Labor market experiences and impressions of recent immigrants

In my dissertation I focus on the experiences of recent immigrants in Canada and Australia. The first two chapters study the role of social networks in the labor market assimilation of new immigrants. The third chapter examines whether the impressions of recent immigrants in Australia, in particular those of Muslims, changed in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States.;In the first chapter I develop a theoretical model to show that among workers whose network is weaker than non-network sources of job offers, those in network jobs should have higher wages than those in non-network jobs. Moreover, this wage differential is decreasing in network strength. I test the latter implication using the Canadian census and the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Canada. The empirical strategy focuses on the interaction between network strength and job-finding method to overcome the problem of omitted variables bias. I find that at the lower end of an individual's potential wage distribution the network premium is decreasing in network strength suggesting that at this end of the distribution the presence of a strong social tie increases the arrival rate of network job offers.;The second chapter replicates the exercise of the previous chapter using the Australian Census and the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Australia. The results are comparable to those for Canada, although due to small sample sizes the data could not be analyzed in as much detail.;In the third chapter I use the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Australia to examine whether recent Muslim immigrants undergo a change in their impressions about religious and racial tolerance and discrimination in the aftermath of 9/11. I adopt a difference in differences approach, where identification comes from the timing of survey interviews. There is no consistent evidence of a change in the perception of Muslims after 9/11 across all the various impressions reported in the survey.