20 percent of the undocumented population would “self-deport” under a yearslong mass-deportation regime, we estimate the ultimate cost of such a longer operation would average out to $88 billion annually, for a total cost of $967.9 billion over more than a decade. This is a much higher sum than the one-time estimate, given the long-term costs of establishing and maintaining detention facilities and temporary camps to eventually be able to detain one million people at a time—costs that could not be modeled in a short-term analysis. This would require the United States to build and maintain 24 times more ICE detention capacity than currently exists. The government would also be required to establish and maintain over 1,000 new immigration courtrooms to process people at such a rate. Even this estimate is likely quite conservative, as we were unable to estimate the additional hiring costs for the tens of thousands of agents needed to carry out one million arrests per year, the additional capital investments necessary to increase the ICE Air Operations fleet of charter aircraft to carry out one million annual deportations, and a myriad of other ancillary costs necessary to ramp up federal immigration enforcement operations to the scale necessary.

 American Immigration Council, 2024. 52p.

By: Sarah J. Eckman and Karen L. Shanton

Federal law prohibits certain types of intimidation of or interference with election workers, including intimidation to discourage serving as a poll watcher or election official or in response to such service; interference by members of the Armed Forces with election officials' exercise of their duties; and intimidation for helping voters register or cast a vote. Many states have laws that address other threats to election workers, such as through privacy protections for election commissioners. More general laws, such as prohibitions against voter intimidation or harassing or threatening interstate communications, might also apply to some conduct. Some state and local officials have responded to recent reports of threats to election workers with administrative action or legislative proposals. Election officials have included local law enforcement in poll worker trainings, for example, and implemented new security measures in their offices. State legislators have established new prohibitions or protections, such as a New Hampshire law that prohibits intimidating election officials to interfere with their work and an Oregon law that extends existing privacy protections to election workers.

Library of Congress, Sep 9, 2024

Edited by Krista Lynes, Tyler Morgenstern, and Ian Alan Paul

In recent years, spectacular images of ruined boats, makeshift border camps, and beaches littered with life vests have done much to consolidate the politics of movement in Europe. Indeed, the mediation of migration as a crisis has worked to shore up various forms of militarized surveillance, humanitarian response, legislative action, and affective investment. Bridging academic inquiry and artistic and activist practice, the essays, documents, and artworks gathered in Moving Images interrogate the mediation of migration and refugeeism in the contemporary European conjuncture, asking how images, discourses, and data are involved in shaping the visions and experience of migration in increasingly global contexts.

Bielefeld : Transcript, [2020]

By National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and MedicineNational Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine

Individuals from minoritized racial and ethnic groups continue to face systemic barriers that impede their ability to access, persist, and thrive in science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine (STEMM) higher education and workforce. Without actively dismantling policies and practices that disadvantage people from minoritized groups, STEMM organizations stand to lose much needed talent and innovation as well as the ideas that come from having a diverse workforce. A new report from the Board on Behavioral, Cognitive, and Sensory Sciences examines the backdrop of systemic racism in the United States that has harmed and continues to harm people from minoritized groups, which is critical for understanding the unequal representation in STEMM. The report outlines actions that top leaders and gatekeepers in STEMM organizations, such as presidents and chief executive officers, can take to foster a culture and climate of antiracism, diversity, equity, and inclusion that is genuinely accessible and supportive to all.

Washington, DC: National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2023. 342p

By Heizler (Cohen), Odelia, Israeli, Osnat

Dramatic events can evoke feelings of compassion, fear, or threat, and can affect public opinion regarding controversial issues. Such an event was the drowning of 3-year-old Alan Kurdi, a Syrian boy whose body washed up on a Turkish shore, and was photographed, producing an iconic image that was seen worldwide. The image evoked empathy and compassion that neuroscience and psychological research associate with a motivation to help. This paper examines the impact of this event on four different aspects of attitudes toward immigration, some of which are more closely linked to pro-social behavior than others. The timing of the European Social Survey in Portugal allowed us to use this tragic event as a natural experiment. Our results show that Kurdi's drowning had a significant effect on emotion-related sentiments, but no such impact was detected on other attitudes. The results suggest that the event did not change the respondents' opinion regarding the possible negative consequences of immigration on the host country's economy, crime level, or culture, nor did it change their perception of the skills required by immigrants. On the other hand, the empathy induced by the tragic event increased their willingness to have a less restrictive immigration policy and their openness to having close social relationships with immigrants.

Bonn: Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), 2024. 34p.

By Ruth Ellen Wasem

This article uses a multidisciplinary approach — analyzing historical sources, refugee and asylum admissions data, legislative provisions, and public opinion data — to track the rise and fall of the US asylum and refugee policy. It shows that there has always been a political struggle between people who advocate for a generous refugee and asylum system and those who oppose it. Today, the flexible system of protecting refugees and asylees, established in 1980, is giving way to policies that weaponize them.

It offers a historical analysis of US refugee and asylum policies, as well as xenophobic and nativist attitudes toward refugees. It places Trump administration refugee policies in three categories: those that abandon longstanding US legal principles and policies, most notably non-refoulement and due process; those that block the entry of refugees and asylees; and those that criminalize foreign nationals who attempt to seek asylum in the United States.

The article concludes with an analysis of public opinion research to square the growing public support for refugees and asylees shown in polling data with the subgroup popularity of Donald Trump’s harsh xenophobic rhetoric and policies. These seemingly contradictory trends are consistent with research on right-wing populism. It argues that the restoration of generous humanitarian policies requires robust civic engagement and steadfast legislative efforts.

Journal on Migration and Human Security Volume 8, Issue 3, September 2020, Pages 246-265

By Paul Butcher, Alberto-Horst Neidhardt

Migration remains a salient political issue and a major topic of disinformation. Lies and half-truths about migrants spread freely across the EU. But the narratives and themes used by disinformation actors are not static. As events develop and public concerns shift, so do the types of stories pushed by those seeking to mislead. For example, the COVID-19 pandemic has led to a growing stream of articles linking migrants to infection risks and accusing them of receiving preferential treatment. Disinformation actors have certain advantages over other communicators, as they can promote simplistic or one-sided depictions of migration without regard for truth or accuracy. Rather than seeking to counteract specific claims, such as through fact-checking or counternarratives, communicators and policymakers should instead promote alternative narratives that can undermine the appeal of hostile frames and create ‘herd immunity’ against disinformation. Alternative narratives should especially target those in the ‘movable middle’ who are most open to changing their views, especially as these groups may also be more liable to being influenced by disinformation. This Issue Paper examines nearly 1,500 news articles from four EU member states (Germany, Italy, Spain and the Czech Republic) published between May 2019 and July 2020. It shows that disinformation narratives about migration seek to exploit readers’ fears to polarise public opinion, manufacture discontent, sow divisions and set the political agenda. Disinformation actors link migration to existing insecurities, depicting it as a threat to three partly-overlapping areas: Health (migrants as violent criminals, potential terrorists, or a COVID-19 infection risk); Wealth (migrants as social benefits cheats, unfair competition for jobs, or a drain on community resources); Identity (migrants as a hostile invasion force, a threat to European or Christian traditions, or the subject of a conspiracy to replace white Europeans). An effective communication strategy based on alternative narratives should take account of the following recommendations: The message should aim to reframe the debate. It should resonate with the target audience’s lived experience, acknowledging their values and concerns, but avoid amplifying anxieties. Messages promoting alternative narratives must be timely and reflect the news cycle. Like a vaccine administered at regular intervals, communicators should repeat simple, specific messages that can prompt the best immune response against hostile frames spread by disinformation. The medium should aim to restore trust among groups. Institutions, which are often subject to discrediting campaigns, should prioritise communication through trusted intermediaries who can get messages to the hard-to-reach. They should work in partnership with civil society and local actors to deliver coordinated messages in the right environments. They should seek to reach people ‘where they are’ using the most appropriate communication channel, taking into consideration where their audience consumes information. The selection of the audience should aim to reclaim readers from the fringes. Audiences should be targeted based on their values and what they feel is important. To gain a first hearing, communicators should find an ‘entry point’ where the messenger and audience share common ground. All communicators seeking to promote a more balanced debate should aim to develop messages that can support a single overarching meta-narrative: for example, that migration is a normal phenomenon that can bring benefits to European societies if managed effectively and in full respect of fundamental human rights. More effective communication strategies can help to undermine threat-based discourses about migration. But such narrative strategies must also be backed up by policy changes. Effective policies combined with alternative narratives will go a long way towards resolving the concerns that drive disinformation on migration. A more balanced debate will, in turn, facilitate the adoption of meaningful reforms in line with EU fundamental values and human rights, thus creating a mutually reinforcing cycle of alternative narratives and policymaking

Brussels, Belgium: Foundation for European Progressive Studies (FEPS). 2020. 52p.

By Commission on the Integration of Refugees

The UK’s asylum system is broken: it is expensive, ineffective, and harmful. There is a desperate need for new ideas on how to create a system that works effectively and enjoys public consent. Taking up this challenge, the Commission on the Integration of Refugees has undertaken the most significant and detailed exploration of the UK asylum system in a generation. Our work has shown that it is possible to find solutions and to build political consensus around them. Based on six pillars of research, including evidence from more than 1,250 individuals and organisations, the Commission – with its diversity of experience and political perspectives – has been able to achieve full or near-consensus around 16 recommendations to shape a new future for the UK’s asylum system based on integration. approach is also necessary to unlock the economic benefits projected by the LSE. The three main conditions for this are that the government needs to meet its target to process asylum applications within six months (meaning people can work from this point), and that asylum seekers receive English language provision from day one and access to employment support from six months. The second is localisation of delivery. At the heart of our recommendations is a new settlement for refugees delivered through ‘local integration partnerships’. These would put devolved governments, regional and local authorities, and communities in control of resources and delivery in order to create the best possible conditions for integration. The national government would play a coordinating role, including setting overall numbers

An integration-based asylum system can deliver benefits not only for refugees but for wider society – from contributing to tackling the housing crisis and homelessness to promoting economic flourishing. The recommendations are underpinned by a financial model developed by the London School of Economics, which found that the benefits outweigh the costs within three years, and that they would yield a net economic benefit to the country of at least £1.2 billion within five years. There are two core elements to our proposals. The f irst is that our recommendations are designed to be mutually reinforcing and their impact will be greater if they are taken together. A coherent and holistic There is an abundance of good practice available to guide this shift towards localisation, including from the devolved national governments of Scotland and Wales, but also from other local authorities in the UK, from other countries, and from the success of initiatives including the community sponsorship and Ukrainian refugee settlement programmes. The solutions we are proposing would not only be more effective than the current system, but cheaper, more coherent, more in tune with the values of compassion and fairness that so many people manifest towards asylum seekers, and capable of delivering long-term economic benefits and positive social outcomes both for refugees and wider British society

Cambridge, U: Woolf Institute, University of Cambridge, 2024. 93p.

 By Daniel Di Martino  

This report estimates the lifetime fiscal impact of immigrants, of various ages and educational attainment, to the United States. It offers a methodological upgrade over similar analyses and estimates and evaluates the fiscal impact of various proposed immigration reforms. A clear picture of the fiscal cost of immigrants is particularly important, given the ongoing border crisis. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the border surge will number 8.7 million unlawful immigrants between 2021 and 2026. The original analysis in this report finds that the border crisis will cost an estimated $1.15 trillion over the lifetime of the new unlawful immigrants—a cost larger than the entire U.S. defense budget and almost equal to the cost of Social Security in 2023. Looking at immigrants more broadly, this report shows that the average new immigrant (lawful or unlawful) has a positive fiscal impact and reduces the federal budget deficit by over $10,000 during his lifetime. For comparison, the average native-born citizen is expected to cost over $250,000 to the federal government. Despite the average immigrant reducing the budget deficit, immigrants without a college education and all those who immigrate to the U.S. after age 55 are universally a net fiscal burden by up to $400,000. The large positive fiscal impact of young and college-educated immigrants pulls up the overall average. Each immigrant under the age of 35 with a graduate degree.   Therefore, for policymakers considering the fiscal impact of immigrants to the U.S., the characteristics of people seeking entry into the country are crucial. Certain immigrants are fiscally beneficial; others are fiscally detrimental. This report quantifies the fiscal impact of common immigration reform proposals: • Mass deportations would significantly reduce the national debt over the long run, but a policy of selective legalization, coupled with mass deportations, would be even more fiscally beneficial, reducing the debt by about $1.9 trillion. • Given the education, age, and earnings of H-1B visa recipients, doubling the number of H-1B visas for just one year would reduce the budget deficit by $70 billion over the long run—and by another $70 billion each year thereafter. • The most beneficial immigration policy change would be to exempt STEM graduate degree holders from green-card caps, increasing immigration by some 15,000 people per year and reducing the visa backlog; this would reduce the deficit by $150 billion in the first year and $25 billion each year thereafter. • Eliminating refugee resettlement and permanent immigration by parents of U.S. citizens would reduce the debt by a combined $40 billion in net present value every year. • Congress could upskill the existing immigration flow by eliminating the diversity visa category and increasing the visas available to the top employment-based categories, and requiring immigrants to have earned a high school diploma to be eligible for a family visa, reducing the national debt by over $60 billion per year. By enacting a selectionist immigration policy—which requires securing the border from unlawful immigration, reducing low-skilled immigration, and expanding high-skilled immigration—the U.S. could reduce future federal debt by trillions of dollars over the long run. This report proposes a legislative package that provides over $2 trillion in net present value during the first year and over $200 billion each subsequent year, without accounting for the additional productivity growth resulting from high-skilled immigration. Furthermore, under these reforms, the annual number of immigrants who are new permanent residents decreases by about 15% after a temporary legalization program and a partial clearing of the employment-based visa backlog. Over the long term, annual legal immigration decreases under this plan from approximately 1 million in FY 2019 to approximately 860,000 

New York: The Manhattan Institute, 2024. 58p.

By Kayla R. Freemon, Melissa A. Gutierrez , Jessica Huff, Hyunjung Cheon, David Choate, Taylor Cox a, Charles M. Katz 

Limited research attention has focused on homicides involving foreign-born victims. Using data from the National Violent Death Reporting System, we examined 9428 homicides that occurred in 2017 in the United States across 32 states and D.C. Approximately 8% of homicide victims were foreign-born. Homicide victimization rates were substantially lower for foreign-born persons, compared to U.S.-born persons. However, foreign-born persons from Honduras, El Salvador, and Jamaica had a substantially higher risk of homicide victimization. Notably, few homicides involving foreign-born victims were gang- or drug-trade-related. With the growing number of immigrants in the United States, policy and prevention efforts should be guided by research.

Preventive Medicine Reports Volume 26, April 2022, 101714

By Alex Nowrasteh, Sarah Eckhardt, and Michael Howard

The National Research Council and the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) published ground breaking investigations into the economics of immigration in 1997 and 2017. Both publications contained thorough literature surveys compiled by experts, academics, and think tank scholars on how immigration affects many aspects of the U.S. economy. The 2017 NAS report included an original fiscal impact model as a unique contribution to immigration scholarship. Its findings have been used by policymakers, economists, journalists, and others to debate immigration reform. Here, we acquired the exact methods used by the NAS from its authors to replicate, update, and expand upon the 2017 fiscal impact model published in the NAS’s The Economic and Fiscal Consequences of Immigration. This paper presents two analyses: a measure of the historical fiscal impacts of immigrants from 1994 to 2018 and the projected long-term fiscal impact of an additional immigrant and that immigrant’s descendants. An individual's fiscal impact refers to the difference between the taxes that person paid and the benefits that person received over a given period. We use and compare two models for these analyses: the first follows the NAS’s methodology as closely as possible and updates the data for more recent years (hereafter referred to as the Updated Model), and the second makes several methodological changes that we believe improve the accuracy of the final results (hereafter referred to as the Cato Model). The most substantial changes made in the Cato Model include correcting for a downward bias in the estimation of immigrants’ future fiscal contributions identified by Michael Clemens in 2021, allocating the fiscal impact of U.S.-born dependents of immigrants to the second generation group, and using a predictive regression to assign future education levels to individuals who are too young to have completed their education. Other minor changes are discussed in later sections. Immigrants have a more positive net fiscal impact than that of native-born Americans in most scenarios in the Updated Model and in every scenario in the Cato Model, depending on how the costs of public goods are allocated. The Cato Model finds that immigrant individuals who arrive at age 25 and who are high school dropouts have a net fiscal impact of +$216,000 in net present value terms, which does not include their descendants. Including the fiscal impact of those immigrants’ descendants reduces those immigrants’ net fiscal impact to +$57,000. By comparison, native-born American high school dropouts of the same age have a net fiscal impact of −$32,000 that drops to −$177,000 when their descendants are included (see Table 31). Results also differ by level of government. State and local governments often incur a less positive or even negative net fiscal impact from immigration, whereas the federal government almost always sees revenues rise above expenditures in response to immigration. With some variation and exceptions, the net fiscal impact of immigrants is more positive than it is for native-born Americans and positive overall for the federal and state/local governments

Washington, DC: The Cato Institute, 2023. 246p.  

By Miguel Pinedo, and Carmen R. Valdez

We examined the differential impact of having a family member, friend, or co-worker/community member detained or deported on the mental health of US citizens. In 2019, a sample of 3446 adult participants of White, Black, and Latinx racial/ethnic descent were recruited to complete an online questionnaire. Participants completed the Patient Health Questionnaire-4 to screen for anxiety, depression, and psychological distress. Analyses were restricted to US citizens (n = 3282). Multivariable logistic and linear regressions were conducted to examine the mental health of US citizens who reported personally knowing a migrant who has been detained or deported and by their relationship to the migrant, overall and among Latinxs only. Among US citizens, 32% reported personally knowing someone who has been detained or deported. In multivariable analyses, US citizens who personally knew a detained or deported migrant were more likely to report anxiety, depression, and greater psychological distress. Associations were more pronounced among those who reported having a family member detained or deported. US-citizen Latinxs with social ties to migrants who have been detained or deported were especially more likely to report poor mental health than White and Latinx participants who did not personally know a migrant who has been detained or deported. It is critical that policy makers consider the potential mental health harms on migrants and its own citizens when designing policies targeting migrant communities. 

Am J Community Psychol (2020) 66:119–129 

May Contain Markup

By Joanne Passaro

Gender and Homelessness: The book explores how gender differences contribute to the persistence of homelessness, with a focus black men in New York City.

Cultural and Moral Location: Homelessness is not just an economic issue but also a cultural and moral one, where homeless men are seen as both hypermasculinized and emasculated.

Survival Strategies: Homeless women often strategize to appear"worthy" to move through the system, while homeless men lack similar strategies and face greater stigmatization.

Impact of Family Structures: The book argues that nuclear family ideologies play a significant role in who remains homeless versus who becomes houseless.

Psychology Press, 1996, 128 pages

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Edited by Marcela Raffaelli & Reed W. Larson

Focus on Street Youth: The document explores the developmental issues faced by homeless and working street youth around the world,highlighting their unique challenges and resilience.

Geographical Approach: It presents studies from different regions,including India, Brazil, Kenya, and the United States, to show the diverse experiences and factors affecting street youth.

Research and Methodology: The document discusses the methodological and ethical issues in researching street youth,emphasizing the importance of understanding their context and using appropriate research methods.

Developmental Impact: It examines how street life affects the development of street youth, including their cognitive skills, identity formation, and psychological adjustment.

Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1999, 90 pages

May Contain Markup

By Jeff Karabanow, Sean Kidd, Tyler Frederick, and Jean Hughes

Study Focus: The book explores the lived experiences of homeless in Canada, focusing on their transition from homelessness stability.

Methodology: The study used a longitudinal mixed-method approach, involving in-depth qualitative interviews and questionnaires with 51 participants over a year.

Key Findings: Factors influencing the transition include consistent support,feelings of belonging,life and social skills, and housing stability.

Challenges: Youth face significant challenges such as instability,scheduling issues, and engagement difficulties during their transition.

Wilfrid Laurier Univ. Press, May 30, 2018, 147 pages