The objective of this book is to analyze the economic and social impact of international migration on labor sending and labor receiving countries in the East Asia region.
... See More + More specifically, the book seeks: (a) to examine the impact of international migration on key development indicators, including poverty, investment, labor force participation, labor productivity and wages; (b) to evaluate current government structures and institutions for managing migration, with a view to identifying future policies for maximizing the benefits of international labor migration. The book includes new work on these key policy issues from six East Asian countries: three labor sending countries (Indonesia, Philippines and Vietnam) and three labor receiving countries (Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand).
See Less -
General Economy, Macroeconomics and Growth Study 93255 JUN 01, 2014
Discussions of high-skilled mobility typically evoke migration patterns from poorer to wealthier countries, which ignore movements to and between developing countries.
... See More + This paper presents, for the first time, a global overview of human capital mobility through bilateral migration stocks by gender and education in 1990 and 2000, and calculation of nuanced brain drain indicators. Building on newly collated data, the paper uses a novel estimation procedure based on a pseudo-gravity model, then identifies key determinants of international migration, and subsequently uses estimated parameters to impute missing data. Non-OECD destinations account for one-third of skilled-migration, while OECD destinations are declining in relative importance.
See Less -
Policy Research Working Paper WPS6863 MAY 01, 2014
Artuc, Erhan; Docquier, Frederic; Ozden, Caglar; Parsons, Christopher
The authors use an original panel dataset of migrant departures from the Philippines to identify the responsiveness of migrant numbers and wages to gross domestic product (GDP) shocks in destination countries.
... See More + The authors find a large, significant response of migrant numbers to GDP shocks at destination, but no significant wage response. This is consistent with binding minimum wages for migrant labor. This result implies that labor market imperfections that make international migration attractive also make migrant flows more sensitive to global business cycles. Difference-in-differences analysis of a minimum wage change for maids confirms that minimum wages bind and demand is price sensitive without these distortions.
See Less -
Journal Article 92929 APR 01, 2014
McKenzie, David; Theoharides, Caroline; Yang, Dean
The Employing Skilled Expatriates indicators analyze the skilled immigration regime relevant for foreign direct investment across 93 economies to provide comparable information about this regulatory space.
... See More + The indicators focus on restrictions that control the inflow of skilled immigrants (quotas); the ease of hiring skilled expatriates (time and procedural steps to obtain a temporary work permit, existence of online application systems, availability of a one-stop shop and fast-tracking option); and the existence of a path to permanent residency and citizenship as well as the existence of spousal work permits. As governments increasingly seek to attract foreign direct investment as a driver of long-term development, reforming the investment climate -- including the skilled immigration regime -- is one policy option to consider. This analysis shows a positive correlation between the Employing Skilled Expatriates index and foreign direct investment inflows. As measured by the Employing Skilled Expatriates index, there is room for economies with a need for skilled workers to improve their immigration regimes as one means of attracting more foreign direct investment. In Singapore and the Republic of Korea, it only takes ten days on average to obtain a temporary work permit. In Honduras, the same process can take up to 22 weeks. The global average to obtain a temporary work permit is eight weeks. The process is the fastest in the East Asia and the Pacific region where it takes five weeks. With 11 weeks, the processing time in the Middle East and North Africa region is the slowest.
See Less -
Policy Research Working Paper WPS6708 NOV 01, 2013
Most migration surveys do not ask about the legal status of migrants due to concerns about the sensitivity of this question. List randomization is a technique that has been used in a number of other social science applications to elicit sensitive information.
... See More + This paper trials this technique by adding it to surveys conducted in Ethiopia, Mexico, Morocco, and the Philippines. It shows how, in principal, this can be used both to give an estimate of the overall rate of illegal migration in the population being surveyed, as well as to determine illegal migration rates for subgroups such as more or less educated households. The results suggest that there is some useful information in this method: higher rates of illegal migration in countries where illegal migration is thought to be more prevalent and households who say they have a migrant are more likely to report having an illegal migrant. Nevertheless, some of the other findings also suggest some possible inconsistencies or noise in the conclusions obtained using this method. The authors suggest directions for future attempts to implement this approach in migration surveys.
See Less -
Policy Research Working Paper WPS6426 APR 01, 2013
The international migration of high-skilled workers may trigger productivity effects at the macro level such that the wage rate of skilled workers increases in host countries and decrease in source countries.
... See More + The authors exploit data on international bilateral migration flows and provide evidence consistent with this theoretical hypothesis. They propose various instrumentation strategies to identify the causal effect of skilled migration on log differences of GDP per capita, total factor productivity, and the wages of skilled workers between pairs of source and destination countries. These strategies aim to address the endogeneity problem that arises when international wage differences affect migration decisions.
See Less -
Policy Research Working Paper WPS6317 JAN 01, 2013
Policy makers apply skilled labor gap projections to their immigration policies in a number of ways including: differentiating immigration policies by region, based on skills supply and demand mismatches; introducing more flexibility in admissions policies to acquire specific skills; and designing programs to actively attract immigrants with specific needed skills to specific occupations.
... See More + Challenges in projecting an economyapos;s demand for skilled foreign labor may include bias and gaps in available data sources, as well as difficulty determining the most appropriate methodology and impediments posed by imperfect methodological assumptions. A difficult economic context may provide further challenges to projecting and filling foreign labor needs.
See Less -
Policy makers apply skilled labor gap projections to their immigration policies in a number of ways including: differentiating immigration policies by region, based on skills supply and demand mismatches; introducing more flexibility in admissions policies to acquire specific skills; and designing programs to actively attract immigrants with specific needed skills to specific occupations.
... See More + Challenges in projecting an economyapos;s demand for skilled foreign labor may include bias and gaps in available data sources, as well as difficulty determining the most appropriate methodology and impediments posed by imperfect methodological assumptions. A difficult economic context may provide further challenges to projecting and filling foreign labor needs.
See Less -
The initial occupational placements of male immigrants in the United States labor market vary significantly by country of origin even when education and other individual factors are taken into account.
... See More + Does the heterogeneity persist over time? Using data from the 1980, 1990, and 2000 Censuses, this paper finds that the performance of migrants from countries with lower initial occupational placement levels improves at a higher rate compared with that of migrants originating from countries with higher initial performance levels. Nevertheless, the magnitude of convergence suggests that full catch-up is unlikely. The impact of country specific attributes on the immigrantsapos; occupational placement occurs mainly through their effect on initial performance and they lose significance when initial occupational levels are controlled for in the estimation.
See Less -
Policy Research Working Paper WPS6140 JUL 01, 2012
The authors use an original panel dataset of migrant departures from the Philippines to identify the responsiveness of migrant numbers and wages to gross domestic product shocks in destination countries.
... See More + They find a large significant elasticity of migrant numbers to gross domestic product shocks at destination, but no significant wage response. This is consistent with binding minimum wages for migrant labor. This result implies that labor market imperfections that make international migration attractive also make migrant flows more sensitive to global business cycles. Difference-in-differences analysis of a minimum wage change for maids confirms that minimum wages bind and demand is price sensitive without these distortions.
See Less -
Policy Research Working Paper WPS6041 APR 01, 2012
McKenzie, David; Theoharides, Caroline; Yang, Dean
Immigrants tend to be more negatively affected by economic crisis than natives, particularly when governments apply strict immigration controls.
... See More + With the onset of the financial crisis in the latter half of 2008, there were widespread concerns: would migrants return to sending countries and communities in large numbers, adding further economic woes to countries already facing difficulties? Would remittance flows slow and potentially cease? The literature offers little guidance on these questions. It is always a challenge to collect data, analyze, interpret, and make recommendations as the phenomenon under study is still unfolding to reveal new turns and twists. The most recent financial crisis and its repercussions are yet to be completed, and scholars have only begun processing the event. This volume is an effort to bring together in one place fresh thinking and evidence from around the world on the outcomes of mobility in the context of global financial crisis. This book is perhaps the first comprehensive study of remittances during the financial crisis and is a timely addition to the literature. It comes at a time when countries are grappling with the global financial crisis and itapos;s after effects. The resilience of remittances is good news for developing countries, but leveraging remittances for socioeconomic development remains a key challenge. The studies in this book identify and discuss key patterns observed in remittance practices across the world and possibilities for the future.
See Less -
This paper reviews the existing literature on the impact of migrants networks on the patterns of international migration. It covers the theoretical channels at stake in the global effect of the networks.
... See More + It identifies the key issues, namely the impact on size, selection and concentration of the migration flows. The paper also reviews the empirical hurdles that the researchers face in assessing the importance of networks. The key issues concern the choice of micro vs a macro approach, the definition of a network, the access to suitable data and the adoption of econometric methods accounting for the main features of those data. Finally, the paper reports a set of estimation outcomes reflecting the main findings of the macro approach.
See Less -
Policy Research Working Paper WPS5721 JUN 01, 2011
Global matrices of bilateral migrant stocks spanning 19602000 are presented, disaggregated by gender and based primarily on the foreign-born definition of migrants.
... See More + More than one thousand census and population register records are combined to construct decennial matrices corresponding to the five census rounds between 1960 and 2000. For the first time, a comprehensive picture of bilateral global migration over the second half of the 20th century emerges. The data reveal that the global migrant stock increased from 92 million in 1960 to 165 million in 2000. Quantitatively, migration between developing countries dominates, constituting half of all international migration in 2000. When the partition of India and the dissolution of the Soviet Union are accounted for, migration between developing countries is remarkably stable over the period. Migration from developing to developed countries is the fastest growing component of international migration in both absolute and relative terms. The United States has remained the most important migrant destination in the world, home to one fifth of the worlds migrants and the top destination for migrants from some 60 sending countries. Migration to Western Europe has come largely from elsewhere in Europe. The oil-rich Persian Gulf countries emerge as important destinations for migrants from the Middle East and North Africa and South and Southeast Asia. Finally, although the global migrant stock is predominantly male, the proportion of female migrants increased noticeably between 1960 and 2000. The number of women rose in every region except South Asia.
See Less -
Policy Research Working Paper WPS5709 JUN 01, 2011
Ozden, Caglar; Parsons, Christopher R.; Schiff, Maurice; Walmsley, Terrie L.
High-skilled emigration is an emotive issue that in popular discourse is often referred to as brain drain, conjuring images of extremely negative impacts on developing countries.
... See More + Recent discussions of brain gain, diaspora effects, and other advantages of migration have been used to argue against this, but much of the discussion has been absent of evidence. This paper builds upon a new wave of empirical research to answer eight key questions underlying much of the brain drain debate: 1) What is brain drain? 2) Why should economists care about it? 3) Is brain drain increasing? 4) Is there a positive relationship between skilled and unskilled migration? 5) What makes brain drain more likely? 6) Does brain gain exist? 7) Do high-skilled workers remit, invest, and share knowledge back home? and 8) What do we know about the fiscal and production externalities of brain drain?
See Less -
Policy Research Working Paper WPS5668 MAY 01, 2011
This paper aims to investigate empirically how international migration and remittances in Indonesia, particularly female migration, affect child outcomes and labor supply behavior in sending households.
... See More + The authors analyze the Indonesia Family Life Survey data set and apply an instrumental variable estimation method, using historical migration networks as instruments for migration and remittance receipts. The study finds that, in Indonesia, the impacts of international migration on sending households are likely to vary depending on the gender of the migrants. On average, migration reduces the working hours of remaining household members, but this effect is not observed in households with female migrants. At the same time, female migration and their remittances tend to reduce child labor. The estimated impacts of migration and remittances on school enrollment are not statistically significant, but this result is interesting in that the directions of the effects can be opposite when the migrant is male or female
See Less -
Policy Research Working Paper WPS5591 MAR 01, 2011
Immigrants in Rome or Paris are more visible to the public eye than the Italian or French engineers in Silicon Valley, especially when it comes to the debate on the effects of immigration on the employment and wages of natives in high-income countries.
... See More + This paper argues that such public fears, especially in European countries are misplaced; instead, more concern should be directed towards emigration. Using a new dataset on migration flows by education levels for the period 1990-2000, the results show the following: First, immigration had zero to small positive long-run effect on the average wages of natives, ranging from zero in Italy to +1.7 percent in Australia. Second, emigration had a mild to significant negative long-run effect ranging from zero for the US to -0.8 percent in the UK. Third, over the period 1990-2000, immigration generally improved the income distribution of European countries while emigration worsened it by increasing the wage gap between the high and low skilled natives. These patterns hold true using a range of parameters for the simulations, accounting for the estimates of undocumented immigrants, and correcting for the quality of schooling and/or labor-market downgrading of skills. All results go counter to the popular beliefs about migration, but they are due to the higher skill intensity of both emigration and immigration relative to non-migrants.
See Less -
Policy Research Working Paper WPS5556 FEB 01, 2011
Migration is an important yet neglected determinant of institutions. This paper documents the channels through which emigration affects home country institutions and considers dynamic-panel regressions for a large sample of developing countries.
... See More + The authors find that emigration and human capital both increase democracy and economic freedom. This implies that unskilled (skilled) emigration has a positive (ambiguous) impact on institutional quality. Simulations show an impact of skilled emigration that is generally positive, significant for a few countries and for many countries once incentive effects of emigration on human capital formation are accounted for.
See Less -
Policy Research Working Paper WPS5557 FEB 01, 2011
Docquier, Frederic; Lodigiani, Elisabetta; Rapoport, Hillel; Schiff, Maurice
Global matrices of bilateral migrant stocks spanning 1960-2000 are presented, disaggregated by gender and based primarily on the foreign-born definition of migrants.
... See More + More than one thousand census and population register records are combined to construct decennial matrices corresponding to the five census rounds between 1960 and 2000. For the first time, a comprehensive picture of bilateral global migration over the second half of the 20th century emerges. The data reveal that the global migrant stock increased from 92 million in 1960 to 165 million in 2000. Quantitatively, migration between developing countries dominates, constituting half of all international migration in 2000. When the partition of India and the dissolution of the Soviet Union are accounted for, migration between developing countries is remarkably stable over the period. Migration from developing to developed countries is the fastest growing component of international migration in both absolute and relative terms. The United States has remained the most important migrant destination in the world, home to one fifth of the worldapos;s migrants and the top destination for migrants from some 60 sending countries. Migration to Western Europe has come largely from elsewhere in Europe. The oil-rich Persian Gulf countries emerge as important destinations for migrants from the Middle East and North Africa and South and Southeast Asia. Finally, although the global migrant stock is predominantly male, the proportion of female migrants increased noticeably between 1960 and 2000. The number of women rose in every region except South Asia.
See Less -
Journal Article 75257 FEB 01, 2011
Ozden, Caglar; Parsons, Christopher R.; Schiff, Maurice; Walmsley, Terrie L.