Mexican migration to U.S. has decreased by more than half, according to new research

By Jesus Chavez
Public Affairs Specialist

(July 22, 2015) -- Mexican migration to the U.S. is at an unprecedented low, according to new research by Rogelio Sáenz, dean of the UTSA College of Public Policy and Peter T. Flawn Professor of Demography. Additionally, Sáenz’s research shows that the socioeconomic status of today’s Mexican migrants is higher than that of past Mexican migrants.

In collaboration with the University of New Hampshire’s (UNH) Carsey School of Public Policy, Sáenz used data from the 2008 and 2013 American Community Survey (ACS) Five-Year Estimates Public Use Files to examine trends among Mexican migration to the U.S. He found that the volume of migrants in the country dropped from 1.9 million from 2003 to 2007 to 819,000 from 2008 to 2012 – 57 percent – across all U.S. states.

Additionally, Sáenz wrote that Texas has superseded California as the primary entry-point for Mexican migrants into the country. From 2008 to 2012, Texas saw 220,522 Mexican migrants pass through its borders; California recorded 206,075. Both numbers are significantly down from estimates between 2003 and 2007 when California saw the arrival of 532,851 migrants and Texas saw 362,882.

“The United States has had a steady and strong flow of immigration from Mexico for much of the 20th and early 21st century,” said Sáenz. “Between 2008 and 2012, the U.S. economic collapse led to a 71 percent loss of jobs in labor-intensive industries such as construction, which relied heavily on a Mexican immigrant labor force, and migrant workers in these industries were among the first to be fired and displaced with the economic downturn.”

Filling the vacuum left in the wake of this decline is a new kind of Mexican migrant majority. By comparing the data recorded about the migrant newcomers migrating between two five-year periods (2003-2007 and 2008-2012), Sáenz noticed that socioeconomically, the migrant population that did come to the U.S during that time tended to be socioeconomically better off than their predecessors in many key ways; they were also more likely to be women than in the past, although men still predominate among Mexican immigrants.

“The migrant population that arrived into the United States between 2008 and 2012 tended to have higher socioeconomic status and were relatively more removed from the workforce than earlier populations,” said Sáenz. “In fact, these migrants were more likely to already be naturalized U.S. citizens, English-speaking, better educated, older, and, interestingly, included a higher concentration of female immigrants than in the past.”

Sáenz posits that many wealthy Mexican migrants – especially those who are naturalized citizens or have chosen to secure investment visas through such programs as the EB-5 program – migrated to the U.S. during this period in an effort to escape the high level of violence during that time in Mexico.

What do these shifts mean for Mexican migration into the U.S. and future immigration reform? According to Sáenz, it’s too early to tell, but, in the wake of recent controversies surrounding immigration and Mexican migration, these are questions that must be posed at the policy level soon.

“Immigration reform continues to go unaddressed in the United States,” wrote Sáenz. “It’s still not clear whether the more favorable socioeconomic standing of the most recent cohort will persist, and, if it does, whether it will change the way Mexican migrants are viewed in the United States.”

“A Transformation in Mexican Migration to the United States” was prepared for and published by the University of New Hampshire’s Carsey School of Public Policy, where Sáenz is a policy fellow.

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