E.g., 04/24/2024
E.g., 04/24/2024
North America

North America

United States
Canada
Mexico

North America is a dynamic migration region, with the United States home to more immigrants than any other country in the world, the Mexico-U.S. corridor the globe's top migration corridor, and Canada a leading destination for migrants. Research collected here focuses on everything from visa policy and border management to immigrant integration, national identity, the demographics of immigrants in the region and their educational and workforce outcomes, and ways to more effectively use migration policy as a lever for national and regional competitiveness.

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Commentaries

Canada's New Tech Talent Strategy Takes Aim at High-Skilled Immigrants in the United States

Canada’s Tech Talent Strategy is highly unusual for its explicit targeting of visa holders in another country. Opening a dedicated stream specifically for high-skilled immigrants in the United States who hold an H-1B visa is the latest salvo in a growing global competition for talent—one in which some countries are racing ahead of the United States in terms of policy dynamism, as this commentary explores.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and other leaders at the 2022 Summit of the Americas
Commentaries

The Los Angeles Declaration Could Represent a Big Step for Real Migration Cooperation across the Americas

The Los Angeles Agreement on Migration and Protection signed by leaders from 20 countries across the Western Hemisphere at the 2022 Summit of the Americas marks a significant step forward in creating a common language and a coherent set of ideas for more cooperatively managing migration movements across a region that has seen very significant mobility in recent years, as this commentary explains.

Recent Activity

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Fact Sheets
December 2010
Updated Estimates of the 2010 DREAM Act
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Fact Sheets
December 2010
Top Languages Spoken by English Language Learners Nationally and by State, 2009
By  Jeanne Batalova and Margie McHugh
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Multimedia
November 30, 2010
Diasporas: New Partners in Global Development Policy
Articles
November 15, 2010
Elections Alter the Political Landscape for Immigration Policy Debate
By Muzaffar Chishti, Claire Bergeron
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Articles
November 10, 2010
Immigration Enforcement in the United States
By Jeanne Batalova, Kristen McCabe
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Books
November 2010
Diasporas: New Partners in Global Development Policy
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Books
November 2010
Prioritizing Integration
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Policy Briefs
November 2010
Structuring and Implementing an Immigrant Legalization Program: Registration as the First Step
By  Donald M. Kerwin and Laureen Laglagaron

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Policy Beat
January 1, 2003
Ridge Tapped to Head Homeland Security Department
Details Emerge Regarding Homeland Security Department... Justice Department Expands Expedited Removal Policy... Citizenship Requirement for Airport Screeners On Hold... Study Highlights Role of Immigrants in 1990s Boom...
January 1, 2003
The New Immigrant Survey in the U.S.: The Experience over Time
Large gaps exist in the social science and public policy research on immigration. Guillermina Jasso of New York University, Douglas S. Massey of the University of Pennsylvania, Mark R. Rosenzweig of Harvard University, and James P. Smith of RAND take an in-depth look at the New Immigrant Survey, which aims to bridge the chasm between information needs and existing data.
Spotlight
December 1, 2002
Characteristics of the Foreign Born in the United States: Results from Census 2000
This Spotlight by Elizabeth Grieco, MPI Data Manager, examines some of the demographic, social, and economic characteristics of the foreign-born population in the United States.
Policy Beat
December 1, 2002
Homeland Security Department Gets Green Light
Department of Homeland Security Bill Clears House and Senate... Registration of Foreigners to Expand... Bishops Advocate on Behalf of Migrants... President Signs Border Commuter Bill... Recent Caribbean Arrivals Highlight Inequities in U.S. Policy...
Doris Meissner
Feature
December 1, 2002
Interview with Doris Meissner

MPI Senior Fellow Doris Meissner, former head of the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, shares her perspective on changes in U.S. migration policy since September 11, the prospects for an immigration agreement with Mexico, and the Department of Homeland Security.

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Recent Activity

Commentaries
April 2020

As U.S. Health-Care System Buckles under Pandemic, Immigrant & Refugee Professionals Could Represent a Critical Resource

In a time of critical shortages of U.S. health-care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic, retired doctors are being called back to work and medical students are graduating on a fast track. There is another important pool that could be tapped: Immigrants and refugees who have college degrees in health fields but are working in low-skilled jobs or out of work. MPI estimates 263,000 immigrants are experiencing skill underutilization and could be a valuable resource.

Expert Q&A, Audio
March 31, 2020

Expert Podcast: Meeting Seasonal Labor Needs in the Age of COVID-19

Governments are facing urgent pandemic-related questions. One of the more pressing ones: Who is going to harvest crops in countries that rely heavily on seasonal foreign workers? In this podcast, MPI experts examine ways in which countries could address labor shortages in agriculture, including recruiting native-born workers and letting already present seasonal workers stay longer. Catch an interesting discussion as border closures have halted the movement of seasonal workers even as crops are approaching harvest in some places.

Commentaries
March 2020

A Race Against the Clock: Meeting Seasonal Labor Needs in the Age of COVID-19

As governments have reacted to the coronavirus pandemic by closing borders, seasonal workers have been kept out, raising a pressing question: who is going to produce the food amid agricultural labor shortages? Policymakers in the Asia Pacific, Europe, and North America have responded by seeking to recruit residents, lengthen stays for already present seasonal workers, and find ways to continue admitting foreign seasonal labor, as this commentary explores.

Fact Sheets
March 2020

Immigrant Workers: Vital to the U.S. COVID-19 Response, Disproportionately Vulnerable

Six million immigrant workers are at the frontlines of keeping U.S. residents healthy and fed during the COVID-19 pandemic, representing disproportionate shares of physicians, home health aides, and retail-store pharmacists, for example. They also are over-represented in sectors most immediately devastated by mass layoffs, yet many will have limited access to safety-net systems and to federal relief, as this fact sheet details.

Articles
March 26, 2020

Crisis within a Crisis: Immigration in the United States in a Time of COVID-19

The global COVID-19 pandemic has brought into sharp focus the intersection of U.S. immigration and public health policy, and the unique challenges that immigrants face. This article analyzes the Trump administration’s introduction of some of the most stringent immigration restrictions in modern times, the often disparate fallout of the outbreak on immigrant communities, the status of federal immigration agency operations, and more.

Video, Audio, Webinars
March 24, 2020

Migration & Coronavirus: A Complicated Nexus Between Migration Management and Public Health

This webinar, organized by MPI and the Zolberg Institute on Migration and Mobility at The New School, discussed migration policy responses around the globe in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and examined where migration management and enforcement tools may be useful and where they may be ill-suited to advancing public health goals. 

Video, Audio, Webinars
March 5, 2020

Green Cards and Public Charge: Who Could Be Denied Based on Benefits Use?

On this webinar, MPI experts discussed the public-charge rule and released estimates of the populations that could be deemed ineligible for a green card based on existing benefits use. They examined the far larger consequences of the rule, through its "chilling effects" and imposition of a test aimed at assessing whether green-card applicants are likely to ever use a public benefit in the future. And they discussed how the latter holds the potential to reshape legal immigration to the United States. 

Expert Q&A, Audio
March 11, 2020

Expert Podcast: Understanding How English Learners Count in ESSA Reporting

This podcast features a discussion between MPI's Margie McHugh and Julie Sugarman about how to understand the varying composition of states' English Learner (EL) subgroup under ESSA, and why understanding these technical differences matters when making decisions about how ELs and schools are faring. They also talk about different groups of ELs: newcomers, students with interrupted formal education, and long-term ELs, and data collection around these different cohorts.

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