Melvyn Krauss, Columnist

The Pitfalls of Cutting Low-Skilled Immigration

Washington’s attempt to slash migrant workers in 1964 should serve as a warning to Trump and Republicans.

August 10, 2017 at 11:30 AM UTC

Melvyn Krauss is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University and an emeritus professor of economics at New York University.

Market forces.
Photographer: John Moore/Getty Images

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President Donald Trump has thrown his support to the Cotton-Perdue bill to restrict legal immigration of low-skilled workers into the U.S. by as much as 50 percent on the grounds it would raise the wages of American working families.

That’s not what the economic evidence is showing, however.