Guest Column
Second-Generation Mexicans: Getting Ahead or Falling Behind?
- From: Migration Information Source
- March 1, 2006
Among women, second-generation Asian and European/Canadian workers are covered at higher rates than whites; all other groups are covered at lower rates.
Mexican immigrants are again highly disadvantaged, with just under a fifth covered by an employer-provided plan. Pension coverage of second-generation Mexican men is twice as high as among foreign-born Mexicans, though it still lags well below the white rate.
Conclusion
Mexican immigrants, the largest single group of poorly schooled newcomers, make up a working poor, with limited access to jobs beyond the low-wage sector. Given these circumstances, can their US-born and US-raised children be expected to progress?
While US-born Mexican men do not retain the extraordinary job-holding rates of their Mexican-born counterparts, the shift downward takes them to levels that characterize native-born whites. As the second generation is significantly better educated than the first, Mexican second-generation men find jobs associated with greater stability, significantly higher levels of pay, and much greater fringe-benefit coverage.
Taking gender into account alters the picture still more. As shown, the labor force behavior of Mexican immigrant men and women sharply diverges, with Mexican immigrant women showing much lower levels of labor force attachment than their male counterparts. By contrast, the labor force behavior of second-generation Mexican women looks a good deal more like the pattern evident among native whites. Though a gap persists, the disparity is of greatly diminished proportions. As with their male counterparts, second-generation Mexican women enjoy higher levels of schooling, which in turn generates more handsome economic rewards.
This type of good news lends support to the idea that second-generation Mexicans are not becoming part of the "rainbow underclass." Yet there are still ample grounds for concern. The progress of second-generation Mexican men and women exemplifies "assimilation" but only if one defines it in absolute terms. Relative to the majority, that is to say, whites, there remains a very substantial gap.
Catching up will require continued schooling, indeed persistence, through the college years. For many children of Mexican immigrants, that achievement still seems far off. Enrollment patterns in the high school and college years clearly leave much to be desired.
It is important to remember that second-generation Mexican drop-outs do find jobs at rates very close to their counterparts among whites. However, these jobs pay poorly and offer little upward mobility and few benefits.
While college completion rates have grown, the pace of change for the Mexican second generation is very modest. The consequences of the college completion gap might be different were the economy moving along a different path. But, under current conditions, the best educated are the best rewarded.
If today's second-generation Mexican adults are struggling to catch up, one also wonders how the young children of the immigrant working poor, for whom things have surely not gotten better over the past 20 years, will manage. Their future cannot be of academic interest only, as demography ensures that the second generation will be a force with dimensions not to be ignored.
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Roger Waldinger is Professor of Sociology at UCLA and the author of numerous books on immigration, most recently, How the Other Half Works: Immigration and the Social Division of Labor (co-authored with Michael Lichter; University of Calfiornia Press, 2003). Renee Reichl is a graduate student in the Department of Sociology, UCLA.- Migration Information Source - http://www.migrationinformation.org/Feature/display.cfm?id=382
- Copyright @ 2004 Migration Policy Institute.
All rights reserved.
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By Roger Waldinger and Renee Reichl
University of California Los Angeles
The
1965 Immigration and Nationality Act, which eliminated nationality-based
quotas, opened the United States to a new wave of immigration from Asia,
Africa, and the Americas. Compared to circumstances in their home
countries, the United States has offered most new arrivals a chance to do
well. In the long run, however, the fate of immigrants may not be the
central issue.
More important are the prospects for integration and social and economic
mobility on the part of their children, also known as the second
generation. Their small but growing numbers have placed them in the
research spotlight: Who are they? How well are they doing in school? What
is their attachment to the workforce? Are they becoming economically
self-sufficient? Are they getting ahead or falling behind in America? The
answers to these questions have consequences for both education and
employment-related policies.
Yet research has not produced a definitive analysis of the paths that the
children of immigrants are likely to follow. The most pessimistic
scenario, "segmented assimilation, " contends that a sizeable portion of
today's second generation — especially the children of working-class
immigrants — may be a "rainbow underclass" in the making, stumbling
beneath the ranks of the lower working class in which their parents have
established themselves. The more conventional perspective posits
"assimilation," meaning progress beyond what their parents achieved.
On the other hand, relative, not absolute progress, may be the more
important factor since doing better than one's parents does not
necessarily imply doing as well as the dominant or majority group. For
example, convergence may be postponed or precluded if the majority of the
second generation never quite succeeds at educational catch-up and, even
more so, if income growth is largely concentrated among workers with the
most schooling.
Which contrast counts is also a matter of perception. The high school
educated children of barely literate dishwashers or factory workers may
well outpace their parents but be unable to attain the middle-class
American dream. If, over time, their prospects are bleak and they find
themselves in the lower socioeconomic ranks (joining historically
underprivileged groups such as African Americans), they may also conclude
that their search for advancement has stalled.
Why Second-Generation Mexicans
According to data from the 2004 Current Population Survey (CPS), Mexicans
accounted for 29 percent of the 34 million foreign-born persons living in
the United States. No group was remotely as numerous; Filipinos, the next
largest group, made up only four percent of the foreign born.
Among immigrants, the Mexican foreign born have consistently been the
least educated. In 1970, eight of every 10 adult Mexican immigrants lacked
a high school degree; in 2004, the proportion fell to just under six in
10, well over 30 percent above any other group. This gradual decline,
however, was out of line with the shifts other groups experienced.
Relative to whites and other groups, the gap actually grew.
Not surprisingly, the Mexican foreign born are overwhelmingly concentrated
in low-skilled, low-wage work. Forty-four percent of all men born in
Mexico fall in the bottom quintile of the male wage distribution. Also, of
the 10.3 million undocumented immigrants in 2004, 57 percent (or 5.9
million) are from Mexico, according to estimates from the Pew Hispanic
Center. With nearly two-thirds of all Mexican immigrants undocumented,
legal status undoubtedly affects their ability to obtain work that matches
their skill level.
The children of immigrants from Europe, Canada, or Australia are an
especially old group; almost 60 percent are at least 50 years old. By
contrast, young children predominate among all the other national-origin
categories. Indeed, the national origins of immigrant children ages 10 or
younger closely resemble the national origins of the foreign-born
population, with one key exception: Mexican-origin youth account for a
disproportionately large 37 percent of the 5.7 million in this group.
The distinctive age structure of the second generation implies that the
advent of a "new" second generation has yet to yield its full effect. As
of now, the institutional impact is mainly felt by public schools,
especially those in the major immigrant-receiving cities where growing
immigrant numbers have produced a large population of school children of
immigrant origins. The impact on the labor market is far more modest
because most of today's second generation have not yet reached working
age.
In this context, the US-born children of Mexican immigrants are of
particular concern. It's important to note that many of them, unlike their
parents, are US citizens because they were born on US soil and therefore
already have an advantage over their parents. The goal is to examine
whether evidence supports the "rainbow underclass" hypothesis for this
group.
Methodology
With the exception of Mexicans, numbers are too small for disaggregating
by national origin. Consequently, the comparison is between
second-generation Mexicans and three global categories:
Europeans/Canadians/Australians (to be referred to as
Europeans/Canadians); "other Americas" (all countries in the Western
Hemisphere except for Mexico and Canada); and "Asia" (including all
countries in Asia, whether in eastern or western Asia). While these global
categories undoubtedly conceal a good deal of internal heterogeneity,
further breakdowns would not yield reliable numbers.
Given interest in generational differences, native-born benchmark groups
are restricted to the third generation, meaning those born in the United
States to US-born parents. We include the two groups that comprise the
great bulk of America's third-generation population: whites and African
Americans (any reference to whites or African Americans only extends to
third-generation members of these groups).
Thia study draws on a variety of statistical sources. As is well known,
the great workhorse of the American statistical system — the US Census of
Population — is of limited use because it ceased asking questions about
parents' place of birth in 1970, making it impossible to track the
children of immigrants once they had moved out of their parents' home.
Therefore, census data is used only for the 1970 results.
For later years, data from CPS is used. In 1979, CPS began asking
respondents about their parents' nativity on a periodic basis, and started
doing so on a regular basis in 1994. The main drawback of CPS is its small
sample size. Consequently, CPS data from several years — 1997, 1999, 2001,
and 2003 — have been merged. As the year 2000 falls in the midpoint among
these years, this merged sample is referred to as the "2000" survey.
A word of caution is in order. Although this comparison includes
generation and origin groups in terms of their educational and work
characteristics, group differences were not tested for their statistical
significance. As such, the analysis provides only a descriptive portrayal
of group differences.
From School to Work
Schooling is a prerequisite for advancement in 21st-century America. The
first hurdle is the high school diploma, a credential possessed by 88
percent of prime-aged adult Americans, according to the 2004 CPS. About 32
percent of the foreign born, however, arrive in the United States with a
few years of secondary schooling or less, according to the 2000 census.
Thus, for immigrants' children to move beyond their parents, graduation
from high school often represents a major leap. Alternatively, as
indicated by the fact that low-skilled immigrants are employed at
impressively high rates, a failure to complete high school may not have
equally negative effects for all. Crucial to examining the effect of a
high-school diploma is the transition from school to work.
Youth, ages 16 to 20
Enrollment is lowest among first-generation Mexicans, among whom only 40
percent are in school (see Table 1). Going to school is much more common
among all other foreign-born and second-generation groups, with rates
generally hovering either around or above the level for third-generation
whites and far above the level for African Americans (with the exception
of first-generation youth from the other Americas).
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Table 1. Percentage Teenagers (Ages 16 to 20) in School by Nationality and Generation, 2000 |
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Among the second generation, enrollment rates among persons originating in
Europe, the other Americas, and especially Asia compare favorably with the
pattern for third-generation whites. Not surprisingly, all groups report
lower full-time enrollment rates. However, the falloff varies. Relative to
whites, the Asian advantage in full-time enrollment rates is even greater
than for enrollment of all types; whether focuses on general or full-time
enrollment rates, African Americans appear equally (and slightly)
disadvantaged. Among both Mexican foreign-born and second-generation
youth, however, the gap in full-time enrollment rates exceeds the
disparity in overall enrollment rates.
In general, early school leavers suffer greater risk of joblessness. Among
third-generation whites, 72 percent of the male and 65 percent of the
female members report having a job. In general, employment rates for
out-of-school youth from most foreign-born or second-generation people
fall below the level enjoyed by whites; the gap, however, is quite modest.
On the other hand, the group least likely to be in school, foreign-born
Mexicans, is also the group most likely to be at work: 80 percent of
out-of-school men in this group hold a job. By contrast, out-of-school
African Americans appear the least likely to have moved from school to a
job: whether male or female, less than half of African Americans out of
school hold a job. Young African Americans are particularly disadvantaged,
holding jobs at less than 60 percent of the rate for comparable whites.
Young adults, ages 21 to 25
As compared to their younger counterparts, adults 21 to 25 are far less
likely to be enrolled in any type of formal education. In this age range,
just over a quarter of third-generation whites are in school (see Table
2). At this modest level, whites are outdistanced by a number of groups:
close to half of Asian foreign-born and foreign-parentage persons are
still in school; enrollment rates for Europeans/Canadians, both first and
second generation as well as second-generation individuals with origins in
the "other Americas," compare favorably with the pattern displayed by
whites.
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Table 2. Percentage Young Adults (Ages 21 to 25) in School by Nationality and Generation, 2000 |
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As young adulthood is also the prime age for migration (especially among
the low skilled), enrollment is rare among Mexican immigrants; by
contrast, enrollment among second-generation Mexicans falls below the
level for whites. While rates of full-time enrollment are lower for all
groups, whites lag behind the first- and second-generation persons of
European/Canadian and Asian origins, as well as second-generation young
adults from the "other Americas."
For Mexican immigrants, however, the full-time enrollment rate is a fifth
of the white level. The Mexican second generation does much better, but in
comparison to whites, only three-quarters as many Mexican-American young
adults are studying full-time.
Although youth is a period of protracted transition from school to work,
the early adult years tend to yield stable job attachment. Overall, 83
percent of out-of-school young men and 71 percent of young women in this
age range are working.
Mexican young adult men work at the highest rates of all (89 percent).
Job-holding among other foreign born and second-generation individuals
does not fully match up to that of whites (87 percent for men and 77
percent for women), though the gap ranges from a percentage point for
European/Canadian foreign born to 10 percentage points for males of "other
Americas" parentage.
A similar pattern holds for women, with the notable exception of Mexicans:
whether first or second generation, their employment rates lag 34 and 10
percentage points, respectively, behind whites' employment rates.
That disparity notwithstanding, the more notable facts are (a)
second-generation Mexican women are far more likely to be employed (66
percent) than are their first-generation counterparts (42 percent); and
(b) gender differences in employment are far smaller among the Mexican
second generation than among the first.
Although the job-holding gap, so evident among African Americans in the
younger cohort, narrows in the 21-to-25 age group, African Americans are
still at a great disadvantage. African-American men do particularly badly,
working at rates (67 percent) substantially below those of other groups.
African-American women, by contrast, have an employment rate (65 percent)
roughly comparable to immigrants from Asia and the other Americas, as well
as second-generation Mexican women.
Education Levels of the Working-Age Population
The paradox of the post-1965 wave of immigration is the simultaneous
influx of a large group of low-skilled workers and an increase in demand
for workers with ever-higher levels of skill. Just how second-generation
Americans fit into this evolving skills structure is a crucial factor,
influencing their access to employment and the types of jobs and levels of
reward that they are likely to attain.
This section focuses on adults between ages 25 and 64, with a particular
focus on employment, wages, and nonmonetary forms of compensation. As
economic attainments are likely to be influenced by the skills that
workers bring to the market, changes in both absolute and relative levels
of their education are examined.
As shown in Table 3, the relative size of the less-educated labor force
has been in sharp decline for over 30 years; whereas in 1970, 49 percent
of all working-age adults did not possess a high school degree, by 2004,
only 12 percent had failed to complete a high school education.
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Table 3. Percent with Less than High School Education, Adults (Ages 25 to 65) 1970, 2004 |
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In 1970, a college education (or higher) was relatively rare, possessed by
one in 10 adults; by 2004, it had become a good deal more commonplace,
with about a third completing college (see Table 4).
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Table 4. Percent with a College Degree, Adults (Ages 25 to 65) 1970, 2004 |
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While college education has become more prevalent among all groups, there
has been no single pattern to the change. College education is actually an
indicator on which whites have consistently lagged behind a number of
first- and second-generation groups. The relatively small group of Asian
immigrants residing in the United States in 1970 already possessed a
markedly high-skilled tilt. By 2004, more than half of the adults in this
group possessed a college diploma. Even more notable is the shift among
Asian second-generation adults, who already enjoyed a slight lead above
whites in 1970, but are now almost twice as likely to possess a college
degree.
On the other hand, groups lagging behind in 1970 have made little progress
toward erasing the gap. A college education was found among only two
percent of Mexican immigrants in 1970. In fact, it was almost as scarce
among African Americans and adults of Mexican parentage.
Among the Mexican foreign born, six percent now have a college education,
but this level of education remains highly uncommon. As a result, Mexican
immigrants are just as disadvantaged at the turn of the 21st century as
they were three decades before. Although second-generation Mexicans, at 14
percent, are much more likely to possess a college degree, they still lag
behind whites.
Labor Market Outcomes
Employment provides the best gauge for assessing the contention that the
offspring of today's working-class immigrants are likely to enter the
ranks of a "rainbow underclass." Although there are many ways to define
the underclass, sociologist William Julius Wilson's description of a world
where "work has disappeared" captures the phenomenon's central trait.
Thus the focus here is on comparison of rates of current employment as an
indicator of labor force attachment. The next section examines other kinds
of labor market outcomes, namely groups' earnings and health and pension
coverage.
Employment
In the years since 1970, employment trends for men and women have followed
two very different paths, with job-holding eroding modestly among men, but
increasing substantially among women. In 1970, 87 percent of adult males
were employed. By 2004, only 82 percent of men were holding a job. White
men and most foreign-born and second-generation men closely track this
shift (see Table 5).
Yet the one group that should be most at risk of job loss, foreign-born
Mexican men in low-skilled work, became more likely to hold jobs by 2004
(see Table 5). Second-generation Mexican men have seen slight erosion in
job-holding, with employment rates always remaining just a few percentage
points below the white level.
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Table 5. Percent Employment among Adults in the Labor Force by Generation and Origin (Ages 25 to 65), 1970 to 2004 |
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The most severe decline has occurred among African-American men. Already a
good deal less likely than whites to be employed in 1970, barely seven out
of 10 African-American men were employed in 2004.
For women, an almost opposite story can be told: 46 percent of adult women
were working in 1970, a number that jumped to 68 percent by 2004.
Employment rose among all groups, though the sharpest gains came from
second-generation Mexican women, whose numbers went from 39 percent to 70
percent during this period — effectively placing them on par with whites
(see Table 5). In contrast, foreign-born Mexican women fell further behind
whites, in both absolute and relative terms.
Unlike their male counterparts, African-American women increased
job-holding rates in the years after 1970. However, the pace of change was
modest, with the result that employment rates, which earlier had exceeded
whites', subsequently slipped below the white job-holding level by 2004.
Median earnings
In 2000, median earnings for third-generation white men were close to
$49,000, a figure that put them above most, but not all groups of men (see
Figure 1). Second-generation Europeans/Canadians reported the
highest earnings of all ($59,330), followed by first-generation members of
the same group, and then second- and first-generation Asians,
respectively.
At the other end of the spectrum stood the Mexican foreign born, who
earned half as much as whites; African Americans, with earnings two-thirds
those of whites; and immigrants from the "other Americas," with earnings
68 percent of the white level. Second-generation Mexican men also lagged
behind whites, though with earnings 76 percent those of whites, they stood
at the midpoint between the earnings of the Mexican foreign born and those
of whites.
With a median wage and salary of roughly $28,000, white women earned just
over half as much as their male counterparts. That figure pushed them
ahead of almost all the foreign-born groups but left them lagging behind
women of European/Canadian, Asian, and "other Americas" parentage. As with
men, foreign-born Mexican women had the lowest earnings of all, barely
exceeding 50 percent of the white level ($14,552). As compared to their
male counterparts, both second-generation Mexican women and
African-American women enjoyed a much smaller earnings gap.
Since educational levels vary so greatly, further light can be shed on the
sources of earnings disparity by examining earnings within major
educational categories. Higher levels of education yield higher earnings
for all groups, whether among men or women. However, the impact of
education varies by level received, as college completion (or continuation
beyond college) boosts earnings more sharply than any other increment in
schooling.
Although more schooling has a positive effect on all groups, it does not
affect them uniformly. As other research has shown, additional years of
schooling acquired before migration do relatively little to boost the
earnings of Mexican-born workers. Consequently, relative gaps in earnings
are smallest among the least educated; among men, in particular, the gap,
relative to whites, is the greatest among the workers with the most
education.
By contrast, each major increment in schooling pushes the earnings of
second-generation Mexican workers upwards: college-educated,
second-generation Mexican men enjoy median earnings two and half times the
level received by their counterparts lacking a high school degree. At all
educational levels, second-generation Mexican men earn more than
African-American counterparts, among whom college completion has a much
weaker impact than among whites or second-generation Mexican workers.
Benefits
Fringe benefits — most notably pensions and health insurance — compose a
crucial dimension of job quality. In the United States, employers
generally provide health and pension benefits.
Health insurance
Two-thirds of white males receive some form of health coverage from their
employer (see
Figure 2). Other groups do better, most notably European/Canadian
and Asian second-generation workers. Foreign-born workers, however, all
lag far behind whites, with Mexican immigrants — among whom only one-third
receives any form of health insurance — the most disadvantaged. By
contrast, half of African-American men and just over half of
second-generation Mexican men have employer-sponsored health insurance.
Health insurance coverage is uniformly lower among women than among men
for all groups but African-American women, half of whom receive health
coverage from their employers, a rate that puts them at parity with
African-American men and ahead of white women (see
Figure 2).
Most second-generation women are also covered at higher rates than whites,
with Mexican second-generation women being the one exception. On the other
hand, employer-provided health coverage is twice as common among
second-generation Mexicans as foreign-born Mexican women. The latter are
particularly unlikely to receive health coverage, a pattern that may be
related to their prevalence in domestic work and similar jobs.
Pension benefits
Employers are more likely to provide health than pension coverage, though
the disparity is generally greater for men. Just over half (56 percent) of
white males are covered by a pension; only second-generation
European/Canadian men exceed whites in pension coverage (see Table 6).
Foreign-born men are all less likely to be covered by a pension plan, and
pension coverage is particularly low for Mexican immigrants — just over
one-third the rate of whites.
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Table 6. Percent of Adults Included in Employer-Provided Pension Plan by Generation and Origin, 2000 |
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