Skills

Foreign-born workers increasingly can be found in occupations across the skills spectrum in many countries—high-, middle-, and low-skilled. While much of the focus in advanced economies is on immigrants in high- and low-skilled professions, an increasing share are working in middle-skilled jobs. The research here examines immigrant workers by skill levels—which sectors they are working in, what share of the workforce they constitute, and how they fare compared to their native-born peers.

Recent Activity

Reports April 2024 How Immigrants and Their U.S.-Born Children Fit into the Future U.S. Labor Market By Jeanne Batalova, Julia Gelatt and Michael Fix	Articles April 19, 2024 Bangladesh’s Economic Vitality Owes in Part to Migration and Remittances By Khandaker Mursheda Farhana and Kazi Abdul Mannan
Articles April 3, 2024 Brain Drain and Brain Gain in Hong Kong’s Population Shuffle By Yiran Yu	Reports March 2024 Diverging Paths: The Impacts of COVID-19 on Migration in the Middle East and North Africa By Samuel Davidoff-Gore
Policy Briefs February 2024 A New Way Forward for Employment-Based Immigration: The Bridge Visa By Julia Gelatt and Muzaffar Chishti	Articles January 26, 2024 Aging Societies Rely on Immigrant Health-Care Workers, Posing Challenges for Origin Countries By Heidi Bludau
Reports October 2023 Un camino sinuoso hacia la integración: Regularización de migrantes venezolanos y perspectivas del mercado laboral By Diego Chaves-González and Natalia Delgado	Reports October 2023 A Winding Path to Integration: Venezuelan Migrants’ Regularization and Labor Market Prospects By Diego Chaves-González and Natalia Delgado

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Reports April 2024 How Immigrants and Their U.S.-Born Children Fit into the Future U.S. Labor Market By Jeanne Batalova, Julia Gelatt and Michael Fix	Reports March 2024 Diverging Paths: The Impacts of COVID-19 on Migration in the Middle East and North Africa By Samuel Davidoff-Gore
Policy Briefs February 2024 A New Way Forward for Employment-Based Immigration: The Bridge Visa By Julia Gelatt and Muzaffar Chishti	Reports October 2023 Un camino sinuoso hacia la integración: Regularización de migrantes venezolanos y perspectivas del mercado laboral By Diego Chaves-González and Natalia Delgado
Reports October 2023 A Winding Path to Integration: Venezuelan Migrants’ Regularization and Labor Market Prospects By Diego Chaves-González and Natalia Delgado	Reports May 2023 Displaced Ukrainians in European Labor Markets: Leveraging Innovations for More Inclusive Integration By Maria Vincenza Desiderio and Kate Hooper
Policy Briefs April 2023 What Role Can Immigration Play in Addressing Current and Future Labor Shortages? By Kate Hooper	Reports March 2023 Migration, Integration, and Diaspora Engagement in the Caribbean: A Policy Review By Valerie Lacarte, Jordi Amaral, Diego Chaves-González, Ana María Sáiz and Jeremy Harris

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A returned migrant with his family in Bangladesh

Profile

April 19, 2024

Bangladesh’s Economic Vitality Owes in Part to Migration and Remittances

For a young country, Bangladesh has a complex migration history, with periods of forced migration during the partition of India and Pakistan as well as the 1971 war of independence. In recent years, labor emigration has proved a major economic boon to the country. This country profile reviews trends and the impact of emigration, with a particular focus on the effects of remittance sending and receipt.

People walk through the streets of Hong Kong

Feature

April 3, 2024

Brain Drain and Brain Gain in Hong Kong’s Population Shuffle

Hong Kong finds itself in the middle of opposing trends. Amid political unrest, Beijing's increasing security pressure, and pandemic disruptions, many Hong Kongers have left and been replaced by a new group of immigrants, largely from mainland China. The dynamic has raised questions whether Hong Kong will remain a global cosmopolitan hub or instead turn inward to Asia, as this article discusses.

Feature

January 26, 2024

Aging Societies Rely on Immigrant Health-Care Workers, Posing Challenges for Origin Countries

Countries such as the United States, the United Kingdom, and Germany are increasingly relying on immigrant health-care workers to fill gaps in their workforce and care for aging populations. That has created opportunities for many foreign-born doctors and nurses, but could harm their origin countries. This article examines the dynamics of global health-care worker migration, particularly in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

An intern examines a newborn baby in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit.

Spotlight

April 7, 2023

Immigrant Health-Care Workers in the United States

Nearly 2.8 million immigrants worked in the U.S. health-care sector in 2021, representing disproportionately high shares of physicians, surgeons, and home health aides. This article offers a demographic and socioeconomic profile of foreign-born workers in health care.

Feature

March 21, 2023

Can Czechia Capitalize on High-Skilled Immigration amid Influx of Ukrainians?

High-skilled immigration represents a potential major benefit to Czechia, which has undergone rapid economic growth since the transition from communism. The arrival of hundreds of thousands of new Ukrainians, many of whom are well educated, marks a moment for the country to re-evaluate its integration policies, as this article details.

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Video, Audio

April 11, 2023

Meeting Global Skills and Talent Needs in Changing Labor Markets

Marking the launch of MPI’s Global Skills and Talent Initiative, this webcast features senior policymakers and other experts discussing the extent to which labor market needs should shape future immigration policy decisions, and how countries are adjusting—and could adjust—their immigration systems to meet human capital and competitiveness needs.

Emergency department. Centre Hospitalier de la Région d'Annecy (CHRA)

Video

April 28, 2022

How Can Europe Address Its Labor Market Needs at a Time of Upheaval?

Held immediately after the European Union unveiled its skills and talent package, this MPI Europe webinar explores how Europe can address its labor market needs at a time of great upheaval, and the role that immigration and immigrant integration policy can play in helping propel Europe’s economic recovery.

Help Wanted sign offers employment in a restaurant in Bethesda, Maryland

Video, Audio

April 20, 2022

With Millions of Unfilled U.S. Jobs, What Role Is There for Immigration?

Experts on this webinar examined the scope and reality of skills shortages and the role of immigrants in the U.S. labor market, ways to address the underemployment of highly skilled immigrants, and how immigrants and immigration policy can be used to fulfil needs in the education sector, STEM occupations, and other skills needs.

Expert Q&A, Audio

November 12, 2021

Leveraging the Benefits That Immigration Can Bring

In this World of Migration podcast episode, MPI Senior Fellow Michael Fix speaks with Senior Policy Analyst Julia Gelatt about the fiscal impacts of immigration, the importance of immigrant integration, how a greater focus on credential recognition could allow immigrants to more fully utilize the academic and professional skills they bring with them, and much more.

Audio

June 24, 2021

Brain Waste among Highly Skilled Immigrants in the United States: A Persistent Problem with Increasing Costs

During this webcast, experts discuss findings from a report examining at U.S. and state levels the underemployment of college graduates by nativity and by race and ethnicity, in the process revealing patterns of economic inequality.

Recent Activity

Policy Briefs

February 2023

Unblocking the U.S. Immigration System: Executive Actions to Facilitate the Migration of Needed Workers

Inefficiencies in the U.S. immigration system and case backlogs are preventing individuals eligible for immigration to the United States from filling some of the millions of job vacancies. This policy brief outlines executive actions that could facilitate the migration of needed workers, retain immigrants already in the U.S. workforce, and ease challenges experienced by U.S. employers and their foreign-born workers.

Fact Sheets

December 2022

The Skills and Economic Outcomes of Immigrant and U.S.-Born College Graduates

College-educated immigrants are more likely to have advanced degrees than their U.S.-born peers with college degrees. But their educational levels have not always translated into similar occupational gains: They are more likely to be overeducated for their positions. Drawing on PIAAC data, this fact sheet sketches educational characteristics, monthly earnings, skill underutilization, and job quality for immigrant and U.S.-born college graduates alike.

Commentaries

November 2022

Apprenticeship Programs Are a Promising Solution to Bring More Multilingual Workers into Early Childhood Field

Shortages of workers continue to plague early childhood education and care (ECEC) systems across the United States. With the field already struggling to effectively serve young children in families that speak languages other than English, apprenticeship programs offer a promising solution to bring more—and more multilingual—workers into early childhood careers.

Articles

November 2, 2022

Living in Limbo: Displaced Ukrainians in Poland

Poland hosts millions of Ukrainians who fled Russia’s invasion. While the new arrivals have tended to have been greeted warmly, many have questions about the future. As the months pass, many displaced Ukrainians wonder when and if they will return to their native country. This article, based on interviews with dozens of displaced Ukrainians in Poland, examines their experiences.

Policy Briefs

October 2022

Diverging Pathways: Immigrants’ Legal Status and Access to Postsecondary Credentials

As the United States seeks to adapt to trends such as technological change and aging that are reshaping the labor market, increasing productivity and the number of high-skilled workers will be critical. This issue brief explores the characteristics of the 115 million adults without postsecondary credentials, 21 percent of them immigrant, as well as the prospects for credential acquisition for foreign-born subgroups.

Commentaries

October 2022

Why the European Labor Market Integration of Displaced Ukrainians Is Defying Expectations

People displaced from Ukraine are finding work more rapidly in European countries than prior refugee cohorts. But uncertainty over how long they will stay, combined with hurdles such as language barriers, has meant many are prioritizing any job over the right job. This commentary examines how policymakers could address this waste of skills as they seek to fill pressing labor needs and facilitate deeper integration of the new arrivals.

Reports

June 2022

The Future of Remote Work: Digital Nomads and the Implications for Immigration Systems

The number of people who work from home or another location other than a traditional office has been growing for decades, but the pandemic has accelerated this shift—with important implications for immigration policy. This report examines trends in remote work, challenges digital nomads and employers face when navigating immigration systems, and opportunities to adapt immigration policies to keep pace with changes in the world of work.

Reports

June 2022

COVID-19’s Effects on U.S. Immigration and Immigrant Communities, Two Years On

The COVID-19 pandemic and associated economic recession have affected the lives of all U.S. residents, but immigrants have been among the hardest hit, with evidence of disproportionately high rates of death as well as a particularly high spike in unemployment. This report takes a look back at how the COVID-19 crisis has affected U.S. immigration policies and levels and the country’s immigrant communities.

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