The Truth About Immigration

For almost a decade, immigration has been a primary issue in U.S. politics. Vehement opponents of increased immigration claim that immigrants steal jobs, lower wages, increase crime, and threaten the fabric of U.S. culture. Staunch proponents of immigration play to humanitarian concerns, asserting immigrants are victims who need our help. In his new book, The Truth About Immigration: Why Successful Societies Welcome Newcomers, Wharton’s Zeke Hernandez seeks to set the record straight by offering a sober analysis of the impacts that immigration has on the societies that welcome them. And for a scholar who focuses on strategic management and organizational behavior, Hernandez offers a surprisingly holistic analysis of the impact immigrants have on their host countries. Using an elegant one-two punch, he first addresses economic concerns related to increased immigration before delving into the social implications of an increased foreign presence and ending with short policy recommendations. His conclusion is simple: Societies that welcome newcomers thrive, while those who fail to recognize their potential contributions fall into entropy.

Hernandez begins by reviewing the economic effects of immigration, taking advantage of his technical expertise as a strategic management scholar. He focuses first on the positive impacts that immigrants, both skilled and unskilled, have on investment. Not only does he rely on typical academic empirical evidence to show that immigrants bring investment with them, but he also tracks the impressive rise of the restaurant chain Pollo Campero, founded in Guatemala, to make his case. Next, he delves into the deep literature on the contributions immigrants make to innovation and entrepreneurship, highlighting complementarities between immigrants and natives that make both more innovative and productive. Hernandez then turns his focus to public finance, outlining how educated immigrants contribute to public coffers, while those with little education typically consume fewer public resources than similar natives. Hernandez then revisits the complementarities between immigrants and natives by explaining that instead of competing for the same jobs as natives, immigrants amplify the work that natives do by focusing on manual labor while their native colleagues can home in on communication-intense tasks. Throughout this first section, Hernandez emphasizes that immigrants improve natives’ economic prospects because of differences between foreigners and natives. The author ends this section with an explanation of how our current immigration restrictions come at the cost of valuable talent with a very creative piece of evidence: The dearth in World Cup soccer appearances by the U.S. Men’s National Team coincided pointedly with severe immigration restrictions imposed between 1924 and 1965.

After a thorough review of the economic consequences of immigration for host countries, Hernandez turns to social issues. He starts by asking whether immigrants integrate and comes to two broad conclusions. First, he provides a variety of evidence suggesting that immigrants tend to integrate on their volition. Not only do immigrants integrate economically in that they have more intergenerational income mobility compared to natives, but they also integrate politically. Indeed, Hernandez rightly points out that immigrants do not decide on their destinations randomly but move to areas with average political views that align closely with their own. And immigrants integrate culturally by picking names for their children that are locally popular. After outlining the myriad ways immigrants integrate into their host societies, Hernandez provides some words of warning: Namely, if host societies attempt to force integration, immigrants tend to double down. Again, Hernandez uses creative and convincing evidence by pointing out that Germans who lived in states that banned German in schools were more likely to keep speaking German, and Italians who grew up in neighborhoods with more Catholic churches were more likely to marry non-Italians.

Hernandez then turns to crime concerns, highlighting the fact that immigrants, both authorized and unauthorized, commit far less crime than natives. He ends this section by making the compelling, and unique, case that restricting immigration is harmful to national security by reminding the reader that the United States can “weaken its geopolitical rivals by poaching their best and brightest people” (p. 183).

Hernandez wraps up with three broad topics. First, he explains why people react harshly to newcomers by differentiating between task conflict, productive conflict that arises from differences in people’s abilities and comparative advantages, and relational conflict, counterproductive conflict that results from differences in identities. He complements this section of the book by explaining the history behind anti-immigrant movements and ways relational conflict between immigrants and natives can be minimized. Hernandez emphasizes the importance of accurate information about immigrants and exposure to immigrants; evidence suggests both tend to improve natives’ attitudes about immigrants. Second, the author provides a more focused analysis of unauthorized immigration and concludes these immigrants also provide a variety of benefits to their host societies, even though their undocumented status stifles their potential contributions. And, of course, Hernandez ends his book by offering policy proposals based on yet another unique analogy: speeding. By comparing speeding with unauthorized immigration, Hernandez evokes the 85th percentile rule, which states that speed limits should not be under the average speed at which 85 percent of drivers travel. He argues that a rule like the 85th percentile rule should be used when deciding how many immigrants to allow into the United States; in other words, he argues officials should defer to market conditions when deciding on the intricacies of immigration quotas.

There is a lot to like about this book. The evidence consists of cutting-edge academic research, but the material is incredibly digestible. Despite outlining research that uses advanced empirical techniques, Hernandez explains the natural experiments and intuition behind these statistics in a way that makes this book appropriate for a light dinner conversation. An undergrad or high school student could easily understand each argument Hernandez outlines, and it is clear he is speaking to the layperson. The accessibility of this text is sure to increase its impact, and the lack of pretentiousness in Hernandez’s writing is refreshing. He’s not trying to speak to academics in an echo chamber; he’s very obviously speaking to the median voter, an art most academics abandoned long ago.

Further, Hernandez adds a cathartic personal touch to his writing without introducing bias. He speaks directly to his experiences as an immigrant as well as his experiences with other immigrants and newcomers. This personal touch, combined with rigorous empirics and theoretical arguments, introduces reality and relevance that few other books written by academics possess.

Of course, no book is without its flaws. At some points in the text, Hernandez dismisses valid empirical and theoretical arguments. Nowhere is this more obvious than when he describes theories that explain immigrant entrepreneurship by relying on selection effects—based on the idea that immigrants are more entrepreneurial because immigration is an entrepreneurial and risky act—before claiming “we have no evidence to back them up” (p. 60). We do have evidence to back these theories up (see, for example, Peter Vandor, 2021, “Are Voluntary International Migrants Self-Selected for Entrepreneurship? An Analysis of Entrepreneurial Personality Traits,” Journal of World Business 56, no. 2, 101142; and Stéphane Mahuteau, Matloob Piracha, Massimiliano Tani, and Matias Vaira Lucero, 2014, “Immigration Policy and Entrepreneurship,” International Migration 52, no. 2, 53–65). And I’m surprised Hernandez dismisses this theory, as he writes extensively about the differences between immigrants and natives being important in explaining immigrant entrepreneurship. It stands to reason that those who choose to immigrate and those who choose to stay are also different in ways that are important for entrepreneurial propensities.

Hernandez also plays fast and loose with some policy recommendations. He very rightly points out that immigration restrictions in the United States amount to socialist central planning, then proceeds to recommend we simply shift immigration responsibilities from one centralized authority, the Department of Homeland Security, to another centralized authority, the Department of Labor. And though he offers excellent core policy recommendations, namely relaxing immigration quotas and allowing more legal pathways into the United States, I fear he will lose some of his readers as he writes about bypassing Congress to allow bureaucrats ultimate authority when it comes to immigration law.

Those criticisms are mild, however. This book is a must-read for anyone interested in immigration, whether they are just being introduced to the topic or a seasoned expert. Hernandez’s arguments are unique, yet persuasive. He writes in simple terms without inadequately explaining theory or empirics. And he focuses on the impacts that immigration has on natives, a focus that is sure to resonate with readers who have different opinions from his. If you aren’t convinced that newcomers help the societies that welcome them before picking up this book, you are sure to at least rethink your position after a careful read.