Local Labor Market Adjustment to Immigration: The Roles of Participation and the Short Run

While previous research has generally found that immigration raises unemployment for natives, effects are often more muted than expected. Anticipated out-migration responses have been similarly difficult to discern. However, these findings may be byproducts of the long-run nature of most inquiries, which furthermore do not account for changes in natives' labor force participation. In response, this study evaluates the impact of the arrival of low-skilled immigrants on low-skilled natives in urban areas over a five year period. Initial static results from the Census Basic Monthly Survey clearly indicate that immigrants have a significant negative impact on natives' labor force participation. Building upon these static panel results, characteristics of immigrants' destination choices are examined along with the ensuing adjustment process through dynamic analyses of local markets. Surges of immigrants significantly reduce the labor force participation of low-skilled natives, emphasizing this often neglected channel for labor market adjustment. Previous work may thus understate the true impact of immigrants on local labor markets by focusing on the longer term and ignoring adjustments through participation. Copyright 2004 Gatton College of Business and Economics, University of Kentucky..

Astrobiology and the possibility of life on Earth and elsewhere…

Astrobiology is an interdisciplinary scientific field not only focused on the search of extraterrestrial life, but also on deciphering the key environmental parameters that have enabled the emergence of life on Earth. Understanding these physical and chemical parameters is fundamental knowledge necessary not only for discovering life or signs of life on other planets, but also for understanding our own terrestrial environment. Therefore, astrobiology pushes us to combine different perspectives such as the conditions on the primitive Earth, the physicochemical limits of life, exploration of habitable environments in the Solar System, and the search for signatures of life in exoplanets. Chemists, biologists, geologists, planetologists and astrophysicists are contributing extensively to this interdisciplinary research field. From 2011 to 2014, the European Space Agency (ESA) had the initiative to gather a Topical Team of interdisciplinary scientists focused on astrobiology to review the profound transformations in the field that have occurred since the beginning of the new century. The present paper is an interdisciplinary review of current research in astrobiology, covering the major advances and main outlooks in the field. The following subjects will be reviewed and most recent discoveries will be highlighted: the new understanding of planetary system formation including the specificity of the Earth among the diversity of planets, the origin of water on Earth and its unique combined properties among solvents for the emergence of life, the idea that the Earth could have been habitable during the Hadean Era, the inventory of endogenous and exogenous sources of organic matter and new concepts about how chemistry could evolve towards biological molecules and biological systems. In addition, many new findings show the remarkable potential life has for adaptation and survival in extreme environments. All those results from different fields of science are guiding our perspectives and strategies to look for life in other Solar System objects as well as beyond, in extrasolar worlds