A report out last month said remittances from workers in the United States to families back in Mexico are down. In fact, Mexico has fallen from third to fourth place in remittance income behind China, India and now the Philippines.
The study, by BBVA Research, suggests that when immigration employment is low and the exchange rate from dollars to pesos is unfavorable, the remittance income also drops.
After the recent economic crisis in the U.S. fewer people came north for work. As the economy recovers more people are returning, but there’s a demand for highly skilled workers.
In 1995 Mexican laborers in the U.S. had no more than 12 years of school. That number has only changed by a few percentage points since then.
The Mexican Migration Outlook speculates in this new chapter of immigration, fewer people from Mexico will cross the border — with or without documents — and more highly skilled Mexican immigrants will move to the U.S. Immigration reform encourages that scenario.
The report also explored whether there could be fewer people without legal documents in the U.S. than estimated. We’ve heard the number 11 milliona lot. While the Department of Homeland Security calculates that, of the 11.5 million people in the country illegally in 2011, 6.8 million or 59 percent are from Mexico.
But this number does not take into account the estimated number of naturalized U.S. citizens born in Mexico, Green Card holders, temporary workers, students, teachers and diplomats. When you subtract all those people, the total number of Mexican migrants is closer to to 5.4 million, or 47 percent of the total number of people in this country without proper identification.
With those calculations, the total number of people in the U.S. without proper documentation would be closer to 10 million. If immigration reform goes through, better numbers will be obtainable and paint a more clear immigration picture.
