Did Immigration Help the US Increase Jobs While Reducing Inflation?

Job numbers are rising, and inflation has slowed. While economic data points to growth, many people feel like the economy is doing poorly. Could immigration help explain these discrepancies?

‘The emerging consensus’: An analysis from The Wall Street Journal (Center bias) said the recent “surge” in immigration “not only explains inconsistencies in the jobs data but suggests the economy can keep adding plenty of jobs without overheating.” Two researchers from the Brookings Institution (Center bias) agreed, writing in TIME Magazine (Lean Left bias) that immigration “means the labor market may not need to slow much to bring down inflation.”

‘A boon for the economy’: An analysis in Semafor (Lean Left bias) framed this trend more positively, saying the border crisis was a “political curse” for President Joe Biden but a “blessing” for the economy: “Economists usually discuss the benefits of immigration in terms of their long-term impact on issues like productivity and population growth, but the latest research is a reminder that new workers can also offer short-term oxygen to an economy that might otherwise run out of breath.”

‘Just a migrant job fair’: Fox News (Opinion rated Right) host Jesse Watters took a substantially more negative tone. Watters said post-pandemic job growth was “not for people born here, born somewhere else,” adding, “This is the great replacement theory the Democrats said is so racist.” The “migrant mirage” gets “even more suspicious,” Watters said, because the prevalence of part-time jobs “pushes our wages down and at the same time triggers inflation.”