Cultural identity, immigrant assimilation and socioeconomic inequalities

Immigrants’ and their descendants’ assimilations are old issues in the economic literature. However, they have mainly been investigated in terms of immigration economic efficiency and discriminations. At the same time, cultural assimilation is a recurrent issue in the public debate and particularly through the concepts of national and cultural identity. The identity theory came out in economics more than a decade ago. It allowed improving the understanding of individuals’ decisions when they define themselves by their belonging to one or more groups to which behaving norms are attached. Thanks to this theory, we explore to what extent cultural identity, seen as the expression of immigrants’ cultural assimilation, allows improving the understanding of socioeconomic inequalities. We first highlight the importance of the family context and the educational attainment for the professional outcomes of first and second generations of immigrants. Then, we analyze the formation of the cultural identity. If ethnic identity diminishes with time since arrival in the host country, it also depends on the way it is measured. We exhibit a negative influence of ethnic identity on employment and voting participation but neutral on the wage level. Finally, thanks to a laboratory controlled experiment, we verify in a more general framework the significant role of group identity on individual behaviors.