Countries depend on both high- and low-skilled immigration to meet economic needs. But most voters prefer high-skilled immigrants, despite the fact that multiple economic sectors structurally depend on low-skilled immigrants. In this paper, we examine voter preferences toward low-skilled immigrants as one barrier to effective immigration policy, even in political regimes where immigration is the consequence of highly coordinated or “planned” policies. Specifically, we consider whether government communication around the benefits of low-skilled immigration can increase favorability of such policies. We are particularly interested in the ways in which government communicates immigration messages and whether the scope or concentration of the proposed benefits will move individual preferences. In an online survey experiment, we present Canadians ( N=2,023) with a policy brief that manipulates immigrant skill level (high vs. low), economic outcomes of migration (positive vs. mixed), and the geographic scope of benefits (concentrated vs. sociotropic). Employing two measures of policy support, we find some evidence that positive framing can increase overall support for low-skill migrants. We also find that manipulating framing around high-skilled workers has little effect on support for low-skill workers, even when that framing presents countervailing evidence as to the benefit of high-skilled labor. In sum, our findings suggest that elite level communication around the benefits of low-skill labor may have the ability to disrupt longstanding antipathy for low-skilled labor, even in regimes with longstanding support for high-skilled labor.

中文翻译：

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移民政策如何影响选民对低技能移民的支持？来自调查实验的证据


各国都依赖高技能和低技能移民来满足经济需求。但大多数选民更喜欢高技能移民，尽管多个经济部门在结构上都依赖于低技能移民。在本文中，我们研究了选民对低技能移民的偏好是有效移民政策的一个障碍，即使在移民是高度协调或“计划”政策结果的政治制度中也是如此。具体来说，我们考虑了政府围绕低技能移民的好处的沟通是否可以增加此类政策的好感度。我们对政府传达移民信息的方式以及拟议福利的范围或集中度是否会改变个人偏好特别感兴趣。在一项在线调查实验中，我们向加拿大人 （N=2,023） 提供了一份政策简报，该简报操纵移民技能水平（高与低）、移民的经济结果（积极与混合）和利益的地理范围（集中与社会倾向）。采用两种政策支持措施，我们发现一些证据表明，积极的框架可以增加对低技能移民的总体支持。我们还发现，围绕高技能工人操纵框架对支持低技能工人的影响很小，即使这种框架提供了关于高技能劳动力的好处的抵消证据。总之，我们的研究结果表明，围绕低技能劳动力的好处的精英层沟通可能有能力打破对低技能劳动力的长期反感，即使在长期支持高技能劳动力的政权中也是如此。