Abstract
In the wake of rising immigration and concerns about immigrant skill levels, this paper investigates the skill distributions of immigrants across different sizes of cities to determine where immigrants of certain skill levels locate and what the implications of those choices are. To that end, I utilize existing theory on skill complementarities as a framework for labor mobility of immigrants across cities, which suggests disproportionately higher concentrations of low- and high-skilled workers in large cities compared to small cities. I use 2018 American Community Survey data and stochastic dominance testing to determine if this theory applies to immigrant workers. I find evidence of a thicker lower tail in the skill distribution of large cities, suggesting a higher density of low-skilled immigrants in those locations. At the same time, I find proof of a thicker upper tail in small cities, which consists of approximately the top 2% of earners, indicating a higher number of high-skilled immigrants there. Furthermore, the results also suggest that there is a range of skills, over which immigrants are more concentrated in large cities, that begins with individuals who have at least earnings consistent with a Bachelor's degree, but which does not include the top 2% of earners. This could have important welfare implications for existing and future immigrants