MIGRATION,SKILL FORMATION,AND THE WAGE STRUCTURE*

ABSTRACT We analyze the impacts of migration and of labor market integration on the distribution of skills and the wage structure in both the short and the long run. To do so, we develop a framework where workers have heterogeneous skills and where in‐migration expands the range of available skills in the economy. In the short run, this expansion leads to productivity gains, which may more than offset the negative endowment effects of a larger labor supply so that all workers may be better off. In the long run, in‐migration impacts wages further by altering the workers' incentives to acquire skills, thereby affecting the wage structure indirectly by changing the economy's skill composition. Since the short and the long‐run effects of in‐migration on wages may differ, compositional changes may be an important element to take into consideration. A numerical illustration calibrated on U.S. data suggests that the immigration of skilled workers negatively affects the incentives for domestic skill formation, thereby suggesting that endowment effects dominate externalities. We finally extend the model to cope with the simultaneous impacts that migration and skill formation have on the host and the source region, and we show that more migration increases wage disparities and the skill gap across regions.     

No Country for Old People: A Paleodemographic Analysis of Migration Dynamics in Early Andean States

In this paper, we present a paleodemographic interpretation of a complete mortuary population from the site of Rio Muerto (southern Peru) affiliated with the early Andean Tiwanaku state (A.D.500–1000). Although advances in biogeochemical paleomobility studies have revolutionized bioarchaeological approaches to certain aspects of migration, paleodemography continues to offer a valuable complementary perspective on migration and population dynamics. Notably, paleodemography, through reference to Uniformitarian age‐at‐death profiles, is uniquely equipped to identify age‐specific subgroups that are missing from the mortuary population. We argue that the marked absence of adult individuals in the M70B cemetery population is the result of the socially regulated movement of older adults or their remains from the state provinces back to the homeland. We suggest that the particular demographic composition of the Rio Muerto M70 cemetery population, when considered within its cultural context and compared to other available paleodemographic data, reveals potential patterns of adult return migration, and carries important implications for the political and social dynamics of early Andean state society. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Rural Youth Migration Trends in Australia: an Overview of Recent Trends and Two Inland Case Studies

Much of what has been written on the topic of Australian rural youth migration trends and processes has often proceeded from data‐free, or data‐poor grounds. In this context, this paper analyses recent trends in youth (15 to 24 years of age) migration for a temporally‐consistent set of Statistical Divisions (SDs) in inland rural Australia, and for local government areas within the Northern Tablelands and Slopes and Ranges of northern New South Wales and the Western Australian Central Wheatbelt. The paper finds that rates of youth loss from rural regions have increased over the past twenty years. Yet the patterns, processes, causes and impacts of rural youth migration are distributed in a spatially‐uneven fashion. Some remote areas are receiving net migration gains while booming ‘sea change’ coastal regions have experienced heavy losses. While the ‘flight to the bright city lights’ syndrome is evident, relatively high proportions of young people in the Northern SD of NSW move within their immediate region. Nevertheless, some common understandings concerning youth mobility were also confirmed. Gender differentials in migration propensity between women and men are evident even at quite local scales. Young people are also more likely to search out capital cities than the rest of the population. Most inland areas still continue to experience heavy losses of local youth. A more precise understanding of rural youth migration trends is an important stepping stone in the establishment of a reinvigorated research effort into young rural people's perspectives of their changing life chances in their home communities.     

Analysis of Interregional Labor Migration in Spain Using Gross Flows

In this paper we study the economic determinants of Spanish interregional labor force flows from an aggregate perspective. The study is based on a matching model of the labor market applied to migration, and uses gross rather than net flows as other studies do. Among the main results, we find that unemployment increases out-migration because unemployed people search more actively, but when the unemployment rate is above a certain level this effect is reduced. We also find that the rate of change of relative wages is a significant determinant of migration in Spain.     

Transnational Migration and the Economy of Funerals: Changing Practices in Ghana

Migrants are increasingly leading transnational lives, impacting the institutions that shape local economies both in their place of residence and in their home communities. One example of this is the institution of funerals in developing countries. Funerals are becoming multi‐sited events as migrants from developing countries play important roles in the organization, financing and practice of funeral ceremonies in their home countries. Funerals thus give rise to flows of money, goods and people across national borders, ultimately affecting different economies around the world. This article uses a multi‐sited research design to follow the flows associated with a funeral held in a village in the Ashanti Region of Ghana. Detailed data were collected simultaneously in four locations involved in the funeral, and a multiplier analysis was used to trace funeral spending in different locations and sectors. The analysis shows that funeral spending supports various economic sectors in Ghana and across the globe, reinforcing the nature of funerals as (partly) economic events, which should be included in economic analyses of remittances and migration. Funeral practices are modified in various ways to accommodate transnational elements. At the same time, funerals continue to act, even in a transnational context, as occasions for reaffirming ties and a sense of belonging; they form a way for home communities, both rural and urban, to keep migrants interested in them.     

flowAMOEBA: Identifying Regions of Anomalous Spatial Interactions

This study aims at developing a data‐driven and bottom‐up spatial statistic method for identifying regions of anomalous spatial interactions (clusters of extremely high‐ or low‐value spatial flows), based on which it creates a spatial flow weights matrix. The method, dubbed flowAMOEBA, upgrades a multidirectional optimum ecotope‐based algorithm (AMOEBA) from areal data to spatial flow data through a proper spatial flow neighborhood definition. The method has the potential to dramatically change the way we study spatial interactions. First, it breaks the convention that spatial interaction data are always collected and modeled between spatial entities of the same granularity, as it delineates the OD region of anomalous spatial interactions, regardless of the size, shape, scale, or administrative level. Second, the method creates an empirical spatial flow weights matrix that can handle network autocorrelation embedded in spatial interaction modeling, thus improving related policy‐making or problem‐solving strategies. flowAMOEBA is tested and demonstrated on a synthetic data set as well as a county‐to‐county migration data set.     

LOCATION‐SPECIFIC HUMAN CAPITAL,LOCATION CHOICE AND AMENITY DEMAND*

ABSTRACT The role of amenities in the flow of migrants has long been a subject of debate. This paper advances an original model of amenities that work through household production instead of directly through utility. Area characteristics (amenities) affect household production, causing certain kinds of human capital investments to be rewarded more than others. Area heterogeneity thus makes such investments location‐specific. This specificity—along with a period of exogenous location—increases the opportunity costs of moving, diminishes migration flows between dissimilar locations and increases valuation of amenities that were present in the originating area. These theoretical results emphasize people's sorting across areas and thus differ from the results of the standard model of compensating differentials. Empirical tests of the model's predictions using NLSY79 data show that childhood investments affect migration flows in the way proposed by the model.     

TAXATION AND INTERNAL MIGRATION—EVIDENCE FROM THE SWISS CENSUS USING COMMUNITY‐LEVEL VARIATION IN INCOME TAX RATES*

ABSTRACT We investigate the relationship between income tax rate variation and internal migration for the unique case of Switzerland, whose system of determining tax rates primarily at the community level results in enough variation to permit analysis of their influence on migration. Specifically, using Swiss census data, we analyze migratory responses to tax rate variations for various groups defined by age, education, and nationality/residence permit. The results suggest that young Swiss college graduates are most sensitive to tax rate differences, but the estimated effects are not large enough to offset the revenue‐increasing effect of a rise in tax rate. The migratory responses of foreigners and other age‐education groups are even smaller, and reverse causation seems negligible.     

Unequal Knowledges in Jharkhand,India: De‐Romanticizing Women’s Agroecological Expertise

Taking the Jharkhand region of India as a case study, this article uses empirical data to intervene in ‘women, environment and development’ and ecofeminist debates regarding women’s environmental knowledge. The article first outlines the adoption of gender/environmental issues into development planning and considers the dangers of overestimating women’s agroecological knowledges and assuming that they can easily participate in development projects. It then highlights the local complexities of environmental knowledge possession and control with reference to gender and other variations in agricultural participation, decision‐making and knowledge transfers between villagers’ natal and marital places. Particular emphasis is placed on the economic, socio‐cultural and ‘actor’ related factors that supplement gender as an influence on task allocation, decision‐making, knowledge distribution and knowledge articulation. The article concludes that given the socio‐cultural constraints women face in accumulating and vocalizing environmental knowledge, simplistic participatory approaches are unlikely to empower them. Instead, more flexible, site‐specific development initiatives (coupled with wider structural change) are required if opportunities are to be created for women to develop and use their agroecological knowledges.     

THE DETERMINANTS OF THE RECENT INTERREGIONAL MIGRATION FLOWS IN ITALY: A PANEL DATA ANALYSIS*

ABSTRACT This study investigates the determinants of interregional migration flows in Italy in the light of the upsurge occurred in 1996, after two decades of decreasing internal migration rates. The fixed‐effect vector decomposition estimator (FEVD) is applied to a gravity model using bilateral migration flows for the period 1996–2005. It is shown that the FEVD improves the estimates with respect to the traditional panel data estimators. The GDP per capita and the unemployment rate appear to be the key determinants whose changes push migrants out from their regions and direct them to “better off” destinations. Migrants leaving the regions in the Center‐North respond differently to the push and pull forces compared to southern migrants. The dynamic model provides evidence for the presence of social networks, which in this analysis take place for each pair of regions.     

Child Trafficking: ‘Worst Form’ of Child Labour,or Worst Approach to Young Migrants?

This article presents a critique to the human trafficking discourse in relation to child migration, based on data obtained from the anti‐trafficking community in the Greater Mekong Sub‐region combined with an analysis of secondary material. It also presents a set of qualitative accounts of migration at a young age from Lao PDR and Thailand. On this basis a more theorized, grounded and nuanced perspective on child labour migration is developed. This situates child labour migration historically, embeds it within overarching processes of rural transformation and accounts for young migrants’ agency in the social process of migration, the latter shedding light on the social production of exploitation in relation to young migrants.     

An Analysis of Migration Streams for the Canadian Regional System, 1952–1983 1. Migration Probabilities

This is part one of a two-part series that seeks to specify the factors and processes contributing to aggregate change in the Canadian population distribution over the recent past. In part one, we use a model of migration probabilities to identify socioeconomic factors that explain the observed interregional migration flows. In part two, we use an adjustment process for our regional population system to calculate equilibrium population distributions. The estimated migration probabilities of part one are essential for this calculation, thus linking equilibria with the socioeconomic factors previously identified. Disequilibrium, defined as the difference between observed and equilibrium population distributions, is then used to infer relative growth and decline tendencies in the system. We examine and justify our results in the larger context of contemporary Canadian history.     

An Analysis of Migration Streams for the Canadian Regional System, 1952–1983: 2. Disequilibrium

This is part two of a two-part series that seeks to specify the factors and processes contributing to aggregate change in the Canadian population distribution over the recent past. In part one, we use a model of migration probabilities to identify socioeconomic factors that explain the observed interregional migration flows. In part two, we use an adjustment process for our regional population system to calculate equilibrium population distributions. The estimated migration probabilities of part one are essential for this calculation, thus linking equilibria with the socioeconomic factors previously identified. Disequilibrium, defined as the difference between observed and equilibrium population distributions, is then used to infer relative growth and decline tendencies in the system. We examine and justify our results in the larger context of contemporary Canadian history.     

Where does all the talent flow? Migration of young graduates and nongraduates,Canada 1996–2001

It has recently been suggested that cities and regions should focus upon attracting talented individuals as a means to develop. Such a suggestion implies two things: first that it is possible to meaningfully alter migration flows by way of local policy, and second that these flows have an effect on local growth (and not the reverse as has generally been admitted). In this paper, we begin to investigate the empirical foundations of such assertions by examining some structural determinants of graduate migration flows by comparing them, in a gravity model context, to flows of nongraduates. Our contention is that, if migration flows are structured by such factors, then policies aimed at modifying flows—and any research purporting to give such policy advice—must first take them into account. We show that migration flows are strongly dependent on basic gravity variables such as size and distance, but that these and other variables (such as income differences, presence of graduates and border effects) do not affect all flows equally. Furthermore, we show that certain factors that are assumed to be local (such as wage levels) in fact only operate at a provincial level. Thus policies implemented locally may have little or no effect if they are manipulating factors that operate at a different scale.     

The assumption of equilibrium in models of migration

In recent articles Evans (1990) and Harrigan and McGregor (1993) (hereafter HM) scrutinized the equilibrium model of migration presented in a 1989 paper by Schachter and Althaus. This model used standard microeconomics to analyze gross interregional migration flows based on the assumption that gross flows are in approximate equilibrium. HM criticized the model as theoretically untenable, while Evans summoned empirical as well as theoretical objections. HM claimed that equilibrium of gross migration flows could be ruled out on theoretical grounds. They argued that the absence of net migration requires that either all regions have equal populations or that unsustainable regional migration propensities must obtain. In fact some moves are inter- and other are intraregional. It does not follow, however, that the number of interregional migrants will be larger for the more populous region. Alternatively, a country could be divided into a large number of small regions that have equal populations. With uniform propensities to move, each of these analytical regions would experience in equilibrium zero net migration. Hence, the condition that net migration equal zero is entirely consistent with unequal distributions of population across regions. The criticisms of Evans were based both on flawed reasoning and on misinterpretation of the results of a number of econometric studies. His reasoning assumed that the existence of demand shifts as found by Goldfarb and Yezer (1987) and Topel (1986) invalidated the equilibrium model. The equilibrium never really obtains exactly, but economic modeling of migration properly begins with a simple equilibrium model of the system. A careful reading of the papers Evans cited in support of his position showed that in fact they affirmed rather than denied the appropriateness of equilibrium modeling. Zero net migration together with nonzero gross migration are not theoretically incompatible with regional heterogeneity of population, wages, or amenities.     

A game of risk: Boat migration and the business of bordering Europe (Respond to this article at http://www.therai.org.uk/at/debate)

Largely in response to irregular migration flows, a Euro‐African border is under construction at the southern edges of Europe. The latest phase in this ‘borderwork’ is a system known as Eurosur, underpinned by a vision of a streamlined surveillance cover of Europe's southern maritime border and the African ‘pre‐frontier’ beyond it. Eurosur and other policing initiatives pull in a range of sectors – from border guards to aid workers – that make the statistically small figure of the irregular border crosser their joint target. To highlight the economic and productive aspects of controlling migratory flows, I call this varied group of interests an ‘illegality industry’. Casting an eye on the Spanish section of the external EU border, this article investigates how the illegality industry conceptualizes migrants as a source of risk to be managed, visualized and controlled. The end result, it is argued, is a ‘double securitization’ of migrant flows, rendering these as both a security threat and a growing source of profits.     

Evaluating Tobler's Migration Vector Fields

In the past decade Tobler has provided an innovative cartographic presentation of migration flows. The central theme of this research has been to utilize detailed migration data to reveal the underlying structures of migration flows. Even though the analyses are not explanatory models of migration exchanges, the application of these techniques to migration flows over time and across different spatial scales provides a visual generalization of often extremely complex flows. The application of his techniques at two spatial scales for the Netherlands illustrates both the strengths and weaknesses of migration force fields for the analysis of migration.     

TESTING ANALOGICAL TAPHONOMIC SIGNATURES IN BONE BREAKING: A COMPARISON BETWEEN HAMMERSTONE‐BROKEN EQUID AND BOVID BONES

Current analogical data used to infer prehistoric human bone breakage rely on a plethora of experimental hammerstone‐broken bovid bone sets. Several criteria have been argued to be diagnostic of bone breakage by humans, among which the most important are: a specific range of broken specimens bearing percussion marks, a specific distribution of different percussion mark types, metric properties of notches, differential notch type distribution, and the angle of oblique breakage planes. The present work shows that those properties derived from the breakage of bovid bones cannot be universally applied to all types of animals. As an example, here it is experimentally demonstrated that hammerstone‐broken equid bones (with different thickness and structural properties compared to bovid bones) show different values in all these variables and some of them overlap with criteria documented in bones broken by static loading. This suggests that the agents of equid bone breakage are more difficult to identify, and that the number of variables that can be successfully used to that end is smaller than in bovid bones.     

The social selectivity of migration flows affecting Britain's larger conurbations: An analysis of the 1991 census regional migration tables

Little is known about the social composition of migration affecting British cities, despite the currently high political salience of this issue. This is principally because of the very limited availability of reliable city‐scale data on such migrant characteristics as occupation and income. This paper uses the Regional Migration Tables from the 1991 Census to document the migration of labour force members to and from Britain's larger conurbations, distinguishing six main Social Groups defined on the basis of occupation. It is found that all eight areas were net losers of economically active people, that all six Social Groups were generally contributing to these net losses and that, in every case except London, there was a strong positive relationship between social status and the rate of net out‐migration to the rest of Britain. This latter case suggests the need for further work, which would benefit from the more detailed migration datasets that are promised from the 2001 Census.