By Christine Park Listen to the entire Knowledge@ Wharton discussion (originally aired on SIRIUS XM Channel 132, Business Radio Powered by The Wharton School)

Yahoo Finance editor Adriana Belmonte reports on the effects of increasing immigration on the American workforce. Belmonte cites PWBM’s interview on Knowledge@Wharton Business Radio SiriusXM 132, along with a policy brief written by Georgetown University professor Harry Holzer and the U.S. Census data, to illustrate the effects of increasing immigration on the U.S. economy. She refers to PWBM to demonstrate that increased immigration can lead to a rise in GDP.

PWBM shows that recent immigrants are better educated than ever before. Since 2007, the share of immigrants with a college degree grew while the share without a high school degree fell (Figure 1). Among legal immigrants who arrived since 2014, half held a bachelor’s or advanced degree, compared to a third of native-born Americans. In addition, PWBM’s Immigration Policy Simulator suggests that increasing the flow of legal immigrants will have a positive impact on employment, GDP, and GDP per capita. The simulator also indicates that “the largest positive impact on employment would come from increasing the net flow of immigrants.”

Immigration is proving to be a key part of policy platforms for 2020 Presidential election candidates. You can use PWBM’s Interactive Immigration State Map to learn about immigration in your state.

Figure 1: Educational attainment of recent immigrants

Percent of immigrants aged 25 and older who arrived in the previous 5 years

Source: PWBM calculations based on Current Population Survey Annual Social and Economic Supplement, 1997-2017.