Global Detroit, a community and economic development organization, has released a new research brief that shows Michigan could lose as much as $416 million in net economic impact, and up to $72 million in state and local taxes over the next 10 years due to changes in immigration policy.
If refugees slated to come to Michigan in 2025 are denied entry, the state will lose access to federal refugee resettlement programs that are now being ended, paused indefinitely, or resumed at a smaller scale.
Recently, the Trump administration indefinitely suspended all refugee resettlement in the United States. The suspension, effective from January 2025, comes in the middle of a fiscal year that anticipated the resettlement in Michigan of an additional 2,265 refugees by September 30.
According to the research brief, the “pause and the loss of additional refugees to the state are not just immediate concerns; they are expected to have a lasting negative impact on Michigan’s economy and tax base over the next decade.”
Steve Tobocman, executive director of Global Detroit, says, “U.S. immigration and refugee policies are humanitarian and civil rights issues that intersect with America’s foreign affairs. But immigration policy also is very much economic policy.
“Working with chambers, economic development organizations, and businesses across the state, our Businesses and People for Immigration campaign seeks to highlight the economic impacts of changes in our immigration policies. Today’s report examines the pause in refugee resettlement through the same lens.”
The research brief was produced by Businesses and People for Immigration and Global Detroit, in collaboration with Public Policy Associates.
The research draws on estimates from three recent studies conducted by Global Detroit and the University of Michigan’s Ford School of Public Policy, the American Immigration Council and the Michigan Global Talent Initiative, and the Michigan League for Public Policy, in collaboration with the Immigration Research Initiative.
“It’s important when considering the kind of immigration and refugee policy that the economic impacts of such policy be taken into account,” says Daniel J. Quinn, chief strategy officer of Public Policy Associates.
View the full research brief here.
For more information about Global Detroit, visit globaldetroitmi.org.
