{"id":75,"date":"2025-05-09T15:20:06","date_gmt":"2025-05-09T19:20:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/people.bsu.edu\/econbriefs\/?p=75"},"modified":"2025-05-22T07:46:40","modified_gmt":"2025-05-22T11:46:40","slug":"muncies-new-neighbors-by-dr-cecil-bohanon-and-dr-john-horowitz","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/people.bsu.edu\/econbriefs\/2025\/05\/09\/muncies-new-neighbors-by-dr-cecil-bohanon-and-dr-john-horowitz\/","title":{"rendered":"Muncie\u2019s New Neighbors \u2013 by Dr. Cecil Bohanon and Dr. John Horowitz"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Originally written on 6\/20\/2023<\/em><\/p>\n<p><span data-contrast=\"auto\">June 20<\/span><span data-contrast=\"auto\">th<\/span><span data-contrast=\"auto\"> is <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.un.org\/en\/observances\/refugee-day\"><span data-contrast=\"none\">World Refugee Day<\/span><\/a><span data-contrast=\"auto\">. The United Nations reports that 20 people per minute \u201cleave everything behind to escape war, persecution or terror.\u201d That adds up to about 10.5 million additional refugees per year. Before the war in Ukraine displaced millions of people, <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.unrefugees.org\/refugee-facts\/what-is-a-refugee\/#:~:text=War%20and%20ethnic%2C%20tribal%20and,Afghanistan%2C%20South%20Sudan%20and%20Myanmar.\"><span data-contrast=\"none\">nearly seventy percent of displaced persons came from five countries<\/span><\/a><span data-contrast=\"auto\">: Syria, Venezuela, Afghanistan, South Sudan, and Myanmar.\u00a0<\/span><span data-ccp-props=\"{}\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-contrast=\"auto\">According to <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.voanews.com\/a\/us-continues-relocating-afghans-even-under-taliban-rule-\/7036129.html#:~:text=More%20than%2090%2C000%20Afghans%20have,2022%2C%20according%20to%20official%20figures.\"><span data-contrast=\"none\">Voice of America<\/span><\/a><span data-contrast=\"auto\">, since the fall of Kabul to the Taliban in August 2021, the United States has accepted some 90,000 Afghan refugees. Most all of these refugees, worked with American entities in Afghanistan before the Taliban takeover.\u00a0 Being compelled to leave one\u2019s homeland is an inherently traumatic and tragic experience. Yet, like many of our ancestors, the Afghan refugees are finding a new life and hope in the United States. Bohanon thinks of his French-Huguenot heritage, Horowitz his Hungarian-Jewish heritage. We see this new hope for the Afghans because Muncie, Indiana, is on the frontlines of the resettlement efforts.\u00a0<\/span><span data-ccp-props=\"{&quot;335559731&quot;:720}\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-contrast=\"auto\">At latest count, some 38 households with 144 people from Afghanistan have settled in Muncie. This resettlement resulted from a concerted community-wide effort to host these refugees as Muncie\u2019s \u201cnew neighbors.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 These new neighbors are working, typically in manufacturing jobs, earning $17-$22 an hour (plus benefits) and taking as much overtime as possible. Most households have at least one member with an Indiana driver\u2019s license. The new immigrants are or are well on their way to becoming self-sufficient community members. Many with families left behind in Afghanistan can send life-saving remittances to their relatives back home.\u00a0<\/span><span data-ccp-props=\"{}\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-contrast=\"auto\">One local company owner confided to Bohanon that his new Afghan employees had \u201csaved the company\u201d from shut down. The firm had difficulty attracting reliable workers at wage and benefit levels viable for continued operations. The new Afghan employees are reliable, hard-working, and productive. Bohanon asked the owner if we could write an op-ed highlighting his firm\u2019s experience. The owner declined: \u201cI don\u2019t want to lose them.\u201d Far from being a \u201cthreat or drain\u201d to the Muncie economy, the Afghan neighbors are helping sustain and revitalize our city.\u00a0<\/span><span data-ccp-props=\"{}\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-contrast=\"auto\">Midwesterners are not prone to bragging. Yet Muncie has much to be proud of. In a city of around 65,000, we have resettled 22 Afghan refugees per 10,000 original residents. That compares with a national average of 2.7 Afghan refugees per 10,000 original residents. We are punching at over eight times our weight. You have to love win-wins!\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Originally written on 6\/20\/2023 June 20th is World Refugee Day. The United Nations reports that 20 people per minute \u201cleave everything behind to escape war, persecution or terror.\u201d That adds up to about 10.5 million additional refugees per year. Before the war in Ukraine displaced millions of people, nearly seventy percent of displaced persons came [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":112,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[795],"tags":[803,335,801,438,804,798,797,802,799,206,66,35,800,221,796],"class_list":["post-75","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-immigration","tag-afghan","tag-community","tag-kabul","tag-midwest","tag-muncie","tag-persecution","tag-refugee","tag-taliban","tag-terror","tag-ukraine","tag-united-nations","tag-united-states","tag-voice-of-america","tag-war","tag-world-refugee-day"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Muncie\u2019s New Neighbors \u2013 by Dr. Cecil Bohanon and Dr. John Horowitz - Econ Briefs<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/people.bsu.edu\/econbriefs\/2025\/05\/09\/muncies-new-neighbors-by-dr-cecil-bohanon-and-dr-john-horowitz\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Muncie\u2019s New Neighbors \u2013 by Dr. Cecil Bohanon and Dr. John Horowitz - Econ Briefs\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Originally written on 6\/20\/2023 June 20th is World Refugee Day. 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