How do socio-economic inequalities in advanced post-industrial countries determine immigration policy preferences? To what extent labor market institutions condition the relationship between unemployment risks and immigration policy demands? I hypothesize that labor market institutions, namely compensation and protection regimes, significantly condition the positive relationship between unemployment risks and restrictiveness demands through their indirect effects. I apply multi-level estimations using the European Social Survey from 2002 to 2010 in 16 European countries. The findings reveal a significant job competition effect captured by workers' relative risk exposure associated with more restrictive immigration policy demands. Risk based attitudinal differences decrease with greater employment protection legislation. Only for workers with fixed contract, contexts with more expansive unemployment compensation policies increase the effect of relative unemployment risk. Overall, this paper contributes to the scholarly work on the determinants of political preferences in advanced post-industrial democracies.