TY  - RPRT
        AU  - Chiswick, Barry R.
AU  - Lee, Yew Liang
AU  - Miller, Paul W.
        TI  - Immigrants' Language Skills and Visa Category
        PY  - 2002/Apr/
        PB  - Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
        CY  - Bonn
        T2  - IZA Discussion Paper
        IS  - 471
        UR  - https://www.iza.org/publications/dp471
        AB  - This paper is concerned with the determinants of English language proficiency among
immigrants in a longitudinal survey for Australia. It focuses on both visa category and
variables derived from an economic model of the determinants of destination language
proficiency among immigrants.
Skills tested and economic immigrants have the greatest proficiency shortly after immigration,
followed by family-based visa recipients, with refugees having the lowest proficiency. These
differences disappear by 3 ½ years after immigration for speaking skills, but they persist for
reading and writing skills. The variables generated from the model of destination language
proficiency are in part predictions of visa category and are more important statistically for
explaining proficiency. The effects of some variables on language skills increase with
duration in these longitudinal data. In particular, the efficiency variable, age, and gender,
which may be reflecting differences in labor market attachment, increase in importance over
time.
        KW  - immigration
KW  - language proficiency
KW  - visa categories
KW  - Australia
        ER  -