Cathy Yang Liu

Immigrant Settlement and Employment Suburbanisation in the US: Is There a Spatial Mismatch?

Two significant trends have occurred in urban areas across the US during recent decades: immigration and the decentralisation of employment. While each trend has been investigated by research, the magnitude of spatial disparity between immigrant settlement patterns and employment location and its change over time has received much less attention. Using a sample of the 60 largest immigrant metropolitan areas, this study uses a spatial mismatch index and regression methods to address this question over the period 1980–2000. Results indicate that immigrants are more spatially mismatched with job opportunities than the White population, but less so than the Black population. It is found that job growth occurred close to where the native-born Whites concentrate and away from immigrants and other minority populations. However, immigrants’ residential location patterns shifted towards employment opportunities and was able to offset the otherwise enlarging spatial disparity.

Travel Behavior among Latino Immigrants The Role of Ethnic Concentration and Ethnic Employment

This article investigates the determinants of Latino immigrants’ travel mode choices (auto alone, carpool, transit, and other modes) from six different immigrant gateways: Atlanta, Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles, Seattle, and Washington, D.C. Particular emphasis is placed on the role of living in ethnically concentrated locations and working in ethnically concentrated employment sectors in shaping their choices. The results indicate that living in areas with higher ethnic concentrations increases both the likelihood of carpooling and of taking public transit. Furthermore, working in an ethnic niche is a strong predictor of carpooling versus driving alone in five metropolitan areas, and of taking transit versus driving alone in four metropolitan areas.

Immigrants and the Spatial Mismatch Hypothesis: Employment Outcomes Among Immigrant Youth in Los Angeles

This paper examines the effect of space and race/ethnicity on labour force participation outcomes among minority and immigrant youth in the Los Angeles metropolitan areas. This research contributes to the spatial mismatch literature by analysing the differences between firstand second-generation immigrants in addition to exploring the role of race and job accessibility on the likelihood of working. It does so by comparing the employment status of comparable youth (16—21 years of age) who reside in central cities, inner-ring suburbs and outer-ring suburbs using 2000 Census PUMS data. Finally, the decision to attend school and to work is modelled in a bivariate probit framework to discover how the correlation across decisions may change the estimated impact of race and space on employment. The results of this study suggest that both space and race play a role in the probability that a youth will work, but that the decision to attend school does not influence the estimated impact of space and race on employment.

Intrametropolitan Opportunity Structure and the Self-Employment of Asian and Latino Immigrants

Using 2000 Census microdata for the Atlanta metropolitan area as a case study, this research investigates the effect of intrametropolitan opportunity structure and local area context, especially spatial structure, urban employment pattern, social environment, and ethnic concentration, on Asian and Latino immigrants’ incidence of self-employment. These two groups grew rapidly both in the total labor force and among the self-employed in Atlanta. It is found that living in central city and inner-ring suburbs depresses Latino immigrants’ entrepreneurial activities. The growth of trade jobs and concentration of immigrants in a local area both give rise to immigrant entrepreneurship. Results suggest that traditional theories such as disadvantage theory need to be reassessed in the context of new immigrant gateways, while the ethnic enclave hypothesis is still validated. Potential policies to promote immigrant entrepreneurship are also discussed.

ARE CENTRAL CITIES MORE CREATIVE? THE INTRAMETROPOLITAN GEOGRAPHY OF CREATIVE INDUSTRIES

ABSTRACT: This paper examines the location and growth of creative industries within metropolitan areas. In recent years, the creative industries have been increasingly sought after as potential engines of metropolitan economic growth. Although some research has been done on the location decisions by such firms and workers, it has primarily focused on interregional and intermetropolitan disparities. We use establishment-level data to investigate intrametropolitan (central city versus suburban) location and growth for creative industry establishments in 40 of the top 101 metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs). We compared the number of employees and total annual payroll in each location, and categorize them by region, population size, and creative employment growth. Findings suggest that although creative industries are more centralized, they are decentralizing faster than other industries in general, but this rate, and even the direction, varies widely across MSAs.

EMPLOYMENT CONCENTRATION AND JOB QUALITY FOR LOW-SKILLED LATINO IMMIGRANTS

ABSTRACT: This article examines the formation, determination, and quality of employment concentration for low-skilled Latino immigrants. Comparative evidence is drawn from the three metropolitan areas of Chicago, Los Angeles, and Washington, DC. Using 2000 Public Use Microdata Sample (PUMS), gender-specific ethnic niches where Latino immigrants disproportionately concentrate are identified and niche effects on wage earnings are analyzed. This study finds that while ethnic niches are evident in all three cities, they are most prevalent among women and newly arrived immigrants, and in the emerging gateway of Washington, D.C. Niche employment is almost uniformly characterized by earnings disadvantage as compared to non-niche employment, with lower returns premium on workers’ human capital and work experience, especially for men. Niche effects on earnings vary across metropolitan areas in accordance with their economic structure as well as with the size and profile of immigrants.

The Causes And Dynamics Of Minority Entrepreneurial Entry

This study examines the causes and dynamics in the creation of business ventures by minority nascent entrepreneurs. Minority business enterprises are an important source of job creation and innovation in the US economy, as well as economic development engines in their respective communities. However, little is understood about the unique motivations, business strategies and plans in the early stage of their venture formation. This paper utilizes the Panel Study of Entrepreneurial Dynamics (PSED) dataset in investigating black and Hispanic entrepreneurial entry as compared to white nascent entrepreneurs around three important dimensions: motivation, business strategy, and community resources. It is found that blacks are highly driven by a range of motivational factors while Hispanics value intergenerational inheritance and role models in business ownership. Both groups heavily focus on a niche market strategy by lowering prices, serving markets missed by others and locating close to customers. Contrary to expectation, their perceptions of community resources are not more favorable than whites. Public policy implications are discussed.

Re-Creating New Orleans: Driving Development Through Creativity

The purpose of this article is to consider the promotion of the entertainment industries as a means to economic redevelopment in post-Katrina New Orleans. A comparative study is conducted with three other cities in the Southeast: Atlanta, Georgia; Austin, Texas; and Wilmington, North Carolina. The study begins by laying a theoretical foundation for such an approach, looking at creative class and human capital theories in particular. After providing a brief background of New Orleans, the authors review current economic development strategies for the region. New Orleans’ existing strength in the creative media cluster is acknowledged and alternative strategies are discussed in terms of firm-centered and people-centered approaches. The article closes with a number of specific policy implications for the city, including entertainment industry cluster development, improved quality of life for residents, and an enhanced business climate. Possible implications for other cities are also discussed.

Immigrant Employment Through the Great Recession: Individual Characteristics and Metropolitan Contexts

Abstract Immigrants continue to settle in metropolitan areas across the United States and bring significant changes to various urban labor markets. Using American Community Survey (ACS) data for 2007 and 2011, we trace the employment outcomes of immigrants compared to native-born workers before and after the recent Great Recession across the 100 largest metropolitan areas and examine individual-level and metropolitan-level factors that shape their employment outcomes. We find that low-skilled workers in general and immigrants without English proficiency and those who are new entrants or earliest arrivals are harder hit in the recession. Latino immigrants and black workers fare worse in areas with high immigrant concentration. Latino immigrants experience employment gains, however, in the South, large urban economies, as well as new immigrant gateways. Asian immigrants see declines in employment likelihood in areas with a large construction sector, while areas with a large trade sector hurt native-born white workers.

Disasters, the Whole Community, and Development as Capacity Building

Disasters provide opportunities to change patterns of development, new resources to support those changes, and incentives to become more resilient and sustainable, reducing losses in future disasters. Policy inertia is broken, new voices are heard, constituencies are mobilized, champions emerge, and new development tools are brought to bear. However, some communities are able to use the opportunity to address risks and sustainable development, while others are not able to do so. What distinguishes the successful communities from the less successful and how are capacities built? An integrated model is built for assessing community characteristics and recovery-related capacities, and critical variables are identified. The model includes social vulnerability, the structure of the local economy, business diversity, nonprofit density, and government capacity. Engagement of the “whole community” and building social capital, as well as having effective community leadership, can mean the difference between success and failure in disaster recovery and sustainable development.