E.g., 04/23/2024
E.g., 04/23/2024
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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Reports
December 2015
Stopping the Revolving Door: Reception and Reintegration Services for Central American Deportees
By  Victoria Rietig and Rodrigo Dominguez-Villegas
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Articles
December 7, 2015
Shine Wears Off Investor Visa Programs as Questions about Economic Benefits and Fraud Lead to Reforms
By Kate Hooper and Demetrios G. Papademetriou
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Multimedia
December 1, 2015
Investor Visa Programs: Examining their Utility, Challenges, and Successes
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Articles
December 1, 2015
European Immigrants in the United States
By Jie Zong and Jeanne Batalova
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Fact Sheets
November 2015
Profile of Syrian Immigrants in the United States
By  Jie Zong
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Articles
November 18, 2015
Immigrants in the Smart City: The Potential of City Digital Strategies to Facilitate Immigrant Integration
By Divia Mattoo, Corinne Goldberg, Jillian Johnson, Carolina Farias Riaño, and Aliyyah Ahad
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Articles
November 12, 2015
Recent Court Rulings Block Deferred Action Programs and Raise Questions for Accessing Birthright Citizenship
By Muzaffar Chishti and Faye Hipsman
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Commentaries
November 2015
Meeting the Education Needs of Rising Numbers of Newly Arrived Migrant Students in Europe and the United States
By  Julie Sugarman

Pages

Feature
April 29, 2010
Arrested on Entry: Operation Streamline and the Prosecution of Immigration Crimes

Those caught trying to enter the United States illegally in portions of five Southwest border sectors face criminal prosecution under Operation Streamline, which the Department of Homeland Security launched in 2005. MPI's Donald Kerwin and Kristen McCabe examine how Operation Streamline works, highlight trends in the prosecution of immigration offenses, and evaluate the program's outcomes.

Policy Beat
April 15, 2010
Supreme Court Rules that Attorneys Must Inform Criminal Defendants of the Immigration Consequences of Pleading Guilty

MPI's Muzaffar Chishti and Claire Bergeron report on Padilla v. Kentucky, Arizona's passage of a controversial immigration bill, Senators Charles Schumer and Lindsey Graham's immigration reform blueprint, the latest H-1B application numbers, and more

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Spotlight
April 7, 2010
Filipino Immigrants in the United States

The 1.7 million Filipino immigrants in the United States made them the countrys second-largest immigrant group in 2008. MPIs Aaron Terrazas and Jeanne Batalova use the latest federal data to explore the population's size, geographic distribution, and socioeconomic characteristics.

Feature
March 31, 2010
Hidden in Plain Sight: Indigenous Migrants, Their Movements, and Their Challenges

The United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues estimates there are more than 370 million indigenous people in some 90 countries worldwide. Carlos Yescas of the New School for Social Research looks at the definition of indigenous people, the three types of indigenous-people flows, and how indigenous migrants maintain ties with their home communities.

Feature
March 29, 2010
In Mexico, Mother's Education and Remittances Matter in School Outcomes

Remittances would seem to boost the chances that children in Mexico complete high school. But money alone does not improve schooling outcomes in the educationally marginalized, migrant-sending regions of southern Mexico, as Adam Sawyer of the Harvard Graduate School of Education reports.

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Recent Activity

Fact Sheets
December 2016

State Sociodemographic Portraits of Immigrant and U.S.-Born Parents of Young Children

These fact sheets provide a sociodemographic sketch of parents with children ages 0 to 8 in the 30 states with the largest number of immigrant families, offering data and analysis of some of the key parental characteristics to help stakeholders identify populations that could be targets for early childhood and parent-focused programs working to improve child and parent outcomes.

Articles
December 13, 2016

As Publics Fear Loss of National Identity, Far-Right Populist Movements Gain Strength

The success of populist movements on both sides of the Atlantic in 2016, including Donald Trump's victory in the United States and the United Kingdom's vote to quit the European Union, have sparked an identity crisis in the West. Campaigns effectively tapped into the anxieties of voters who feel left behind by societal change and out-of-touch elites, while normalizing anti-immigrant rhetoric in mainstream discourse, as this Top 10 article explores.

Articles
December 12, 2016

Crises with Links to Immigration Result in Divergent Policy Responses on Either Side of the Atlantic

While Europe and the United States saw terror attacks in 2016 carried out by radicalized immigrants or members of the second generation, policy responses varied on either side of the Atlantic. The perceived security threat posed by refugees was the main concern in the United States. Meanwhile, European debates centered more on concerns over loss of control of migration flows and lack of social cohesion.

Articles
December 8, 2016

Migrants and Smugglers Get Creative to Circumvent Immigration Enforcement

Smugglers and migrants adapted their paths in light of changing conditions in 2016, including the construction of walls and closure of borders. Cuban and Haitian migrants increasingly chose to make their way to the United States through South and Central America rather than by sea. Meanwhile, migrant flows to Europe have splintered into a wider range of routes, seeking new openings through the Western Balkans.

Video, Audio
December 7, 2016

Doctors as Taxi Drivers: The Costs of Brain Waste among Highly Skilled Immigrants in the United States

A presentation of the first-ever U.S. estimates on the economic costs of brain waste for highly skilled immigrants, their families, and the U.S. economy. The researchers discuss their findings in terms of the billions of dollars in forgone earnings and unrealized taxes when college-educated immigrants are relegated to low-skilled work.

Video, Expert Q&A
December 6, 2016

Brain Waste: Researchers Discuss Economic Costs of Skill Underutilization among Highly Skilled Immigrants

Nearly 2 million college-educated immigrants in the United States are stuck in low-skilled jobs or are unemployed—a phenomenon known as brain waste. In this brief video, MPI researchers discuss their key findings on immigrant skill underutilization and the resulting billions of dollars in unrealized wages and forgone federal, state, and local tax receipts.

Fact Sheets
December 2016

The Costs of Brain Waste among Highly Skilled Immigrants in Select States

Across the United States, nearly 2 million immigrants with college degrees are unemployed or stuck in low-skilled jobs. This skill underutilization, known as “brain waste,” varies significantly by state. These fact sheets offer a profile of these highly skilled immigrants and estimate their forgone earnings and resulting unrealized tax receipts in eight states: California, Florida, Michigan, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Texas, and Washington.

Reports
December 2016

Untapped Talent: The Costs of Brain Waste among Highly Skilled Immigrants in the United States

Nearly 2 million immigrants with college degrees in the United States—one out of every four—are employed in low-skilled jobs or unable to find work. This report explores this skill underutilization, often referred to as brain waste, and offers the first-ever economic costs of underemployment for immigrants in the United States: More than $39 billion in forgone wages and a resulting $10 billion in unrealized tax receipts.

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