} MIGRATION AND BUSINESS CYCLES
of the immediately subsequent increase in immigration, particularly
from Russia, Italy, and Austria. On the whole, the evidence is less
clear for Russia than it is for the other European countries studied
that economic conditions in the United States have dominated the
fluctuations in migration.
Austria-Hungary.
The fraction of total immigration to the United States originating
in Austria-Hungary rose rapidly from less than five per cent in the
seventies to 25.6 per cent in the year ending June 30, 1900, and
from then to the opening of the war remained relatively steady,
never reaching 27 per cent and falling below 20 per cent only in 1911.
The large influence of industrial activity in the United States upon
immigration from Austria-Hungary is indicated by the fact that
from 1900 to 1914 each decline in pig iron production in the United
States—that is, in 1901, 1904, 1908, and 1911 (Chart 35)—is ac-
companied by a concurrent decline in the ratio of immigration
from Austria-Hungary to the total immigration. Sharp increases in
this ratio in the years ending June 30, 1874, 1884, 1890, and 1896
challenge attention. Some significance in this connection may be
attached to the fact that in Austria at least, which at that time was
contributing the major portion of the immigration from Austria-
Hungary, the respective calendar years terminating six months
prior to the four years of relatively large immigration just mentioned
were years of poor crops or, as in 1895, of agricultural depression
despite good crops. However, too much importance should not be
attached to such fragmentary data. A closer examination of the
conditions of economic activity in Austria-Hungary would doubtless
reveal further interesting relationships, but we have not thought it
necessary to subject the heterogeneous conditions of the Dual
Empire to close study, in view of the fact that probably clearer
conclusions can be drawn from the data concerning the more homo-
geneous countries to which major attention has been given in this
chapter.
CHAPTER SUMMARY
The above study of the international aspects of cyclical fluctua-
tions in the current of migration, particularly of the immigration
movement into the United States, reveals that this movement is on
the whole dominated by conditions in the United States. The “pull”
is stronger than the ‘‘push.”
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