title: Determinants of Employment among Well-Educated Refugees before and After the 2007 U.S. Economic Recession.
abstract: Little is known about how the overall employment conditions in a country impact the likelihood of employment of newly arrived refugees. In the current study, we compare employment and determinant of employment of highly educated Middle Eastern refugees to Michigan that arrived before and after the 2007 recession. We also look at self-reported barriers to employment. Results show that the general downturn of the economy made it substantially more difficult to secure employment, even for well-educated refugees. Thus, before the economic downturn, 22.9 % of refugees were unemployed as compared to 55.1 % once the recession had set in (p < 0.01). There were also substantially more self-reported barriers to employment after the economic downturn. The study points to the importance of understanding both individual characteristics and the general employment conditions in the new host country when studying variation in refugee employment success.
authors.affiliation: Department of Family Medicine, College of Human Medicine, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, USA; International Society of Iraqi Scientists, Michigan, USA.
authors.forename: Hikmet J
authors.initials: HJ
authors.lastname: Jamil
authors.affiliation: Beamount Hospitals, Cancer Section, Michigan, USA.
authors.forename: Monty
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Fakhoury
authors.affiliation: Department of Family Medicine, College of Human Medicine, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, USA.
authors.forename: Jolin B
authors.initials: JB
authors.lastname: Yamin
authors.affiliation: Department of Family Medicine, College of Human Medicine, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, USA; Department of Public Health and Caring Sciences, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden.
authors.forename: Judith E
authors.initials: JE
authors.lastname: Arnetz
authors.affiliation: Department of Family Medicine, College of Human Medicine, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, USA; Department of Public Health and Caring Sciences, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden.
authors.forename: Bengt B
authors.initials: BB
authors.lastname: Arnetz
keywords: Barriers to employment; Economy; Facilitators for employment; Iraq; Risk factors