SOC 100

Prof. Davis

COMPUTER PROJECT 5: THE POLITICS OF IMMIGRATION

Due in class Thursday December 5th

There has been considerable political mobilization of late against immigrants, especially in states with large immigrant populations. Some of this anti-immigrant sentiment has been limited to illegal aliens, but in other cases, it has been more generalized hostility against immigrants. Assume that you have been hired to serve as the research team for a national commission on immigration and asked to prepare a report that addresses these issues:

1) the relative size of the immigrant population

2) the educational attainment of immigrants relative to native-born Americans

3) the proportion of immigrants in top white-collar professions compared to native- born Americans

4) poverty rates for immigrants versus native-born Americans

5) the proportion of immigrants living comfortably compared to the native-born

6) the effect of time in the U.S. on the position of immigrants (e.g., their ability to speak English, their economic standing)

7) geographic differences in immigration and immigration politics

8) the effect of immigration on racial/ethnic composition in the U.S.

9) the politics of immigration and race/ethnicity in the future

The commission is especially interested in whether immigrants are a drain on our society or a contribution to it and if it matters whether a short-term view or long-term view is taken in addressing this question. Sitting on the committee are the mayor of Los Angeles, the governors of California, Florida, and Vermont, and the Secretary of Labor of the Clinton Administration. As a research team, you need to address in your report the specific concerns that each would have as representative of their particular city, state, or nation (in the case of the Labor Secretary). In particular, they are wondering whether in the future immigration is likely to be an important issue for voters in their constituency and whether voter concern on this issue is likely to be divided along racial or ethnic lines. (Here you would need to look at the proportions of immigrants in each area, their racial/ethnic composition, and racial/ethnic projections for the future in these areas.)

Your report should contain a written text with tables, graphs, and/or pie charts that illustrate the findings you refer to in your text. Graphical or tabular displays of data should be clearly labelled so that committee members know what they are looking at. The report should contain some conclusions about the effects of immigration on American society in general and on the particular areas that the commission members are from. Type your report and include as an appendix the StudentChip tables that you used in preparing your report and visual displays of data.

The following StudentChip data files from the 1990 Census have information relevant to your task: EducImm9, EngAsn9, EngLat9, ImmUSA9, OcIm9-35, PopLA9, and PopProj9. The immigration variable (Imm) has four categories: FB80-90 (foreign born people who came to the US in the period 1980-90), FB70-79 (foreign born who arrived between 1970-79), FB<1970 (immigrants who arrived before 1970), and native (non-immigrants; people born in the US). It is up to you to decide how to categorize variables and present results. Your emphasize should be on providing the committee with as much relevant information as you can and presenting this information in a clear, visually appealing manner.