October 2000

IZA DP No. 204: Labor Market Interactions Between Legal and Illegal Immigrants

published in: Review of Development Economics, 2003, 7 (1), 30-43

This paper looks at the situation of legal immigrants who employ illegal immigrants to provide them with various services. This enables the legal immigrants to allocate more time to other work, thereby increasing their earnings. Illegal immigrants employed by legal immigrants may specialize in certain professions and may themselves employ other illegal immigrants. An economy is evolving whose sole purpose is the provision of services by illegal immigrants for legal immigrants.