PhD Graduate Maria Majerski has published an article in The Sociological Quarterly that examines the earning of immigrant and native-born men in Canada. The article demonstrates that while immigrants have higher levels of education, they still earn less than native-born Canadians due to the effects of human capital and visible minority status.
Maria Majerski has successfully completed her dissertation entitled Networks of Mobility and Constraint: The Economic Integration of New Immigrants to Canada." She is currently a CLTA Assistant Professor at Bishop's University. Her research focuses on social networks and economic immigrant integration in Canada.
The article is available to those with access here. The full citation and abstract have been posted below.
Maria M. Majerski (2018) The Earnings of Immigrant and Native-Born Men in Canada: The Role of Social Networks and Social Capital, The Sociological Quarterly, DOI: 10.1080/00380253.2018.1526054
Using data from the Canadian General Social Survey (2008), this study considers the role of social networks in immigrants’ earnings. Despite higher levels of education, immigrants continue to earn less than native-born Canadians. This paper shows that social network characteristics are associated with earnings net of the effects of human capital and visible minority status. Social networks are important for understanding immigrants’ earnings both as a direct cause of employment disadvantages and as a force that exacerbates the disadvantages that immigrants face due to racial discrimination, a lack of proficiency in Canada’s official languages, and/or discrepancies over foreign credentials. While most current data on immigrant networks is limited to specific ethnic groups, cities, and/or occupations, the present study contributes to scholarship by generalizing data to all immigrants in Canada. This study also expands the temporal scope by comparing immigrants who arrived in the 2000s, 1990s, and earlier. Future research and public policy should put greater emphasis on the role of social networks in the economic integration of new immigrants.