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on Economics of Human Migration |
| By: | Olga Nottmeyer |
| Abstract: | Taking advantage of the panel structure of the data, the impact of intermarriage on labor market productivity as measured by earnings is examined. Contrarily to previous studies which rely on instrumental variable techniques, selection issues are addressed within a fixed effects framework. The model accounts for short and long term effects as well as general differences between those who intermarry and those who do not. Once unobserved heterogeneity is incorporated, advantageous effects from intermarriage vanish and do not differ from premiums from marriage between immigrants. However, immigrants who eventually intermarry receive greater returns to experience indicating better labor market integration. |
| Keywords: | intermarriage, integration, labor market, migration |
| JEL: | J1 J12 |
| Date: | 2010 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:diw:diwwpp:dp1044&r=mig |
| By: | Gil S. Epstein (Department of Economics, Bar Ilan University, IZA and CReAM); Ira N. Gang (Department of Economics, Rutgers University, IZA and CReAM) |
| Abstract: | Culture is not new to the study of migration. It has lurked beneath the surface for some time, occasionally protruding openly into the discussion, usually under some pseudonym. The authors bring culture into the open. They are concerned with how culture manifests itself in the migration process for three groups of actors: the migrants, those remaining in the sending areas, and people already living in the recipient locations. The topics vary widely. What unites the authors is an understanding that though actors behave differently, within a group there are economically important shared beliefs (customs, values, attitudes, etc.), which we commonly refer to as culture. Culture and identify play a central role in our understanding of migration as an economic phenomenon; but what about them matters? Properly, we should be looking at the determinants of identity and the determinants of culture (prices and incomes, broadly defined). But this is not what is done. Usually identity and culture appear in economics articles as a black box. Here we try to begin to break open the black box. |
| Date: | 2010–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crm:wpaper:201020&r=mig |
| By: | Howard Bodenhorn; Carolyn M. Moehling; Anne Morrison Piehl |
| Abstract: | Past studies of the empirical relationship between immigration and crime during the first major wave of immigration have focused on violent crime in cities and have relied on data with serious limitations regarding nativity information. We analyze administrative data from Pennsylvania prisons, with high quality information on nativity and demographic characteristics. The latter allow us to construct incarceration rates for detailed population groups using U.S. Census data. The raw gap in incarceration rates for the foreign and native born is large, in accord with the extremely high concern at the time about immigrant criminality. But adjusting for age and gender greatly narrows that observed gap. Particularly striking are the urban/rural differences. Immigrants were concentrated in large cities where reported crime rates were higher. However, within rural counties, the foreign born had much higher incarceration rates than the native born. The interaction of nativity with urban residence explains much of the observed aggregate differentials in incarceration rates. Finally, we find that the foreign born, especially the Irish, consistently have higher incarceration rates for violent crimes, but from 1850 to 1860 the natives largely closed the gap with the foreign born for property offenses. |
| JEL: | J01 K4 N3 |
| Date: | 2010–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:16266&r=mig |
| By: | Lilo Locher |
| Abstract: | Using uncertainty about the future returns to migration, the option value theory of migration can explain low migration rates in spite of huge wage differences. This paper presents the theory in a simple two-period framework and uses ethnic Germans in the CIS to find empirical support for it. Since July 1990, ethnic German immigration from Eastern Europe and the CIS is restricted by means of a protracted application mechanism. In our data on ethnic Germans in Russia and Kazakhstan in the 1990s, we use information on the stage of the application process, migration intentions and ethnicity to construct close proxies for the option value of postponing migration and for migration costs. The link between the two is shown to be as theory predicts. [IZA Discussion Paper No. 405] |
| Keywords: | Migration, option theory, ethnic Germans |
| Date: | 2010 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ess:wpaper:id:2763&r=mig |
| By: | Niknami, Susan (Stockholm University Linnaeus Center for Integration Studies - SULCIS) |
| Abstract: | This study uses extensive Swedish register data to analyze the intergenerational transmission of education between immigrant mothers and their daughters. The results show that the transmission is only slightly lower among daughters of immigrant mothers compared to native daughters. The educational relationship between mothers and daughters is further found to be nonlinear. For both groups, the intergenerational link is weaker among daughters of poorly educated mothers. Moreover, the average transmission differs across immigrant groups but these differences can be explained partly by dissimilar maternal educational backgrounds. In addition, the differences between women with an immigrant background and native women have decreased across the two generations. Finally, the educational attainment of an immigrant group has a positive but weak impact on daughters’ educational outcomes. |
| Keywords: | Immigrants; Education; Intergenerational transmission |
| JEL: | I20 J15 J62 |
| Date: | 2010–08–14 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:sulcis:2010_010&r=mig |
| By: | Grady, Patrick |
| Abstract: | This paper utilizes the comprehensive data on income taxes paid by immigrants and others and the government transfer payments received by immigrants and others provided by the 2006 Census from income tax statistics. The Census data was recently made available to researchers in the 2006 Census PublicUse Microdata File (PUMF), which contains 844,476 records, presenting census data on individuals representing 2.7 per cent of the Canadian population. The analysis revealed that recent immigrants on average only paid about half as much income tax as native Canadians ($4,172.69 per capita compared to $8,130.82). It also showed that the most recent cohort of immigrants from 2000 to 2004 paid only 40 per cent as much income tax as native Canadians. In the Other Government Transfer Income category, which is a catch-all for “all transfer payments, excluding those covered as a separate income source (child benefits, old age security pensions and guaranteed income supplements, Canada or Quebec Pension Plan benefits and employment insurance benefits) received from federal, provincial, territorial or municipal programs,immigrants received per capita amounts in 2005 that are $13.05 less than nonimmigrants so there is no prima facie evidence of disproportionate reliance on social assistance from the Census. The one area where recent immigrants got a disproportionate share of government transfers is child benefits. This reflects their larger number of dependent children, which could be a result of their lower average age or greater proclivity to have children. On the other hand, recent immigrants received a lower per capita amount of employment insurance benefits. This could reflect their tendency to locate in areas with stricter eligibility requirements for EI such as the TorontoMetropolitan Region in 2005. Taking into account Other Government Transfer Income,Child Benefits and Employment Insurance, recent immigrants received $346.15 more per capita from Government Transfers than non-immigrants. In total, this would amount to $534 million, an amount that is small in relation to the fiscal transfer resulting from lower per capita income taxes paid. |
| Keywords: | tax paid by immigrants; transfer payments paid to immigrants |
| JEL: | H22 J61 |
| Date: | 2010–04–26 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:24402&r=mig |
| By: | Grady, Patrick |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the poor performance of recent immigrants to Canada in the labour market as revealed in the Statistics Canada Census 2006 Public Use Microdata File (PUMF). It presents the data which shows that immigrants from less developed countries are doing much worse than immigrants from industrialized countries. Using regression analysis it shows that key explanatory variable for their poor performance are the location of their education, their visible minority status, their language skills, and the level of GDP in their countries of origin. A profiling of immigrants who have done better than non-immigrant Canadians suggests that the performance of immigrants could be improved by utilizing information from the Census on the characteristics of immigrants who succeed in labour markets to improve the selection criteria and distribution of points used in the current scoring system to chose immigrants. |
| Keywords: | wages; recent immigrants to Canada; immigration policy; immigrant labour; human capital |
| JEL: | J61 J24 J23 |
| Date: | 2010–06–27 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:24403&r=mig |
| By: | Matti Sarvimäki (Aalto University School of Economics, Government Institute for Economic Research and London School of Economics); Kari Hämäläinen (Government Institute for Economic Research) |
| Abstract: | The design of the immigration policy is an important and controversial topic in most developed countries. We inform this debate by evaluating the effects of an integration program for immigrants to Finland. The program consists of an individualized sequence of training and subsidized employment. Non-compliance is sanctioned by reductions in welfare benefits. Our empirical strategy exploits a discontinuity that made participation obligatory in May 1999 only for those who had entered the population register after May 1997. The results suggest that the program strongly increased the employment and earnings of immigrants and decreased their dependency on social benefits. |
| Keywords: | Immigrants, assimilation, integration programs, regression-discontinuity. |
| JEL: | J61 J68 H53 |
| Date: | 2010–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crm:wpaper:201019&r=mig |
| By: | John Gibson (University of Waikato); David Mckenzie (World Bank) |
| Abstract: | Brain drain has long been a common concern for migrant-sending countries, particularly for small countries where high-skilled emigration rates are highest. However, while economic theory suggests a number of possible benefits, in addition to costs, from skilled emigration, the evidence base on many of these is very limited. Moreover, the lessons from case studies of benefits to China and India from skilled emigration may not be relevant to much smaller countries. This paper presents the results of innovative surveys which tracked academic high-achievers from five countries to wherever they moved in the world in order to directly measure at the micro level the channels through which high-skilled emigration affects the sending country. The results show that there are very high levels of emigration and of return migration among the very highly skilled; the income gains to the best and brightest from migrating are very large, and an order of magnitude or more greater than any other effect; there are large benefits from migration in terms of postgraduate education; most high-skilled migrants from poorer countries send remittances; but that involvement in trade and foreign direct investment is a rare occurrence. There is considerable knowledge flow from both current and return migrants about job and study opportunities abroad, but little net knowledge sharing from current migrants to home country governments or businesses. Finally, the fiscal costs vary considerably across countries, and depend on the extent to which governments rely on progressive income taxation. |
| Keywords: | brain drain; brain gain; highly skilled migration |
| JEL: | O15 F22 J61 |
| Date: | 2010–08–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wai:econwp:10/05&r=mig |
| By: | Ruist, Joakim (Department of Economics, School of Business, Economics and Law, Göteborg University); Bigsten, Arne (Department of Economics, School of Business, Economics and Law, Göteborg University) |
| Abstract: | Wage effects of immigration are investigated in a setting with international capital mobility, which eliminates two-thirds of the native wage-effects of immigration. Without international capital mobility, overall gains from migration in the immigration region are only a small fraction of total losses to native workers, but with perfect international capital adjustment, overall gains are larger than total losses to native workers. Two alternative tax policies to eliminate the negative wage-effects of immigration on low skilled native workers are evaluated.<p> |
| Keywords: | International labor migration; wage effects |
| JEL: | F21 J61 |
| Date: | 2010–08–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:gunwpe:0464&r=mig |
| By: | Giles, John; Murtazashvili, Irina |
| Abstract: | This paper proposes a parametric approach to estimating a dynamic binary response panel data model that allows for endogenous contemporaneous regressors. This approach is of particular value for settings in which one wants to estimate the effects of an endogenous treatment on a binary outcome. The model is next used to examinethe impact of rural-urban migration on the likelihood that households in rural China fall below the poverty line. In this application, it is shown that migration is important for reducing the likelihood that poor households remain in poverty and that non-poor households fall into poverty. Furthermore, it is demonstrated that failure to control for unobserved heterogeneity would lead the researcher to underestimate the impact of migrant labor markets on reducing the probability of falling into poverty. |
| Keywords: | Rural Poverty Reduction,Population Policies,Achieving Shared Growth,Debt Markets,Regional Economic Development |
| Date: | 2010–08–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:5400&r=mig |
| By: | Matthias Deschryvere |
| Abstract: | The information on the impact of mobility on society is plenty but scattered. A good understanding of the impact of mobility requires first an understanding of what mobility actually means. This paper lists aspects of mobility that can contribute to a useful conceptualisation. It is found that in its core mobility is about connectivity of individuals. In addition mobility is more than just geographical mobility of human interactions. Mobility also has important temporal and contextual dimensions. Mobile technology has increased mobility in these dimensions and has been the driver of digitalising society into a mobile network society that connects not only individuals but also remote data and objects. There seems to be a need for an in depth conceptualisation of mobility that has to be updated along the lines of a fast moving mobile technology and mobile society |
| Keywords: | mobility, mobile communication, network society |
| JEL: | L96 O30 |
| Date: | 2010–08–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rif:dpaper:1218&r=mig |
| By: | Arroyo, Santiago; Tovar , Luís |
| Abstract: | The objective of this document is to analyze the determinants of the probability that the migrant rural population colombian, will acceded to the contributing regime of health in 2006. We consider a logit model and data of the Encuesta Continua de Hogares, which is applied by the Departamento Administrativo Nacional de Estadística (DANE). The model contains variables such as: sex, age, civil state, head of household, education,education of the head of household and reason of the migration. All the variables including in the model turned out to be signicant. In agreement with the results, to have more years of approved education, to be man, and to be married or in free union they generate a positive effect on the probability of being aliate to the contributing regime of health. Of another side, an increase in the age, being head of household or migrated for involuntary reasons aects the probability that negatively the migrant ones of the countryside accede to the contributing regime. |
| Keywords: | Acceso a Salud. Régimen Contributivo. Modelo Logit. Migrantes. |
| JEL: | J60 C35 I10 |
| Date: | 2009–09–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:24393&r=mig |