Immigrant Displacement Of American Workers Intensifies—And A New Immigration Surge Is Underway

Most economists expected job creation to slow a bit in March, but few expected such a steep drop: the economy created just 126,000 jobs last month, the smallest gain since the end of 2013. Still worse, reported job gains for the first three months of the year were revised downward by a combined 69,000. There’s now debate over whether the drop is just a temporary setback, due harsh winter weather, a now-ended port strike and other temporary factors—or whether a broader economic slowdown, or even a mild recession, is underway. As usual, the immigration dimension is ignored. But the “other” employment survey—of households rather than businesses—and suggests the recession scenario is already in play, at least for native-born Americans.

March marked the second consecutive month in which native-born Americans lost jobs while foreign-born workers gained them:

• Total employment rose by a mere 34,000—statistically unchanged
• Native-born American employment fell by 81,000—down by 0.1%
• Foreign-born employment rose by 115,000 – up by 0.5%

Over the past two months native-born American employment has declined by a total of 96,000 positions—a 0.1% decline. Foreign-born employment rose by 226,000—a 0.9% gain.

The falling national unemployment rate—it remained at a post-recession low of 5.5% in March—has obscured the skewed nature of employment gains. Thus blacks, arguably the group most at risk of being displaced by unskilled immigrants, have not fared well...