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Abstract
The first chapter of the dissertation analyzes issues related to the U.S. hired farm workers utilization of health care services and their specific choices among health care provider and health bill payment method options. Using data from the National Agricultural Workers Surveys for the years 2000 to 2012 and controlling for other demographic factors, this studys results indicate that undocumented hired farmworkers are 10.6% and 8.4% less likely to use U.S. and foreign health care, respectively, compared to documented immigrant hired farmworkers. Moreover, the general preference of hired farmworkers in the U.S. tends to lean towards patronizing private clinics and settling their health care bills using out-of-pocket funds. The second chapter of the dissertation investigates the employment time allocation choices of U.S. workers between farm and non-farm work alternatives using individual level data from the National Agricultural Workers Survey (NAWS). Green card farm workers are found to devote smaller share of working time to the farm sector than citizen and undocumented workers, which raises the concern that the legalization of immigrant status could possibly exacerbate farm labor shortage conditions. Language barrier and length of residence in the country are found to play important roles in the time allocation of farm workers between farm and non-farm employment. Moreover, external economic shocks could more easily induce citizen and green card farm workers to abandon farm employment while undocumented workers tend to remain in their farm jobs during such difficult times.The third chapter of this dissertation analyzes the impact of undocumented immigrants emigration caused by E-verify on the wages of the natives and immigrants in the adopting states. Using data from the Current Population Survey for the 2000-2014 period, we examine the heterogeneous wage effects on non-migrant natives and immigrants by industrial and educational group. Immigrants and natives who work in manual industries are found to experience decreases in their wages, while other industries are more likely to witness wage increase. The wage effects of E-verify on natives are found to be smaller and insignificant.