Migration and business cycles

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Monograph

Identifikator:: 1736236210

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-111544

Document type:: Monograph

Author:: Jerome, Harry

Title:: Migration and business cycles

Place of publication:: New York

Publisher:: National Bureau of Economic Research

Year of publication:: 1926

Scope:: 256 S.

Digitisation:: 2020

Collection:: Economics Books

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Chapter

Document type:: Monograph

Structure type:: Chapter

Title:: Chapter V. The pre-war quarter century : 1890-1914

Collection:: Economics Books

THE PRE-WAR QUARTER CENTURY cent deviation in immigration. This ratio of ten to one is some- what arbitrarily chosen,* nor could the correct ratio be determined without full knowledge of the number of immigrants destined for gainful employment as compared with the number of persons em- ployed in the occupations and geographical areas affected by immi- gration. However, the visual impression received from Fig. C probably comes closer to a correct interpretation of the relative numbers involved than is furnished by either of the two methods first considered. But another question arises which is not answered by any of the three graphs so far considered; that is, what is the cumulative immigration during the period of declining employment? In Fig. D we have a comparison between the employment curve shown in Fig. C and a bar chart showing the cumulative number of male immigrants beginning in June, 1893, the first month in which the employment curve shows a decided cyclical drop. Though, as just noted, the employment curve begins to drop sharply in June, im- migration continues to some extent, and, while it also declines sharply, in no month of these three years were there less than five thousand immigrant males arriving. By the end of September, 1894, when the employment curve first begins to show a decided recovery, over 270,000 males had immigrated. Obviously, even such a severe depression as that of 1893-1894 did not operate to check immigration completely, and it seems unquestionable that some of these 270,000 newly arrived Immigrants from June, 1893, to September, 1894, found employment with great difficulty or replaced others who were forced into the ranks of the unemployed. However, in interpreting the significance of cumulative im- migration in depression periods, it should be noted that, as in Chart 15, the cycle curves ordinarily represent deviations from an upward trend, and this trend in employment may be more than sufficient to offset such upward trend as is present in the available number of workers other than immigrants. In such case, at least part of the cumulative immigration is absorbed by the trend in employment. In the following pages no one of the four methods of graphic comparison illustrated in Chart 15 has been used exclusively; but in each case the method of presentation has been determined by the ‘Based upon consideration of the fact that in the early nineties the number of persons engaged in manufacturing was between 4,000,000 and 5,000,000 and the annual im- migration then averaged somewhat less than ten per cent of that number; hence the number of persons represented by 4 one per cent change in factory employment was roughly approximate to the number involved in a ten per cent change in immigration. 99

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