This paper contributes to the literature on temporary migration by developing and solving a model of repeated circular migration that accounts for saving behavior. Using Mexican Migrant Project data on undocumented migrants and non-migrants, I estimate the parameters of the model through the Method of Simulated Moments. The intensity of U.S. border enforcement is found to have a significant pos...

This paper presents a cross country empirical investigation of impacts of skilled labor emigration on sending country’s institutional development. Based on Albert Hirschman’s “Exit and Voice” model, we analyze different channels through which emigration can affect institutions; using Djankov et al.’s “Institutional Possibility Frontier” framework, we assess emigration’s heterogeneous effects on...

Much foreign direct investment (FDI) takes the form of mergers and acquisitions (M&A). It is commonplace in finance to view acquisitions as manifestations of the market for corporate control. Following on that insight we propose a model of FDI in which headquarters bid to control overseas assets. We derive an equation for bilateral FDI stocks that resembles the recently developed fixed effects ...

We study the determinants of international migration with special attention to the role of institutional factors other than economic and demographic fundamentals. We evaluate the impact of political institutions and of those institutions specifically targeted at attracting migrants. For a dataset on 19th century migration, we find that economic and demographic differentials play a major role, b...

This paper argues that new immigrants cluster in culturally homogenous groups in the host country because of imperfect information. However, the pulling-effect exists provided that the cultural communities are not too large. With a panel of migration flows to the major OECD countries from the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s, it is shown that the existence of similar cultural communities does attract...

The paper enquires into the relationship between economic inequality and economic growth, but different from others, it also studies the relationship between inequality and economic growth in the situation where consideration of effect of factor movement is included. The paper tends to answer the questions such as whether inequality should be eradicated completely. Panel data models are used fo...

I examine the effects that the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA), which legalized almost 3 million immigrants, had on crime in the United States. I exploit the IRCAs quasi-random timing as well as geographic variation in the intensity of treatment to isolate causal impacts. I find decreases in crime of 2%-6%, primarily due to decline in property crimes, equivalent to 80,000-240,000...

Economic theory points out that immigration of even low-skilled immigrants may improve public finances in Western welfare states, and it is some times suggested that fiscal sustainability problems in Western countries caused by ageing populations could be solved by increasing immigration. We examine consequences of various immigration scenarios using the large-scale computable general equilibri...

Factors shaping international migration, over the last half century, from and into the countries and territories of Sub-Saharan and North Africa, as well as the economic and some social implications of those movements, are examined. Existing analyses of these issues are critically reviewed, including topics particularly pertinent to the African context and evidence on crosscutting themes studie...

In this paper, we analyze the political economy of immigration policy in a direct democracy setting. We formulate a structural model of voting and participation behavior integrating instrumental and expressive motivations. The model is estimated using data drawn from a survey carried out after a vote in Switzerland in 2000 on a popular initiative proposing to implement immigration restrictions....