Columbia International Affairs Online: Working Papers

CIAO DATE: 05/2015

Securing the border: Defining the current population living in the shadows and addressing future flows

Madeline Zavodny

March 2015

American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research

Abstract

Chairman Johnson, Senator Carper, and Members of the Committee, thank you for inviting me to appear here today to discuss unauthorized immigration to the United States and guest worker programs. In the testimony that follows, I will first discuss why people become unauthorized immigrants. I will then discuss what we know about unauthorized immigrants in the U.S. labor market. At the end, I will discuss how future guest worker programs can affect immigration flows and the U.S. economy.