CONTENTS

PART I.

SUMMARY REVIEW.

Difference between the old and the new immigration quantitative,

not qualitative.

Immigration and emigration regulated by demand for labor

The myth of imported immigrants.

PAGE

Unemployment the result of industrial maladjustment
Unemployment varies inversely with immigration
Limited demand for immigrant labor in agriculture

1 33457

Effect of immigration not racial displacement, but evolution of

an English-speaking aristocracy of labor.

9

Causes of the decrease of emigration from Northern and Western

Europe.

13

Economic reason for the predominance of unskilled laborers among

the immigrants

19

The standard of living of the recent immigrant not inferior to that

of his predecessors

Higher standard of living of the American workman maintained

with the aid of his children's wages.

Native workmen and older immigrants not underbid by recent

immigrants

Employment of immigrants in large numbers going together with

advances in wages

Reduction of child labor in States with a large immigrant popu-

lation. Child labor a substitute for immigration

Work accidents not the result of immigration

Immigration and trade-unionism. Union membership rising and

falling with the rise and fall of immigration

Organization among the unskilled .

Regulation of terms of employment by conferences between organ-

ized capital and organized labor

35

36

Restriction of immigration no relief for unemployment

The lesson of the late war; decline of real wages amidst industrial
prosperity, in the absence of immigration

Restriction of competition demanded by organized labor
Cosmopolitanism and the theory of "seclusion and isolation"

Lack of statistical evidence to support its conclusions
Race distinction the dominant idea of the investigation
Deceptive statistical generalizations .

CHAPTER III.

OLD AND NEW IMMIGRATION.

The immigrant of bygone days as popularly pictured

The bulk of immigrants a century ago indentured servants

Destitution of the free immigrants before the era of the "new

immigration"

Congestion in the settlements of past generations of immi-

grants in New York City

65

Majority of the old immigration unskilled laborers

Percentage of skilled mechanics about the same for the last

half century.

No evidence of a lowered standard of immigration

The average immigrant intellectually above the average of his

countrymen at home

Social prejudice against immigrants in the past

The "bird of passage"

The problem of assimilation

80

Opposition of organized labor antedates the "new immigration" 78

Note: The Statistics of Italian Illiteracy.

THE DEMAND FOR LABOR IN AGRICULTURE.

Relative and absolute decrease of the rural population

Migration of Americans of native stock to the city.

Comparative demand for labor in agriculture and industry

Differentiation of manufacturing from farming

Centralization of industry and its effect upon farming

Introduction of labor-saving machinery

Native and foreign-born workmen equally affected by un-

employment

Unemployment is in inverse ratio to the relative number of

foreign-born

125

128

Annual variations of the relative number unemployed
Annual variations of the number of working days
Immigration not a contributory cause of unemployment
A remedy against unemployment

CHAPTER VII.

RACIAL STRATIFICATION.

Migratory character of the population of the United States

Industrial growth of the country west of the Atlantic Seaboard

States

Adjustment of native and foreign elements on the scale of

occupations

148

150

Actual displacement of American wage-earners by immigrants a
rare exception

Extraordinary expansion of the iron and steel industry. Native

Americans employed in increased numbers since immigration

from Southern and Eastern Europe has become conspicuous. 158

Economic opportunity for the advancement of English-speaking
wage-earners created by immigration
"Racial displacement" a negligible quantity

EMIGRATION FROM NORTHERN AND WESTERN EUROPE.

A. Introductory: Emigration from Northern and Western
Europe cannot keep pace with the demand for immigrant
labor in the United States

B. Germany.

Excess of immigration to, over emigration from Germany

Sources of immigration to Germany: Southern and Eastern

Europe.