IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/pubcho/v160y2014i1p131-153.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Politics, unemployment, and the enforcement of immigration law

Author

Listed:
  • Michael Makowsky
  • Thomas Stratmann

Abstract

Immigration control-related audits and their resulting sanctions are not solely determined by impartial enforcement of laws and regulations. They are also determined by the incentives faced by vote-maximizing politicians, agents acting on their behalf, and workers likely to compete with immigrants in the local labor market. In this paper, we use a unique data set to test the extent to which congressional oversight determines the bureaucratic immigration enforcement process. We examine the decisions made at each stage of enforcement from over 40,000 audits from 1990 to 2000. This includes analysis of (1) whether a firm is found in violation, (2) whether a fine is issued, (3) the size of the fine issued, and (4) how much of a dollar reduction fined employers were able to negotiate. We find that the number of audits conducted increases with local unemployment. We also find that a congressman’s party affiliation and its interaction with committee membership and party majority status, as well as firm size and local union membership, correlate to decisions made at every stage of enforcement. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media New York 2014

Suggested Citation

  • Michael Makowsky & Thomas Stratmann, 2014. "Politics, unemployment, and the enforcement of immigration law," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 160(1), pages 131-153, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:pubcho:v:160:y:2014:i:1:p:131-153
    DOI: 10.1007/s11127-014-0174-2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s11127-014-0174-2
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11127-014-0174-2?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
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gordon H. Hanson & Antonio Spilimbergo, 2001. "Political economy, sectoral shocks, and border enforcement," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 34(3), pages 612-638, August.
    2. George J. Borjas, 2021. "The Economic Benefits from Immigration," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Foundational Essays in Immigration Economics, chapter 13, pages 411-430, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    3. Michael D. Makowsky & Thomas Stratmann, 2011. "More Tickets, Fewer Accidents: How Cash-Strapped Towns Make for Safer Roads," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 54(4), pages 863-888.
    4. Anna Maria Mayda, 2006. "Who Is Against Immigration? A Cross-Country Investigation of Individual Attitudes toward Immigrants," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 88(3), pages 510-530, August.
    5. Michael D. Makowsky & Thomas Stratmann, 2009. "Political Economy at Any Speed: What Determines Traffic Citations?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(1), pages 509-527, March.
    6. Bawn, Kathleen, 1995. "Political Control Versus Expertise: Congressional Choices about Administrative Procedures," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 89(1), pages 62-73, March.
    7. Gordon H. Hanson, 2006. "Illegal Migration from Mexico to the United States," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 44(4), pages 869-924, December.
    8. Facchini, Giovanni & Steinhardt, Max Friedrich, 2011. "What drives U.S. immigration policy? Evidence from congressional roll call votes," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(7), pages 734-743.
    9. Bryan Caplan, 2002. "Systematically Biased Beliefs About Economics: Robust Evidence of Judgemental Anomalies from the Survey of Americans and Economists on the Economy," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 112(479), pages 433-458, April.
    10. Hill, John K & Pearce, James E, 1990. "The Incidence of Sanctions against Employers of Illegal Aliens," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 98(1), pages 28-44, February.
    11. Card, David, 2001. "Immigrant Inflows, Native Outflows, and the Local Labor Market Impacts of Higher Immigration," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 19(1), pages 22-64, January.
    12. Winegarden, C R & Khor, Lay Boon, 1991. "Undocumented Immigration and Unemployment of U.S. Youth and Minority Workers: Econometric Evidence," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 73(1), pages 105-112, February.
    13. Patrick Puhani, 2000. "The Heckman Correction for Sample Selection and Its Critique," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 14(1), pages 53-68, February.
    14. Marilyn Young & Michael Reksulak & William F. Shughart, 2001. "The Political Economy of the IRS," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 13(2), pages 201-220, July.
    15. Barro, Robert J, 1986. "Recent Developments in the Theory of Rules versus Discretion," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 96(380a), pages 23-37, Supplemen.
    16. Glenn Withers & David Pope, 1985. "Immigration and Unemployment," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 61(2), pages 554-564, June.
    17. McCubbins, Mathew D & Noll, Roger G & Weingast, Barry R, 1987. "Administrative Procedures as Instruments of Political Control," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 3(2), pages 243-277, Fall.
    18. Robert Gibbons & John Roberts, 2012. "The Handbook of Organizational Economics," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 9889.
    19. Terry M. Moe, 2012. "Delegation, Control, and the Study of Public Bureaucracy [The Handbook of Organizational Economics]," Introductory Chapters,, Princeton University Press.
    20. Benjamin Powell, 2012. "Coyote ugly: the deadweight cost of rent seeking for immigration policy," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 150(1), pages 195-208, January.
    21. Weingast, Barry R & Moran, Mark J, 1983. "Bureaucratic Discretion or Congressional Control? Regulatory Policymaking by the Federal Trade Commission," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 91(5), pages 765-800, October.
    22. Makowsky, Michael & Sanders, Shane, 2013. "Political costs and fiscal benefits: The political economy of residential property value assessment under Proposition 212," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 120(3), pages 359-363.
    23. repec:bla:ecorec:v:61:y:1985:i:173:p:554-63 is not listed on IDEAS
    24. Juergen Jung & Michael Makowsky, 2014. "The determinants of federal and state enforcement of workplace safety regulations: OSHA inspections 1990–2010," Journal of Regulatory Economics, Springer, vol. 45(1), pages 1-33, February.
    25. Ferejohn, John & Shipan, Charles, 1990. "Congressional Influence on Bureaucracy," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 6(0), pages 1-20.
    26. Liesbet Okkerse, 2008. "How To Measure Labour Market Effects Of Immigration: A Review," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(1), pages 1-30, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Noel Gaston & Douglas R. Nelson, 2013. "Bridging Trade Theory And Labour Econometrics: The Effects Of International Migration," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(1), pages 98-139, February.
    2. Juergen Jung & Michael D. Makowsky, 2012. "Regulatory Enforcement, Politics, and Institutional Distance: OSHA Inspections 1990-2010," Working Papers 2012-02, Towson University, Department of Economics, revised Apr 2013.
    3. Adam R. Fremeth & Guy L. F. Holburn & Richard G. Vanden Bergh, 2016. "Corporate Political Strategy in Contested Regulatory Environments," Strategy Science, INFORMS, vol. 1(4), pages 272-284, December.
    4. Facchini, Giovanni & Testa, Cecilia, 2021. "The rhetoric of closed borders: Quotas, lax enforcement and illegal immigration," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 129(C).
    5. Boubtane, Ekrame & Coulibaly, Dramane & Rault, Christophe, 2013. "Immigration, unemployment and GDP in the host country: Bootstrap panel Granger causality analysis on OECD countries," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 261-269.
    6. Giovanni Facchini & Anna Maria Mayda, 2006. "Individual Attitudes towards Immigrants: Welfare-State Determinants across Countries," CESifo Working Paper Series 1768, CESifo.
    7. Ian R Turner, 2017. "Working smart and hard? Agency effort, judicial review, and policy precision," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 29(1), pages 69-96, January.
    8. Liesbet Okkerse, 2008. "How To Measure Labour Market Effects Of Immigration: A Review," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(1), pages 1-30, February.
    9. Juergen Jung & Michael Makowsky, 2014. "The determinants of federal and state enforcement of workplace safety regulations: OSHA inspections 1990–2010," Journal of Regulatory Economics, Springer, vol. 45(1), pages 1-33, February.
    10. Gianmarco I. P. Ottaviano & Giovanni Peri, 2021. "Rethinking The Effect Of Immigration On Wages," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Firms and Workers in a Globalized World Larger Markets, Tougher Competition, chapter 9, pages 245-290, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    11. Paola Conconi & Giovanni Facchini & Max F. Steinhardt & Maurizio Zanardi, 2020. "The political economy of trade and migration: Evidence from the U.S. Congress," Economics and Politics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 32(2), pages 250-278, July.
    12. Steinhardt Max Friedrich, 2011. "The Wage Impact of Immigration in Germany - New Evidence for Skill Groups and Occupations," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 11(1), pages 1-35, June.
    13. Mayr, Karin & Minter, Steffen & Krieger, Tim, 2012. "Policies on illegal immigration in a federation," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(1-2), pages 153-165.
    14. Thomas Braendle & Alois Stutzer, 2013. "Political selection of public servants and parliamentary oversight," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 14(1), pages 45-76, February.
    15. Giovanni Facchini & Anna Maria Mayda, 2008. "From individual attitudes towards migrants to migration policy outcomes: Theory and evidence [‘Immigration policy, assimilation of immigrants and natives’ sentiments towards immigrants: Evidence fr," Economic Policy, CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po;CES;MSH, vol. 23(56), pages 652-713.
    16. Giovanni Facchini & Tommaso Frattini & Cora Signorotto, 2013. "Mind What Your Voters Read: Media Exposure and International Economic Policy Making," Development Working Papers 358, Centro Studi Luca d'Agliano, University of Milano.
    17. Cyril Benoît, 2021. "Politicians, regulators, and regulatory governance: The neglected sides of the story," Regulation & Governance, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 15(S1), pages 8-22, November.
    18. Facchini, Giovanni & Mayda, Anna Maria & Mishra, Prachi, 2011. "Do interest groups affect US immigration policy?," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 85(1), pages 114-128, September.
    19. Anna Mayda, 2010. "International migration: a panel data analysis of the determinants of bilateral flows," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 23(4), pages 1249-1274, September.
    20. Gordon Hanson, 2010. "The Governance of Migration Policy," Journal of Human Development and Capabilities, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 11(2), pages 185-207.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Immigration; Regulation; Enforcement; Congressional oversight; J61; K31; K42;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J61 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Geographic Labor Mobility; Immigrant Workers
    • K31 - Law and Economics - - Other Substantive Areas of Law - - - Labor Law
    • K42 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior - - - Illegal Behavior and the Enforcement of Law

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:kap:pubcho:v:160:y:2014:i:1:p:131-153. 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    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.