International Organization for Migration (IOM)

Improving Access to Labour market Information for migrants and employers
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1.2. Medium-term occupational outlook: role of migrant
labour
A large number of factors including changes in demand for goods and services,
technological change, and trends in globalization will determine occupational
patterns over the next half century. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics projections
assume full employment, thus discounting for any prediction errors due to the
business cycle. According to their forecast, total employment during the period
2010–2020 will increase by 20.5 million. Most of the numerical increase would be at
the low end of the skill distribution; however, proportional increase would be greater
for jobs with a college degree than for jobs with less than a high-school education
(Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2012).
In numerical terms, 5.2 million jobs are projected to arise in occupations that require
less than a high-school degree, 7.5 million are projected to arise in occupations
that require a high-school degree, 2.5 million in occupations with some college or
associate degree, and five million in occupations that require a BA or higher degree.
In terms of growth, jobs with a Masters, Doctoral or professional degree are likely to
grow by more than 20 per cent; jobs with a high-school or less education by less than
14 per cent; and those with some college or a BA degree by 17 per cent to 18 per cent.
Demographic changes, in particular the projected rise in elderly population, are
likely to propel demand for health care and personal care. Thus in service providing
industries, health care and social assistance will provide the largest number of new
jobs, about 5.7 million, followed by professional, scientific, technical, and educational
services together providing for an additional 4 million jobs (BLS, 2012). Immigrants
are over-represented in many of the occupations that are projected to grow fast over
the next decade: in 2010, for instance, almost a quarter of the home health-care
aides, nursing aides and personal care aides were foreign born (Brookings, 2012).
Clearly, the validity of these projections depends on the validity of the assumptions
on which they are based. Automation in health care and service industry may be one
factor that could challenge these assumptions. Of the top 20 occupations with the
largest projected growth, four are in the office and administrative group; some of them
could, and would, be outsourced (Table 12.1). For the remaining 16 occupations, the
US labour market is likely to draw on the supply of potential migrant workers from
other countries, mostly developing ones. At the domestic policy level, however, there
will continue to be questions on whether immigration is the most effective tool in
filling these jobs and how it would affect the opportunities of US-born workers (For
recent literature on this issue see: Borjas, 2003; Card, 2006; Kaestner and Kaushal,
2012).
The broader pattern of the BLS projections suggests that if foreign-born workers were
to fill the labour market needs in areas where demand is likely to grow the fastest,
immigration would have to be bi-modal: very highly educated immigrants meeting
job requirements at the higher end of the skill distribution and very low-skilled
immigrants meeting the requirements at the lower end of the skill distribution. As