High-skilled Migrants Research Articles

Does High-Skilled Migration Affect Publicly Financed Investments?

This paper analyzes the interaction between migration of high-skilled labor and publicly financed investment. We develop a theoretical model with multiple, ex ante identical jurisdictions where individuals decide on education and subsequent emigration. Migration decisions are based on differences in net income across jurisdictions which endogenously may occur. The interaction between income differences and migration flows gives rise to the potential of multiple equilibria: a symmetric equilibrium without migration and an asymmetric equilibrium in which net income levels differ among jurisdictions and trigger migration flows. In the former equilibrium, all jurisdictions have the same public investment level. In the latter one, public investment is high in host economies of skilled expatriates and low in source economies. We empirically test the hypothesis that emigration rates are negatively associated with various kinds of publicly .nanced investment levels for OECD countries.

Wage Effects of High-Skilled Migration: International Evidence

This paper argues that international migration of high-skilled workers triggers productivity effects at the macro level such that the wage rate of skilled workers may well rise in host countries and decline in source countries. We exploit a recent data set on international bilateral migration flows and provide evidence which is consistent with this hypothesis. In order to identify the causal effect of migration on wages, we propose different instrumentation strategies which address the endogeneity problem arising from the fact that international wage differences affect migration decisions.

Human capital acquisition and international migration in a model of educational market

This paper analyzes international high-skilled migration caused by financial frictions in educational market. I develop a model of learning in which acquisition of skill is only possible through personal interaction with a skilled individual; the income of the skilled is sensitive to financial constraints for the unskilled. Cross-country differences in such constraints have a multiplicative effect on the skill premium, causing outmigration of skilled individuals from a less developed country. I study welfare implications of such brain drain for the sending and receiving countries. Although it makes more difficult skill acquisition in the sending country, the unskilled may still be better off: increased cost of skill acquisition is offset by higher income once the skill has been acquired. For the receiving country, I identify a phenomenon of immiserizing immigration: a depletion of the stock of skill in the sending country due to brain drain hinders further production of skill, which may hurt the receiving country. Additionally, I find that increased openness of the sending country to migration and the resultant accelerated brain drain increase the incentives of the country government to reduce financial frictions.

White Privilege, Language Capital and Cultural Ghettoisation: Western High-Skilled Migrants in Taiwan

Drawing on the case of Taiwan, this article looks at high-skilled migration from the West to Asia. I explore how Western high-skilled migrants exert agency to negotiate their positions as non-citizens, privileged others and professional workers. I have coined the term ‘flexible cultural capital conversion’ to describe how English-speaking Westerners convert their native-language skills, as a form of global linguistic capital, into economic, social and symbolic capitals. Their privileged positions are nevertheless mediated and constrained by their class, nationality, race/ethnicity and gender. In the global context, whiteness is marked as a visible identity and the ‘superior other’. Such cultural essentialism functions as a double-edged sword that places white foreigners in privileged yet segregated job niches. Their flexibility in capital conversion and transnational mobility is territory-bound. Many experience the predicament of ‘cultural ghettoisation’ in the global South, and they often face grim job prospects on returning home to the North.

Human Capital Acquisition and International Migration in a Model of Educational Market

This paper analyzes international high-skilled migration caused by financial frictions in educational market. I develop a model of learning in which acquisition of skill is only possible through personal interaction with a skilled individual; the income of the skilled is sensitive to financial constraints for the unskilled. Cross-country differences in such constraints have a multiplicative effect on the skill premium, causing outmigration of skilled individuals from a less developed country. I study welfare implications of such brain drain for the sending and receiving countries. Although it makes more difficult skill acquisition in the sending country, the unskilled may still be better off: increased cost of skill acquisition is offset by higher income once the skill has been acquired. For the receiving country, I identify a phenomenon of immiserizing immigration: a depletion of the stock of skill in the sending country due to brain drain hinders further production of skill, which may hurt the receiving country. Additionally, I find that increased openness of the sending country to migration and the resultant accelerated brain drain increase the incentives of the country government to reduce financial frictions.

Transnational Mobility and International Academic Employment: Gatekeeping in an Academic Competition Arena

This article draws upon concepts developed in recent empirical and theoretical work on high skilled and academic mobility and migration including accidental mobility, forced mobility and negotiated mobility. These concepts inform a situated, qualitative study of mobility among international postdoctoral researchers in life sciences and engineering fields who were employed at US and UK universities in 2008 and 2009. Informed by epistemological methods in the Foucauldian tradition of discourse and governmentality, the study explores how policy discourse and technologies empower and limit scientists and engineers in negotiating employment arrangements across national boundaries.

Skilled Migration, Knowledge Transfer and Development: The Case of the Highly Skilled Filipino Migrants in New Zealand and Australia

This paper provides evidence that highly skilled migrants continue to remain connected with and deeply committed to their home country. These connections challenge the notion of knowledge and skills loss from high-skilled migration. Highly skilled migrants are also involved in remittance giving, which, although of the noneconomic type, offers new possibilities for building wealth. These are the so-called ‘knowledge transfers’ which consist of the flows of knowledge, skills and ideas to the home country. This paper analyses these knowledge transfers through the highly skilled Filipino migrants in New Zealand and Australia.

Eight Questions about Brain Drain

The term “brain drain” dominates popular discourse on high-skilled migration, and for this reason, we use it in this article. However, as Harry Johnson noted, it is a loaded phrase implying serious loss. It is far from clear that such a loss actually occurs in practice; indeed, there is an increasing recognition of the possible benefits that skilled migration can offer both for migrants and for sending countries. This paper builds upon a recent 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? 8) What do we know about the fiscal and production externalities of brain drain?

Two-Way Migration between Similar Countries

We develop a model to explain two-way migration of high-skilled individuals between countries that are similar in their economic characteristics. High-skilled migration is explained by a combination of two features: In both countries workers’ abilities are private knowledge and the production technology gives incentives to firms for hiring workers of similar ability. In the presence on migration cost, high-skilled workers self-select into the group of migrants, thereby ensuring they are hired together with other high-skilled migrants. The laissez-faire equilibrium features too much migration, explained by a negative migration externality, and as a result all individuals are worse off than in autarky. We also show that for sufficiently low levels of migration cost the optimal level of migration is strictly positive. In extensions to our basic model, we consider the presence of an internationally immobile factor and find that in this case the possibility of aggregate gains from migration in the laissez-faire equilibrium emerges. We also show that our basic results are robust with respect to small differences in countries’ technologies.

International Migration, Imperfect Information, and Brain Drain

We consider a model of international migration where skills of workers are imperfectly observed by firms in the host country and where information asymmetries are more severe for immigrants than for natives. There are two stages. In the first one, workers in the South decide whether to move and pay the migration costs. These costs are assumed to be sunk. In the second stage, firms offer wages to the immigrant and native workers who are in the country. Because of imperfect information, firms statistically discriminate high-skilled migrants by paying them at their expected productivity. The decision of whether to migrate or not depends on the proportion of high-skilled workers among the migrants. The migration game exhibits strategic complementarities, which, because of standard coordination problems, lead to multiple equilibria. We characterize them and examine how international migration affects the income of individuals in sending and receiving countries, and of migrants themselves. We also analyze under which conditions there is positive or negative self-selection of migrants.

Highly-skilled ‘guest-workers’ in the UK: Implications for ‘citizenship’ in naturalisation policy and integration policy

Guestworker programmes have typically referred to programmes of a temporary nature, where guests are not integrated into the state, but are expected to leave ( Hahamovitch, 2003). Critics argue that such programmes are discriminatory, and that long-term membership in a society should entitle such workers to the legal rights of membership, including citizenship ( Carens, 2008). The UK's programme for highly-skilled migrants, introduced in 2008, is part of a five-tier points-based immigration system. It allows highly-skilled individuals to immigrate to the UK, initially for one year, without sponsorship from an employer, and on securing employment, this stay can be extended with subsequent entitlement to apply for British citizenship after five years. I examine the requirements and entitlements for these guestworkers, in relation to naturalisation and integration policy. I argue that a ‘moral’ conception of citizenship is invoked on economic grounds. Also, ‘integration’ is narrowly conceived in terms of the assumed unskilled or semi-skilled migrant's knowledge and skills ‘deficit’, rather than in terms of the integration of ‘highly-skilled’ guestworkers. Finally, I argue that methodologically, we cannot make judgements on either the economic validity, or the fairness of this programme without considering the managed migration system as a whole, integrated system of unskilled, semi-skilled as well as highly-skilled guestworkers.

Migrants' Skills and Productivity: A European Perspective

The freedom of movement of persons is one of the core tenets of the European Union. Immigration however is often seen as a cause for concern amongst native workers, as rising labour supply may threaten jobs and create downward pressure on wages. National politicians are increasingly under pressure to guard against it — in times of recession particularly. Despite this, there is evidence that highly-skilled migrant labour has the potential to raise competitiveness significantly and in theory this may feed into productivity. In this paper, we explore first the composition of inward migration to the EU and within the EU, concentrating specifically on the role of the highly-skilled and the extent to which migrants are overqualified within their jobs. We then analyse whether migrant workers affect productivity at the sectoral level. We find under-utilisation of skilled foreign labour and there is little evidence in general to suggest that migrants have raised productivity which may in part be attributable to over-qualification. However, we find robust evidence that migrants — particularly highly-skilled migrants — play a positive role in productivity developments in industries which are classified as ‘skill intensive’.

Migration and Human Capital in an Endogenous Fertility Model

How do high and low skilled migration affect fertility and human capital in migrants' origin countries? This question is analyzed within an overlapping generations model where parents choose the number of high and low skilled children they would like to have. Individuals migrate with a certain probability and remit to their parents. It is shown that a brain drain induces parents to have more high and less low educated children. Under certain conditions fertility may either rise or decline due to a brain drain. Low skilled emigration leads to reversed results, while the overall impact on human capital of either type of migration remains ambiguous. Subsequently, the model is calibrated on a developing economy. It is found that increased high skilled emigration reduces fertility and fosters human capital accumulation, while low skilled emigration induces higher population growth and a lower level of education.

Een definitie van de expat: hoogopgeleide migranten in Brussel

Sociologen besteden steeds meer aandacht aan de relatie tussen steden en hun ontwikkeling, en de activiteiten en profielen van mensen die door de steden zelf worden aangetrokken. Brussel is een bijzonder levendig voorbeeld van die relatie omdat de stad in sterke mate beïnvloed is door het enorme percentage aan Europese migranten van hoog niveau – de expats genaamd – die er op tijdelijke of permanente basis leven. Het artikel probeert niet alleen te definiëren wat een expat is, het biedt ook een verkennende schets van hoe expats worden gepercipieerd en hoe zij zichzelf percipiëren. Het artikel analyseert eveneens hun gemeenschapsgevoel en toont aan dat spreken van een coherente “expat community” – zoals de Brusselse instellingen vaak doen – niet zo juist is.

Définir les expats : le cas des immigrés hautement qualifiés à Bruxelles

La sociologie fait preuve d’un intérêt grandissant pour le lien qui unit les villes à leur développement et aux activités et profils de ceux qu’elles attirent. Bruxelles en est un exemple particulièrement frappant, étant donné l’influence qu’elle subit au contact d’une large proportion d’immigrés européens hautement qualifiés, résidents de passage ou à long terme, appelés expats. Cet article se propose de définir ce que sont les expats, et donne par ailleurs les grands traits de la façon dont ils sont perçus et se perçoivent. Il procède en outre à une analyse de leur sens communautaire, qui démontre que la notion de communauté cohérente d’Expats, couramment partagée par les institutions bruxelloises, ne s’avère pas toujours très pertinente.

Defining the Expat: the case of high-skilled migrants in Brussels

More and more attention is put by sociologists on the relation between cities, development and the activities and profiles of the people attracted by cities themselves. Brussels is a particularly vivid example of this relation, being so influenced by the massive percentage of European high-level migrants, called Expats, who live there on a temporary or a permanent basis. The article, besides trying to define what an Expat is, provides an exploratory outline of how they are perceived and they perceive themselves. Moreover, the article analyses their sense of community, showing that speaking of a coherent Expats’ community, as it is commonly done by Brussels’ institutions, might be quite imprecise.

Fiscal Competition, Brain Drain and Redistribution

The debate on the effects of high skilled migration (Brain Drain) has recently intensified. Actually, the BD literature is not adequate to explain the European Brain where there are not strong differences between sending and receiving country and there is a bi-directional BD. To cover this lack in the literature, we propose a simple model which helps us to analyze the BD mechanisms between symmetric countries. In this paper we analyze the impact of BD on redistributive policies and the provision of education as a publicly provided good. Differently of the main BD literature, this analysis is adequate to simulate the new European framework, where mobility of European citizens is free of institutional constraints and where Fiscal treatments must be identical for all the European citizens of the same region. In these contests study of the BD linked with the Fiscal Competition (FC) and the choice of education for both workers and/or by governments. Potential mobility of educated workers can increase the degree of FC through taxation or the provision of public education. An increase in FC can be caused by competition among different jurisdictions that aim to attract educated workers. When the importance of FC increases, then the States may employ FC as a new policy tool. The contribution of this study is to emphasize the increase of effciency loss caused by the two negative effects due to the absence of coordination among jurisdictions: less redistribution and less provision of education as a publicly provided good.

The Effect of Migration on Income Growth and Convergence: Meta-Analytic Evidence

We compare a set of econometric studies that measure the effect of net internal migration in neoclassical models of long-run real income convergence and derive 67 comparable effect sizes. The precision-weighted estimate of beta convergence is about 2.7%. An increase in the net migration rate of a region by one percentage point in increases the per capita income growth rate in that region on average by about 0.1 percentage points, thus suggesting an impact of net migration that is more consistent with endogenous self-reinforcing growth than with neoclassical convergence. Introducing a net migration variable in a growth regression increases the estimate of beta convergence slightly. Studies that use panel models or IV estimation methods yield smaller coefficients of net migration in growth regressions, while the opposite holds for regressions controlling for high-skilled migration.

'Subsidies from the Poor to the Rich': The Role of High-Income Countries in the Brain Drain of Sub-Saharan Africa

This paper discusses the brain drain of Sub-Saharan Africa and particularly the effects of policies of Western governments which focus on attracting highly-skilled migrants. The first part of the discussion focuses on defining the brain drain and some of the factors which have a direct or indirect amplifying effect on it. The second part of the paper goes beyond the Western policies which exacerbate this major development problem to look at some of the apologetic discourses behind such policies, as well as their ethical implications for development aid.

The Determinants of International Remittances in Developing Countries

Summary What causes developing countries to receive different levels of international remittances? This paper addresses this question by using new data on such variables as the skill composition of migrants, poverty, and interest and exchange rates to examine the determinants of remittances. The paper finds that the skill composition of migrants does matter in remittance determination. Countries which export a larger share of high-skilled (educated) migrants receive less per capita remittances than countries which export a larger proportion of low-skilled migrants. It also finds that the level of poverty in a labor-sending country does not have a positive impact on the level of remittances received.