Latin American Migrations to the U.S. Heartland: Changing Social Landscapes in Middle America

Chapter 11. Latin American Migrations to the U.S. Heartland: Demographic and Economic Activity in Six Heartland States, 2000–2007

Chapter 11 Latin American Migrations to the U.S. Heartland Demographic and Economic Activity in Six Heartland States, 2000–2007 Scott Carter introduction Latin American migrations away from traditional growth states to regions such as the U.S. Heartland have been dubbed “new destinations” (Zúñiga and Hernández-León 2005). The forces, both demographic and economic, behind this most recent of immigrations is an amalgam involving local communities in vastly different parts of the world being thrust together by the forces of globalization. The problem is quite complex, and no answer can be postulated without a deep understanding of the various inter- and intraconnections between the movement of people in one direction and a movement of capital in the other (Kwong 1997; Sassen 1988, 1995). Certainly since the passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the opening of commodity trade and capital flows (not labor flows) between the United States, Canada, and Mexico, the United States especially has seen an influx of undocumented immigrants displaced by the importation of cheaper U.S.-produced agricultural commodities into Mexico. The local market for the goods produced by many people in rural Mexico and Central America (and all over the world) simply evaporated once the effects of NAFTA began to make themselves felt throughout the countryside. At the same time, communities in the United States were also becoming victims to the winds of globalization. Factories in local communities closed down and were either relocated to countries such as Mexico and other localities or their former function was contracted out to the low-cost manufacturing mecca of China. The power of labor unions had for many 272 . Scott Carter years been crushed in the reforms of the Ronald Reagan–Margaret Thatcher era in the early 1980s, and in recent years, many working- and middle-class Americans began to see the “good life” erode before their eyes. Such is the context of the recent Latin American migrations. Displaced peoples from rural communities with little history of migration northward came to regions of the United States in search of work to what in many ways were displaced American communities, displaced in the context that what had been the norm only a few years earlier was now gone. This chapter presents empirical evidence on the demographic and economic impact of Latin American migrations to the six core Heartland states of Arkansas (AR), Iowa (IA), Kansas (KS), Missouri (MO), Nebraska (NE), and Oklahoma (OK); hereafter referred to collectively as the Heartland 6 (HL6). The findings presented here are consistent with literature on the recent immigrations: although remaining small in terms of the actual number of Hispanics in these states, the rates of growth especially of the foreign-born component are both relatively high and on an upward trajectory from 2000 to 2007. Put simply, the Heartland has become increasingly a “new destination ” for Latin American migrations. Presenting these findings in some detail is the purpose of the present chapter, which is broken down into a demographic section and an economic section. In the initial demographic portion, the performance of the HL6 will be compared against that of the traditional growth states vis-à-vis Latin American migrations, specifically those of California (CA), Florida (FL), Illinois (IL), New Jersey (NJ), New York (NY), and Texas (TX), hereafter referred to collectively as the traditional growth 6 (TG6). This allows for a broader understanding of recent movements in Latin American migrations by comparison of the respective growth rates and other indicators of these two state clusters. The subsequent economic portion of the essay will concentrate in the main on labor-market indicators, per capita income measures, and income distribution in the face of the demographic flows presented. Here, especially, the impact of gender will be explicit. Demographic Analysis The data used in this study comes from three separate U.S. government sources. The most highly used data comes from the U.S Census American Community Survey (ACS) Annual Supplements. This data contains a large number of demographic and economic variables broken down according to ethnicity and citizenship status for each state. Note that the undocumented are not specifically singled out for measurement, although according to Passel (2006) the lion’s share of the undocumented is captured in noncitizen Latin American Migrations to the U.S. Heartland . 273 foreign-born measures. Also used in this study are rates of unemployment and labor force participation rates from...