Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

As income and wealth inequality grow in the United States, increasing shares of children are affected not only by living on the low end of the income/wealth divide, but also by a second disadvantage–their parents’ immigration status. An estimated 5.3 million children in the United States live with an unauthorized immigrant parent who lacks permission to live or work in the United States (Passel et al. 2014). Emerging evidence shows having unauthorized immigrant parents affects children’s cognitive development (Yoshikawa 2011), mental health (Dreby 2012; Potochnick and Perreira 2010), and educational attainment (Bean et al. 2011). The severity of the issue led to President Obama’s November 2014 announcement of a plan (currently before the Supreme Court) to offer temporary relief from deportation and work authorization to an estimated 4 million parents of US citizen or lawful permanent resident children (The New York Times 2014).

The effects of growing up with undocumented parents are likely not the same across the United States. While the federal government has debated reforms to federal immigrant law over the past 15 years, state and local governments have sought to legislate immigration within their jurisdictions, creating varying immigration policy contexts state by state. Our study tests the effects of state immigration policy contexts on the intergenerational transmission of disadvantage in immigrant families. Specifically, we examine the relationship between state policies toward immigrants and levels of material hardship in immigrant families, using difference-in-difference techniques. And we explore some potential factors—uptake of public benefits, receipt of private benefits, and wages—that may mediate between higher enforcement and higher family material hardship. 

We are currently finalizing a comprehensive database of state-level policies toward immigrants over the past 15 years, including levels of emphasis on immigration enforcement and deportations, laws governing access to driver’s licenses and in-state tuition for those without legal status, and public benefit policies toward immigrants. This database will be publicly available online by November 2016. 

We next merge this database onto data from the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) and examine the relationship between state policy contexts and immigrant families’ material hardship. Specifically, we will answer the following questions:

1. How do levels of material hardship in low-income immigrant families compare to levels of material hardship in low-income US native families? How does material hardship vary among unauthorized immigrant, new legal immigrant, and long-term legal immigrant families?

2. How do levels of material hardship in immigrant families vary based on state policies toward immigrants?

3. Do state policies affect expected mediators between state immigration policy and immigrant family material hardship, such as uptake of public benefits, receipt of private assistance, and wages?

This study will provide valuable information to those involved in policymaking at the state level by providing clear information on how state policies toward immigrants have affected the well-being of immigrant families.