“Differences in Social Transfer Support and Poverty for Immigrant

Families with Children: Lessons from the LIS”

 

Timothy Smeeding, Coady Wing, Karen Robson

for

Bellagio Meeting on Immigrant Children

Introduction

LIS offers the possibility to compare ‘immigrants’ and ‘minorities’ to majorities in several nations for at least one time period (circa 2000) .

How much help do less advantaged groups get from social tax-benefit programs and from their own market incomes in rich nations ?

Working hypothesis:

The country where ‘immigrants’ (minorities) live is more important than their legal (majority-minority/immigrant) status in determining net social benefits (cash and near cash) and poverty status.

If supported, then countries can make a difference for immigrant child well being –at least in income support

Research Questions • Migrants come to countries for work, but if

something goes wrong, what do countries look like in terms of overall poverty and program effects on minority and immigrant groups—how do they fare ?

• How big are differences across groups within nations as compared to across nations?

• Unanswered: how about education and healthcare?

Methods

• Relative poverty at 50 percent median

• Market Income (MI) vs. Disposable Income (DPI)

• Net social benefits (cash and near-cash transfers in minus direct taxes paid)

• No count health or education benefits

• Define ‘immigrant’ and-or ‘minority’

Meaning of ‘Minority’ or ‘Immigrant’ in LIS data

• US, France, Canada : ‘Born outside country’• Germany, Sweden: ‘‘Non-national”• Australia: ‘Not Australian’• UK: ‘Non-white or minority ‘(with many

categories of ethnicity) • Belgium, Spain, Ireland, Austria, Belgium,

Greece, Portugal, Italy : ‘Multiple nationality’ • Finland: ‘Swedish speaking’ (HA!)

Idiosyncrasies • EU-ECHP (old and bad for this purpose )

vs. EU-SILC (birth, nationality,--but not here yet)

• Native American blacks not counted as minority in this go around

• Naturalized vs. not (data question in only surveys )

• Documented vs. not (sampling question and response rate question )

• Our decision: press on but be careful

Literature : Sparse

• Lots out there on earnings and second vs. first generation minorities

• Lots on labor market effects of immigrants

• Lots on ‘rhetoric’ of pull back of welfare state benefits in face of immigration

• BUT not much hard evidence on how cash welfare state reacts to immigrants in across country context

Results: How About Poverty and Program Effects for ‘Immigrant’ vs. ‘Majority’?

• Minority -Majority Poverty Rates (Table 2)

• Overall System Effects: Majority Kids (Figure 4a)vs.Minority Kids (Figure4b)

• Majority vs. Minority Poverty Reduction for all Households with Kids : Last Figure

Country Majority Minority Majority MinorityUnited States 15.9 30.3 19.9 40.3United States* 15.8 24.7 19.8 33.0Canada 14.4 10.8 13.7 21.7Australia 12.2 15.0 13.3 19.7Germany 7.6 16.0 8.0 14.5Sweden 6.1 14.2 3.6 13.6Ireland (e) 16.2 18.9 12.5 27.4Belgium 7.4 11.8 6.6 5.2Austria 7.8 7.2 7.9 6.1Finland 5.4 4.2 2.8 3.5Spain 14.0 35.0 15.7 59.1Greece 14.3 11.5 12.6 15.3England 11.7 22.2 15.6 28.8France 6.3 14.8 6.1 18.5Portugal (e) 12.8 13.1 12.8 12.5Italy 11.0 3.2 14.8 6.4Country Avg 11.2 15.8 11.6 20.4

Table 2: Household and child poverty by minority status across countriesHousehold poverty Child poverty

Countries marked with (e) use data from the echp outside of LIS .*Naturalized foreign-born heads are classified as minorities

United States

Canada

Australia

Germany

Sweden

Ireland (e)

Belgium

Austria

Finland

Spain

Greece

England

France

Portugal (e)

Italy (e)

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

Imm

igra

nt

Ch

ildre

n

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100

Majority ChildrenCountries in red use the echp

Percent Reduction in Child Poverty: Immigrants vs. Majorities

Results So Far

Majority minority poverty rates and welfare state treatment differ by nation, but biggest differences are across nations and not within nations

USA looks bad in most all comparisons, especially compared to Canada and Australia, but mainly because of weak welfare state- not because they mistreat immigrants in particular

What is left to do? LOTS• Support for hypothesis that destination

country more important than minority-immigrant status in determining poverty status –will it hold up?

• Definitions of immigrant inconsistent and needing more exploration

• More work needed here: EU-SILC; age of kids , parental mix, etc

• Really need comparable assessments for education and health care systems

What to Lobby For

•ALL ADULTS: Were you born in this country (Y or N) ?

If no, when did you migrate ?

•ALL CHILDREN : Were your children born in this country (Y or N)?

If no, where were they born and when did they come?