IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/anname/v666y2016i1p150-163.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Effects of Legal Status on Employment and Health Outcomes among Low-Skilled Chinese Immigrants in New York City

Author

Listed:
  • Zai Liang
  • Bo Zhou

Abstract

Using a 2004 survey done in New York City’s Chinese community, we explore the extent to which legal status affects immigrants’ labor market performance and health status. We focus on five issues related to legal status of immigrants: wages, weekly working hours, employment location, self-rated health, and health care utilization. Our results show that undocumented immigrants are more likely to work for exceptionally long hours and are less likely to see a doctor when they get sick. However, we also find that current legal status does not have a significant effect on current health status. This work contributes to a growing literature on how legal status is linked to labor market and health consequences.

Suggested Citation

  • Zai Liang & Bo Zhou, 2016. "The Effects of Legal Status on Employment and Health Outcomes among Low-Skilled Chinese Immigrants in New York City," The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, , vol. 666(1), pages 150-163, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:anname:v:666:y:2016:i:1:p:150-163
    DOI: 10.1177/0002716216650632
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0002716216650632
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0002716216650632?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Douglas S. Massey & Kerstin Gentsch, 2014. "Undocumented Migration to the United States and the Wages of Mexican Immigrants," International Migration Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 48(2), pages 482-499, June.
    2. Korinek, Kim & Smith, Ken R., 2011. "Prenatal care among immigrant and racial-ethnic minority women in a new immigrant destination: Exploring the impact of immigrant legal status," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 72(10), pages 1695-1703, May.
    3. Matthew Hall & Emily Greenman, 2015. "The Occupational Cost of Being Illegal in the United States: Legal Status, Job Hazards, and Compensating Differentials," International Migration Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 49(2), pages 406-442, June.
    4. Baldwin, P. J. & Dodd, M. & Wrate, R. W., 1997. "Young doctors' health--I. How do working conditions affect attitudes, health and performance?," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 45(1), pages 35-40, July.
    5. Hacker, Karen & Chu, Jocelyn & Leung, Carolyn & Marra, Robert & Pirie, Alex & Brahimi, Mohamed & English, Margaret & Beckmann, Joshua & Acevedo-Garcia, Dolores & Marlin, Robert P., 2011. "The impact of Immigration and Customs Enforcement on immigrant health: Perceptions of immigrants in Everett, Massachusetts, USA," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 73(4), pages 586-594, August.
    6. Julie Phillips & Douglas Massey, 1999. "The new labor market: Immigrants and wages after IRCA," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 36(2), pages 233-246, May.
    7. Eschbach, K. & Ostir, G.V. & Patel, K.V. & Markides, K.S. & Goodwin, J.S., 2004. "Neighborhood context and mortality among older Mexican Americans: Is there a barrio advantage?," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 94(10), pages 1807-1812.
    8. Jasso, Guillermina & Massey, Douglas S. & Rosenzweig, Mark R. & Smith, James P., 2008. "From Illegal to Legal: Estimating Previous Illegal Experience among New Legal Immigrants to the United States," IZA Discussion Papers 3441, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Annie Ro & Jennifer Van Hook, 2021. "Comparing immigration status and health patterns between Latinos and Asians: Evidence from the Survey of Income and Program Participation," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(2), pages 1-15, February.
    2. Bárbara Badanta & María González-Cano Caballero & Elena Fernández-García & Rocío de Diego-Cordero & Giancarlo Lucchetti & Rafael-Jesús Fernández-Castillo & Sergio Barrientos-Trigo, 2020. "“Work Like a Chinese”: Aspirations, Patterns of Work, and Working Conditions of the Chinese Immigrant Community in Southern Spain," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(19), pages 1-15, September.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Nelly Elmallakh & Jackline Wahba, 2022. "Return migrants and the wage premium: does the legal status of migrants matter?," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 35(4), pages 1631-1685, October.
    2. Katharine M. Donato & Amanda R. Carrico & Blake Sisk & Bhumika Piya, 2016. "Different but the Same," The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, , vol. 666(1), pages 203-218, July.
    3. Douglas S. Massey & Jorge Durand & Karen A. Pren, 2016. "The Precarious Position of Latino Immigrants in the United States," The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, , vol. 666(1), pages 91-109, July.
    4. Jorge Durand & Douglas S. Massey & Karen A. Pren, 2016. "Double Disadvantage," The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, , vol. 666(1), pages 78-90, July.
    5. Asad, Asad L. & Clair, Matthew, 2018. "Racialized legal status as a social determinant of health," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 199(C), pages 19-28.
    6. Ruhnke, Simon A. & Reynolds, Megan M. & Wilson, Fernando A. & Stimpson, Jim P., 2022. "A healthy migrant effect? Estimating health outcomes of the undocumented immigrant population in the United States using machine learning," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 307(C).
    7. Claire E. Altman & Colleen M. Heflin & Chaegyung Jun & James D. Bachmeier, 2021. "Material Hardship Among Immigrants in the United States: Variation by Citizenship, Legal Status, and Origin in the 1996–2008 SIPP," Population Research and Policy Review, Springer;Southern Demographic Association (SDA), vol. 40(3), pages 363-399, June.
    8. Erin R. Hamilton & Caitlin Patler & Robin Savinar, 2022. "Immigrant Legal Status Disparities in Health Among First- and One-point-five-Generation Latinx Immigrants in California," Population Research and Policy Review, Springer;Southern Demographic Association (SDA), vol. 41(3), pages 1241-1260, June.
    9. Tse-Chuan Yang & Stephen A Matthews, 2015. "Death by Segregation: Does the Dimension of Racial Segregation Matter?," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(9), pages 1-26, September.
    10. Stoddard, Pamela & Handley, Margaret A. & Vargas Bustamante, Arturo & Schillinger, Dean, 2011. "The influence of indigenous status and community indigenous composition on obesity and diabetes among Mexican adults," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 73(11), pages 1635-1643.
    11. Adda, Jérôme & Pinotti, Paolo & Tura, Giulia, 2020. "There's More to Marriage than Love: The Effect of Legal Status and Cultural Distance on Intermarriages and Separations," CEPR Discussion Papers 14432, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    12. Terriquez, Veronica & Joseph, Tiffany D., 2016. "Ethnoracial inequality and insurance coverage among Latino young adults," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 168(C), pages 150-158.
    13. Sherrie A. Kossoudji & Deborah A. Cobb-Clark, 2002. "Coming out of the Shadows: Learning about Legal Status and Wages from the Legalized Population," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 20(3), pages 598-628, July.
    14. Amelie F. Constant & Olga Nottmeyer & Klaus F. Zimmermann, 2013. "The economics of circular migration," Chapters, in: Amelie F. Constant & Klaus F. Zimmermann (ed.), International Handbook on the Economics of Migration, chapter 3, pages 55-74, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    15. Joseph Persky & Daniel Felsenstein, 2008. "Multipliers, Markups, and Mobility Rents: In Defense of ‘Chain Models’ in Urban and Regional Analysis," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 40(12), pages 2933-2947, December.
    16. Richard C. Jones, 2021. "Has DACA promoted work over schooling and professional advancement for qualifying Mexican Dreamers?," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 102(6), pages 3007-3019, November.
    17. Chloe N. East & Annie L. Hines & Philip Luck & Hani Mansour & Andrea Velásquez, 2023. "The Labor Market Effects of Immigration Enforcement," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 41(4), pages 957-996.
    18. Gindling, T. H. & Poggio, Sara Z., 2010. "The Effect of Family Separation and Reunification on the Educational Success of Immigrant Children in the United States," IZA Discussion Papers 4887, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    19. Borjas, George J. & Cassidy, Hugh, 2019. "The wage penalty to undocumented immigration," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 61(C).
    20. S. M. Kanaiaupuni, "undated". "Child Well-Being and the Intergenerational Effects of Undocumented Immigrant Status," Institute for Research on Poverty Discussion Papers 1210-00, University of Wisconsin Institute for Research on Poverty.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:anname:v:666:y:2016:i:1:p:150-163. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.