This article investigates whether and to what extent poor proficiency in Italian impairs immigrants’ labor market integration in Italy. Using individual-level survey data, we apply instrumental variables methods to leverage presumably exogenous variations in Italian proficiency induced by immigrants’ demo-linguistic characteristics (e.g., age at arrival, linguistic distance between mother tongue and destination language, speaking Italian during childhood) and their interplays. We find that, given the low-skill nature of Italy's immigrant labor market, poor proficiency in communication skills (speaking and understanding Italian) produces larger penalties for immigrants’ labor force participation and employment than does the lack of formal skills (reading and writing). In contrast, no effect is found on immigrants’ job characteristics like the type of contract and full-time or part-time work. Whereas female immigrants were more penalized than males by poor linguistic proficiency in labor force participation, immigrants in linguistic groups that were more likely to work with (for) co-nationals were less affected by linguistic barriers than other immigrant groups. Yet, when investigating perceived integration outcomes, immigrants working with (for) co-nationals fared worse on feeling at home, feeling accepted, and overall life satisfaction in Italy. As our analysis shows, linguistic enclaves in workplaces, while not always representing a hurdle to immigrants’ labor market success, can generate trade-offs for other non-labor market integration outcomes. These findings highlight that the development of linguistic skills should be prioritized in migration policy agendas, taking into account heterogeneity in immigrants’ demographic and linguistic profiles.

本文调查了意大利语水平低下是否以及在多大程度上损害了移民在意大利的劳动力市场整合。使用个人层面的调查数据，我们应用工具变量方法来利用可能由移民的演示语言特征（例如，抵达年龄、母语与目的地语言之间的语言距离、童年时期说意大利语）引起的意大利语熟练度的外生变化和他们的相互作用。我们发现，鉴于意大利移民劳动力市场的低技能性质，与缺乏正式技能（阅读和写作）相比，缺乏沟通技巧（说和理解意大利语）对移民劳动力参与和就业的影响更大. 相比之下，没有发现对移民的工作特征如合同类型和全职或兼职工作的影响。虽然女性移民在劳动力参与方面比男性更容易受到语言能力低下的惩罚，但与其他移民群体相比，更有可能与（为）同胞一起工作的语言群体中的移民受到语言障碍的影响较小。然而，在调查感知到的融合结果时，与（为）同胞一起工作的移民在在意大利有宾至如归的感觉、被接受的感觉和整体生活满意度。正如我们的分析所示，工作场所的语言飞地虽然并不总是阻碍移民在劳动力市场取得成功，但可以为其他非劳动力市场一体化结果产生权衡。这些研究结果强调，在移民政策议程中应优先考虑语言技能的发展，同时考虑到移民人口和语言特征的异质性。