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This paper asks how much foreign-born workers contribute to US labor productivity through the spatial sorting channel. We document two facts (1) foreign-born workers sort themselves better, with respect to wages, across US states, (2) US-born workers earn a wage premium for leaving their birth state, but the magnitude of this premium is similar across destination states. Through the lens of a Rosen-Roback spatial sorting framework, these two facts translate into a higher dispersion of local amenities for US- born workers, which is mostly due to disproportionately higher amenities in their state of birth. In order to quantify the productivity effects of this heterogeneity in amenities, we embed the sorting framework in a general equilibrium model that features congestion and agglomeration forces. Counterfactual analysis of the US economy in 2018 shows that foreign-born workers overall contribute positively to US productivity: the positive contribution of their better spatial sorting is 25% stronger than their negative productivity contribution.
