Mexican Immigrant Self-Employment Along the U.S.-Mexico Border: An Analysis of 2000 Census Data

Explores the rate of self-employment among Mexicanimmigrants living in U.S. cities along the U.S.-Mexico border. Data used inthis analysis were obtained from the 5% Integrated Public Use Microdata Series(IPUMS) of the 2000 U.S. Census. The border region is defined asthe eightidentifiable metropolitan statistical areas in counties located directly on theMexican border including El Paso, Texas, and San Diego, California. The datashow that there is a higher self-employment rate among Mexican immigrants inthese border cities than in the interior of the United States (12.1 versus6.8%) and that the immigrants in these cities have higher education levels,more potential labor market experience, and a longerU.S. tenure despitetheir lower English-proficiency levels. The analysis demonstrates that immigrants in these border cities havedifferent reasons for pursuing self-employment than those immigrants in otherparts of the Unied States. There appears to be stronger support for theproposition that those who choose self-employment do so because of the tradeopportunities as opposed to the lack of job opportunities. This pull towardself-employment occurs even though the self-employed Mexican immigrants earnless than their non-Hispanic white counterparts in these border cities. Thepolicy implications of these findings are discussed. (SRD)