Immigration, Beneficiary Assumptions, and Welfare Support

ABSTRACT Previous research demonstrates that assumptions and perceptions about who benefits from welfare programs and the deservingness of those welfare beneficiaries play a considerable role in shaping individuals' welfare attitudes. However, a holistic understanding of how these assumptions and perceptions are formed remains limited. In this study, I indicate that elements of welfare policy design (e.g., means‐testing rules) can shape native citizens' assumptions about immigrants as welfare beneficiaries. Through an original survey experiment on Cint Theorem, I find that including a means‐testing rule makes respondents more likely to assume a welfare program benefits immigrants to the exclusion of native‐born Americans. Such a rule also appears to increase assumptions that these programs primarily benefit low‐skilled immigrants and newcomers from less developed countries, though the magnitude of these effects varies across policy domains. In the Pell Grant experiment, the effects are statistically stronger, whereas the corresponding effects in the Child Tax Credit experiment—though pointing in the same direction—are smaller and only marginally significant. Moreover, while certain assumptions—such as the exclusion assumption—are more strongly associated with welfare opposition among those with stronger anti‐immigration views.