The Aggregate and Distributional Effects of Immigration Restrictions : Immigration Quotas and the Great Black Migration

Based on county-level aggregate data and linked individual census samples, I examine the labor market effect of the negative immigration shock caused by the US immigration quota system between 1920 and 1930 and identifies the causal impact of immigration restrictions on the Great Black Migration. I find that immigration restrictions did not affect average wages and lowered the wages of US-born whites and immigrants at the aggregate level. The analysis based on linked individual samples reveals substantial internal migration and distributional effect caused by the immigration shock: in-migrants to counties more affected by the shock had greater wage gains while non-movers suffered a sharper decline in wages. In particular, the negative immigration shock causally and substantially increased the migration of black southerners to northern counties. Black migrants who moved to more affected counties earned higher wages, and they were more likely to become literate and work in urban areas as low-skilled manufacturing workers