Closing the Gates: Assessing Impacts of the Immigration Act of 1917

Ina Ganguli and Jennifer R. Withrow

No 32624, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: On February 5, 1917, the United States passed the Immigration Act of 1917, which included a test for all migrants arriving to the U.S. to prove they were literate. The Literacy Test was one of the first and few times the U.S. used a broad ‘skill-based’ immigration policy in an attempt to limit migration. We assess whether the Immigration Act had any measurable impacts on immigration to the U.S. Using a differences-in-differences approach and digitized data from Ellis Island ship manifests from directly before and after the Act’s passage and enactment, we show that the Act significantly altered selection into migration to the U.S. from Europe through Ellis Island, reducing migration from low literacy countries by 70 percent compared to arrivals from high-literacy countries. We also discuss other provisions of the Act that had the potential to influence the gender composition of arrivals. We show that women – and in particular single women – were less likely to arrive after its passage. Our analysis suggests that even during this period of lower immigration due to WWI and rising literacy levels, the 1917 Act was a consequential moment in immigration history in the United States.

JEL-codes: F22 J15 J61 N32 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-his, nep-int, nep-lab, nep-mig and nep-ure
Note: DAE LS
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