Ethnic enclaves and labor markets: An analysis of immigrant outcomes in California

The goal of this article is to examine how immigrant enclaves influence labor market outcomes. We examine the effect of ethnic concentrations on earnings in the state of California. Individual-level wage equations that control for several observable human capital and demographic characteristics are estimated. In addition, we introduce a measure that captures an ethnic group's proportion of the metropolitan area population. In general, we find that any potentially positive enclave effects are likely to be offset by negative labor market competition effects. In particular, most enclave effects become insignificant after controlling for metro area-specific effects.