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on Economics of Human Migration |
| By: | Mohamed Amara (University of Tunis) |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates the impact of sub-Saharan African immigrants on the Tunisian labor market, as well as their economic, social, and psychological integration pat- terns, with a focus on the migration influx since the Tunisian uprising of 2010-11. Using annual micro-level household labor force surveys and data from the last two population censuses on the concentration of immigrants by country of origin, we identify the impact of sub-Saharan Africans on the Tunisian labor market. Furthermore, the pa- per uses the first Tunisia Households International Migration Survey (Tunisia-HIMS) to understand the labor market results of sub-Saharan immigrants and their social integration compared to immigrants of other origin. Using a difference-in-differences (DiD) research design, we find a negative and significant immediate impact of sub- Saharan immigrants on the average annual earnings of local workers in micro-firms in the retail trade and food service sectors between 2011 and 2014. After 2014, there is a significant negative impact on employment in low value-added sectors, particularly in the building sector. The results of the Multidimensional Integration Index show that social and psychological integration is particularly challenging for sub-Saharan immigrants, especially for young people, the uneducated and women. |
| Date: | 2025–12–15 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:erg:wpaper:1815 |
| By: | James J. Feigenbaum; Yi-Ju Hung; Marco Tabellini; Monia Tomasella |
| Abstract: | We study the effects of immigration restrictions on the intergenerational mobility of US-born men in the United States. We link US-born sons observed in 1900, 1920, and 1940 full-count Censuses to their fathers, and construct a measure of county-level exposure to the 1920s immigration acts, which sharply curtailed immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe. Exploiting this policy-induced variation, we find that the quotas reduced intergenerational mobility among US-born white men, but had no adverse effect for Black men. Among whites, losses were smaller for sons of richer fathers, who were more likely to migrate away from highly exposed areas. Evidence from the 1940 Census indicates that exposed white men were less likely to be employed and earned lower wages in adulthood, consistent with both occupational downgrading and reduced productivity within occupations. We show that these effects operated through both reduced immigrant–native complementarities and incomplete substitution from unrestricted migration, while human capital investment can explain at most only a modest part of the total effect. |
| JEL: | J15 J62 K37 N32 |
| Date: | 2026–01 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:34775 |
| By: | Nicolás Irazoque Sillerico (IIE-FCE-UNLP) |
| Abstract: | This paper provides the first estimate of the impact of the Venezuelan exodus on Colombian students’ learning. To identify the impact, I use the reopening of the ColombianVenezuelan border in 2016 as a natural experiment and propose a differences-in-differences design. The results indicate that, on average, native high school students exposed to immigrants on the schools experience a decrease of 1.8% of a standard deviation in their academic performance and the effect is persistent for the first four years and tends to zero after that. A possible mechanism for this negative effect is that teachers allocate class time to assist lower-achieving Venezuelans. This effect becomes insignificant when the concentration of immigrants is higher. The negative effect is larger for women, for Colombians with high achievement, with highly educated mothers, and for natives who attend schools with high average scores and a high concentration of educated mothers. |
| JEL: | I21 J15 J24 |
| Date: | 2026–01 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dls:wpaper:0364 |
| By: | Alberto Ciancio; Camilo Garcia-Jimeno |
| Abstract: | Immigration enforcement affects millions of individuals who make daily economic decisions under uncertainty about state action. Using data from 2014 to 2018, we study how households learn about and respond to enforcement risk by combining daily bank account transaction data with arrest-level records of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations. We show that, during that period, ICE enforcement followed predictable weekday patterns and that communities with large immigrant populations learned these patterns over time: Consumption is depressed not only on raid days but also seven days before and after—the same weekday, and bounces back in between—, indicating that behavior responds to beliefs about enforcement risk, not just to realized enforcement. To distinguish permanently foregone consumption from activity shifted to safer days, we estimate a structural model of consumption with pent-up demand and Bayesian learning. Roughly half of the immediate decline in consumption is recovered through subsequent rebound, while the remainder reflects genuinely foregone activity. Counterfactual exercises quantify the welfare costs of living under enforcement risk and the value of information. Eliminating enforcement risk entirely would increase Hispanic foreign born consumption by 3.6 percent. However, when enforcement is removed and immigrants must learn that their environment has changed, only 42 percent of the potential gains materialize within the first year. The remaining losses reflect learning frictions: even after state action ceases, beliefs must adjust. |
| Keywords: | Immigration enforcement, Bayesian learning, beliefs, pent-up demand |
| JEL: | D83 D84 H11 J15 K37 |
| Date: | 2026–01 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:gla:glaewp:2026_02 |
| By: | Albarello, Alessio; Boix, Carles |
| Abstract: | We examine the impact of 1990 and 2000 laws of citizenship in Germany, which liberalized the path to the acquisition of citizenship, on the national identity of immigrants. Leveraging the exogenous variation in waiting time for naturalization generated by those two reforms, we find that immigrants who benefited from less restrictive conditions to become citizens developed a stronger national identification with Germany, both after and during their waiting time for naturalization. The effect was particularly strong for women and for those immigrants that were older at the time of their arrival. A higher attachment to Germany seems to have been mainly driven by psychological and socioeconomic mechanisms: a more liberal regime reduced subjective concerns about discrimination, heightened immigrants’ social and political participation, and fostered their use of the German language. |
| Date: | 2026–01–20 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:osf:socarx:2zy64_v1 |