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Sociology Of Immigration Research Paper

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Migration is not a new phenomenon throughout the history of human, but the issue of migration has become more of a problem since the emerging of modern states. The distinction between immigrants and local citizens has become official with the emergence of nation-state authority and the ideas of sovereignty, citizenship and nationality. From the 19th century, the control of passport and visa has made the borders between immigrants and citizens even clearer and more identified. Today, as there are more restrictions on entering a country, states have to deal with regulating policies for immigration to control the influx of people
In a more liberal and democratic country, the immigration issue is greater with ‘unwanted migrations’. For example, …show more content…

Some of pioneers in this field are Hollifield, Freeman, and Kesstler. In their study of immigration in political economic perspective, Kessler and Freeman argue that immigration is more likely to increase the benefits for receiving economy and the local people rather than harming them (year). Even though the cheap labor of the immigrants may make wages decrease for some jobs that the they participate in, it increases the productivity of labor as a whole and it increases the benefits of the owners of business that choose to hire immigrants. Also usually the immigrants work in low-levels jobs that the locals don't want to do, so they help fulfil the shortage of low-skilled labor without increasing the competition for other jobs that the locals prefer. However, if the immigrants pay less tax (because of governmental support or because of illegal immigration) than the citizens, the tax payers would feel resentful and want to oppose immigration, and therefore would make it problematic for the government. Ideally, according to Kessler and Freeman (year), the interest of state when making policies for immigration is maximizing the economic revenue that the immigrants can bring in while minimizing their consumptions of public benefits. Most of the states are driven by economic incentives when they adjust

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