Immigrant Latino workers hit hard but still working

The Pew Hispanic Center (on 6/4/2008) released Latino Labor Report, 2008: Construction Reverses Job Growth for Latinos. Using data through the first quarter of 2008, the report finds the economic downturn having a disproportionate impact on Hispanic workers. especially Mexican immigrants and recent arrivals, have been hurt the most by the slump in the construction industry.

There are no signs Latino immigrants are leaving the U.S. labor market but they now play a smaller role in the growth of the Hispanic workforce than in recent years.

The report is available at the Pew Hispanic Center's website, http://www.pewhispanic.org/.

Measuring undocumented Mexican worker wages: Collecting information

For Mexican undocumented worker cases, specialized and more specific work life expectancy estimates for the injured or deceased worker can be constructed using the methodology in research such as: 'How Long Do Mexican Migrants Work in the U.S.?', Journal of Forensic Economics 19(2), 2006, pp.217-229.

However there is some data and information that must be collected about the deceased or injured undocumented worker that is not routinely collected in injury and death cases. The check list of items to collect in undocumented worker cases is below.


* Gender
* Age
* Maritial status
* Years of education (home + U.S)
* Does the worker have familiy in U.S.?
* Was the injured or deceased involved in sports or social organizations prior to the injury?
* Injured or deceased does not BOTH speak and read english
* Individual was earning more than minimum wage at time of injury
* Person is legalized or authorized worker
* City in U.S. in which they lived
* Date of migration
* Total years in U.S

Estimating economic damages based Mexican wages

Sources of Mexican wage information:

www.inegi.gob.mx: The Mexican version of the U.S. BLS gold standard for wage information. A wealth of information on salaries (salarios, ingreso, and -->Remuneraciones). Many of the statistics and wage information is provided in U.S. dollars. Tables showing the salary distribution (rangos de ingreso mensual) can also be found.

Information can also be found on the age distribution of Mexican workers. The age distribution is useful because it can help determine a reasonable Mexican work life. There are also statistics on the unemployment rate and the minimum wage for Mexican workers. The minimum wage varies by Mexican state.

(In some setting, the low end estimate of the loss of Mexican earnings capacity can be determined using the minimum wage)

Other sources:

Annuario Estadistico De Los Estados Unidos Mexicano

Instituto Nacional De Estadistica Geografia e Informatica