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on Economics of Human Migration |
| By: | Gehrsitz, Markus (University of Strathclyde); Ungerer, Martin (ZEW Mannheim) |
| Abstract: | Millions of refugees made their way to Europe between 2014 and 2015, with over one million arriving in Germany alone. Yet, little is known about the impact of this inflow on labor markets, crime, and voting behavior. This article uses administrative data on refugee allocation and provides an evaluation of the short-run consequences of the refugee inflow. Our identification strategy exploits that a scramble for accommodation determined the assignment of refugees to German counties resulting in exogeneous variations in the number of refugees per county within and across states. Our estimates suggest that migrants have not displaced native workers but have themselves struggled to find gainful employment. We find very small increases in crime in particular with respect to drug offenses and fare-dodging. Our analysis further suggests that counties which experience a larger influx see neither more nor less support for the main anti-immigrant party than counties which experience small migrant inflows. |
| Keywords: | immigration, refugees, unemployment, crime, voting |
| JEL: | J6 J15 K4 D72 |
| Date: | 2017–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10494&r=mig |
| By: | Meng, Xin (Australian National University); Xue, Sen (Jinan University) |
| Abstract: | Over the past two decades, more than 160 million rural residents have migrated to cities in China. They are usually separated from their rural families and work in an unfamiliar, and sometimes hostile, city environment. This paper investigates to what extent city social networks alleviate mental health problems among these migrants. Using the longitudinal migrant survey from the Rural-to-Urban Migration in China (RUMiC) project, we find that larger social networks are significantly correlated with fewer mental health problems in both OLS and fixed effect estimates. To mitigate the endogeneity issue, we use past rainfall in the home county and the distance between home village and the closest transportation centre as the instrument variables for city social networks. The instrument variable estimates and fixed effect instrumental variable estimates suggest that an additional person in the city social networks of migrants reduces GHQ 12 by 0.12 to 0.16 Likert points. The results are robust for migrants who are less educated, who work long hours and who do not have access to social insurances in the city. |
| Keywords: | mental health, social networks, migration, China |
| JEL: | I12 I18 J61 |
| Date: | 2017–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10481&r=mig |
| By: | Dibeh, Ghassan (American University of Beirut); Fakih, Ali (Lebanese American University); Marrouch, Walid (Lebanese American University) |
| Abstract: | This paper studies the determinants of youth emigration decisions, which is considered to be one of the main causes of 'Brain Drain' in Arab Mediterranean Countries (AMCs). We focus on the case of Lebanon using a unique dataset covering young people aged 15 to 29 from the year 2016. The aim of the paper is to identify the profile of youth's propensity to emigrate from Lebanon. The empirical results indicate that youth from non-wealthy backgrounds living in smaller dwellings have a higher propensity to emigrate. It is also found that being male and unemployed has a positive incidence on migration. Moreover, university education promotes the willingness to emigrate; while residents of poor regions are more likely to express such willingness. Finally, the paper provides some insights for policymakers. |
| Keywords: | emigration, youth, Lebanon, probit model |
| JEL: | C25 J60 O15 |
| Date: | 2017–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10493&r=mig |
| By: | Economidou, Claire; Karamanis, Dimitris; Kechrinioti, Alexandra; Xesfingi, Sofia |
| Abstract: | Migration has strongly manifested itself to historic highs, creating divisive views among politicians, policy makers and individuals. The present paper studies the Europeans’ attitudes toward immigration and the contextual factors that shape these attitudes. Based on 267,282 respondents from 22 countries and over the period 2002-2014, we find that despite the eventful past years, Europeans, on average, are still positive toward immigrants with the North European countries to be the most xenophile to immigrants of all backgrounds. High educational level and political orientation (right-wing) are among the most important individual characteristics that associate with xenophile and xenophobic sentiments, respectively. Macroeconomic conditions and ethnic diverse environments play a very important role in shaping public attitudes. A salient finding of our analysis is that regardless of the impact of other contextual factors, individuals (and countries) with high social capital do exhibit more positive attitudes toward immigration than the rest of the population (countries). Social capital further moderates the negative effects of any "perceived threat" on people’s opinions about immigrants. |
| Keywords: | immigration, social capital, public attitude, survey, Europe |
| JEL: | C25 F22 J61 O52 |
| Date: | 2017–01–31 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:76511&r=mig |
| By: | Iftikhar, Zainab (Center for Mathematical Economics, Bielefeld University); Zaharieva, Anna (Center for Mathematical Economics, Bielefeld University) |
| Abstract: | In this study we develop and calibrate a search and matching model of the German labour market and analyze the impact of recent immigration. Our model has two production sectors (manufacturing and services), two skill groups and two ethnic groups of workers (natives and immigrants). Moreover, we allow for the possibility of self-employment, endogenous price and wage setting and fiscal redistribution policy. We find that search frictions are less important for wages of the low skilled, especially in manufacturing, whereas wages of the high skilled are more sensitive to their outside opportunities. Furthermore, employment chances of immigrant workers are up to four times lower than employment chances of native workers, especially in the high skill segment. Our results show that recent immigration to Germany, including refugees, has a moderate negative effect on the welfare of low skill workers in manufacturing (-0.6%), but all other worker groups are gaining from immigration, with high skill service employees gaining the most (+4.3%). This is because the productivity of high (low) skill workers is increasing (decreasing) and there is a higher demand for services. The overall effect of recent immigration is estimated at +1.6%. Finally, we observe that productive capacities of immigrant workers are underutilized in Germany and a policy implementing equal employment opportunities can generate a welfare gain equal to +0.9% with all worker groups (weakly) gaining due to the redistribution. |
| Keywords: | search frictions, immigration, general equilibrium, redistribution, welfare |
| Date: | 2016–10–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bie:wpaper:568&r=mig |
| By: | Tripathi, Sabyasachi; Kaur, Hardeep |
| Abstract: | The present paper tries to investigate the relevant determinants of rural to urban migration in large agglomerations/cities in India. OLS regression analysis is used in this paper to analyse data pertaining to 51 large cities in India by using data from Census of India and unit level data of National Sample Survey (NSS) on employment and unemployment and consumption expenditure data. The OLS regression results show that city-wise employment and unemployment situation (measured by male self employed, not in labour force male, male casual labourer) have a negative impact on city level rural to urban migration. The level of poverty (measured by poverty head count ratio) and inequality conditions (measured by Gini coefficients) of a city also has a negative impact. However, infrastructure condition (availability of total number of electricity connection) of a city has a positive impact on city-wise rural to urban migration. Economic conditions also matters higher level of rural to urban migration. Finally, it suggests that cities need to equip themselves with better infrastructural facilities along with higher job opportunities to encourage urbanization through rural-urban migration for higher and sustainable economic growth in India. |
| Keywords: | Urbanization, rural to urban migration, urban economic growth, India. |
| JEL: | O10 O15 R12 |
| Date: | 2017–01–30 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:76484&r=mig |
| By: | Clemens, Michael A. (Center for Global Development) |
| Abstract: | The effect of foreign labor on native employment within an occupation depends on native labor supply to that occupation – which is rarely directly measured – even if native and foreign labor are perfect substitutes in production. This paper uses two natural quasiexperiments to directly compare foreign to native labor supply in manual farm work. The first quasi-experiment is a legal requirement for employers to demand native labor with infinite elasticity at the wage earned by migrants; the second is a large exogenous shock to native workers' reserve option. Together these offer what is essentially a natural audit study in which tens of thousands of 'immigrant jobs' were offered to native workers with a range of exogenously varying terms. It uses novel data on the universe of domestic applicants to tens of thousands of farm jobs in the state of North Carolina over a 15 year period. The wage elasticity of unemployed domestic workers' relative labor supply is 0.0015. This implies that the effect of migrant labor supply on native employment is close to zero within this occupation, and may be positive outside it. Job-specific estimates of this kind are useful alongside more generalized evaluations of immigration because immigration policy often regulates access to specific occupations. |
| Keywords: | immigrant, immigration, displacement, visa, labor-market, employment, wage, farm, agriculture, natural experiment, United States, Mexico |
| JEL: | F22 J61 O15 |
| Date: | 2017–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10492&r=mig |