Working Paper: NBER ID: w7737
Authors: Eli Berman; Kevin Lang; Erez Siniver
Abstract: We examine the effect of language acquisition on the growth of immigrants' earnings. We gathered data on recent Soviet immigrants to Israel that include retrospective questions on earnings and language ability on entry into their current job. Language acquisition is found to interact positively with occupation level. Immigrant programmers and computer technicians have a return to tenure about three percentage points higher than that of natives; improved Hebrew language skills account for between 2/3 and 3/4 of that differential wage growth. In contrast, construction workers and gas station attendants have no convergence of wages to those of natives and language acquisition has no discernible effect on their wages. For these less skilled workers the estimated return' to Hebrew proficiency in the cross-section is entirely due to ability bias. This finding may invite a reinterpretation of other studies on the returns to language acquisition for low wage immigrants.
Keywords: language acquisition; immigrants; wage growth; Hebrew fluency; occupational skills
JEL Codes: C81; F22; J15; J31; N35
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| language acquisition (K37) | wage growth of skilled immigrant workers (J69) |
| language acquisition (K37) | wage growth of unskilled immigrant workers (F66) |
| occupation level (J29) | wage growth of skilled immigrant workers (J69) |
| ability bias (D91) | estimated return to Hebrew proficiency (I26) |