IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp12754.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Does the Implementation of the Schengen Agreement Boost Cross-Border Commuting? Evidence from Switzerland

Author

Listed:
  • Parenti, Angela

    (University of Pisa)

  • Tealdi, Cristina

    (Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh)

Abstract

In this paper we study the effects of Switzerland implementing the Schengen agreement on cross-border commuting from regions of neighbouring countries. As vehicles are allowed to cross borders without stopping and residents in border areas are granted freedom to cross borders away from fixed checkpoints, commuting costs are severely reduced. Using data from the European Labour Force Survey, we estimate that the individual probability to cross-border commute to Switzerland in response to this policy has increased among inter-regional commuters in the range between 3 and 6 percentage points, according to different model specifications. Our result is particularly important due the meaningful policy implications, in a time in which the Schengen agreement is under scrutiny and at risk of termination.

Suggested Citation

  • Parenti, Angela & Tealdi, Cristina, 2019. "Does the Implementation of the Schengen Agreement Boost Cross-Border Commuting? Evidence from Switzerland," IZA Discussion Papers 12754, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp12754
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp12754.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Andreas Beerli & Jan Ruffner & Michael Siegenthaler & Giovanni Peri, 2021. "The Abolition of Immigration Restrictions and the Performance of Firms and Workers: Evidence from Switzerland," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 111(3), pages 976-1012, March.
    2. Damiaan Persyn & Wouter Torfs, 2012. "A Gravity Equation for Commuting," Working Papers of VIVES - Research Centre for Regional Economics 545998, KU Leuven, Faculty of Economics and Business (FEB), VIVES - Research Centre for Regional Economics.
    3. Matthew J. Bloomfield & Ulf Brüggemann & Hans B. Christensen & Christian Leuz, 2017. "The Effect of Regulatory Harmonization on Cross‐Border Labor Migration: Evidence from the Accounting Profession," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55(1), pages 35-78, March.
    4. Carmen M. Reinhart & Kenneth S. Rogoff, 2009. "The Aftermath of Financial Crises," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(2), pages 466-472, May.
    5. Christian Dustmann & Uta Schönberg & Jan Stuhler, 2017. "Labor Supply Shocks, Native Wages, and the Adjustment of Local Employment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 132(1), pages 435-483.
    6. Annekatrin Niebuhr & Silvia Stiller, 2004. "Integration and Labour Markets in European Border regions," ERSA conference papers ersa04p29, European Regional Science Association.
    7. Giovanni Peri, 2014. "Do immigrant workers depress the wages of native workers?," IZA World of Labor, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA), pages 1-42, May.
    8. Misbah Tanveer Choudhry & Enrico Marelli & Marcello Signorelli, 2012. "Youth unemployment rate and impact of financial crises," International Journal of Manpower, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 33(1), pages 76-95, March.
    9. Damiaan Persyn & Wouter Torfs, 2016. "A gravity equation for commuting with an application to estimating regional border effects in Belgium," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 16(1), pages 155-175.
    10. Angela Parenti & Cristina Tealdi, 2019. "The role of job uncertainty in inter‐regional commuting: The case of Italy," Growth and Change, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(2), pages 634-671, June.
    11. Alberto Abadie, 2005. "Semiparametric Difference-in-Differences Estimators," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 72(1), pages 1-19.
    12. Stefan P. T. Groot & J. L. Möhlmann & J. H. Garretsen & Henri L. F. de Groot, 2011. "The crisis sensitivity of European countries and regions: stylized facts and spatial heterogeneity," Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society, Cambridge Political Economy Society, vol. 4(3), pages 437-456.
    13. Decressin, Jorg & Fatas, Antonio, 1995. "Regional labor market dynamics in Europe," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 39(9), pages 1627-1655, December.
    14. Guido W. Imbens & Jeffrey M. Wooldridge, 2009. "Recent Developments in the Econometrics of Program Evaluation," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 47(1), pages 5-86, March.
    15. Marianne Bertrand & Esther Duflo & Sendhil Mullainathan, 2004. "How Much Should We Trust Differences-In-Differences Estimates?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 119(1), pages 249-275.
    16. Rouwendal, Jan, 1999. "Spatial job search and commuting distances," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(4), pages 491-517, July.
    17. repec:oup:qjecon:v:132:y:2016:i:1:p:435-483. is not listed on IDEAS
    18. Juan F. Jimeno & Diego Rodríguez-Palenzuela, "undated". "Youth unemployment in the OECD: Demographic shifts, labour market institutions, and macroeconomic shocks," Working Papers 2002-15, FEDEA.
    19. Maurizio Bigotta & Gonzalez Oscar & Fabio Beniamino Losa, 2013. "Free movement of people: joy or sorrow?," Post-Print halshs-01182924, HAL.
    20. Kent Eliasson & Urban Lindgren & Olle Westerlund, 2003. "Geographical Labour Mobility: Migration or Commuting?," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 37(8), pages 827-837.
    21. Huber, Peter, 2011. "The self-selection of Commuters," Working Papers in Economics 2011-6, University of Salzburg.
    22. Bartz, Kevin & Fuchs-Schündeln, Nicola, 2012. "The role of borders, languages, and currencies as obstacles to labor market integration," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 56(6), pages 1148-1163.
    23. Sara Davies, 2011. "Regional resilience in the 2008--2010 downturn: comparative evidence from European countries," Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society, Cambridge Political Economy Society, vol. 4(3), pages 369-382.
    24. Verick, Sher, 2009. "Who Is Hit Hardest during a Financial Crisis? The Vulnerability of Young Men and Women to Unemployment in an Economic Downturn," IZA Discussion Papers 4359, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    25. Ademmer, Esther & Barsbai, Toman & Lücke, Matthias & Stöhr, Tobias, 2015. "30 Years of Schengen: Internal blessing, external curse?," Kiel Policy Brief 88, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    26. Lewis Dijkstra & Enrique Garcilazo & Philip McCann, 2015. "The effects of the global financial crisis on European regions and cities," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 15(5), pages 935-949.
    27. Jos van Ommeren & Piet Rietveld & Peter Nijkamp & Jos van Ommeren & Piet Rietveld & Peter Nijkamp, 2004. "Job Moving, Residential Moving, and Commuting: A Search Perspective," Chapters, in: Location, Travel and Information Technology, chapter 11, pages 223-246, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    28. Moulton, Brent R, 1990. "An Illustration of a Pitfall in Estimating the Effects of Aggregate Variables on Micro Unit," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 72(2), pages 334-338, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Chiara Castelli & Angela Parenti, 2020. "Commuting in Europe: An Inter-regional Analysis on its Determinants and Spatial Effects," Working Papers 2020.19, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei.
    2. Emanuele Dicarlo, 2022. "How do firms adjust to a negative labor supply shock? Evidence form migration outflows," Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) 1361, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    3. Jason Poulos & Andrea Albanese & Andrea Mercatanti & Fan Li, 2021. "Retrospective causal inference via matrix completion, with an evaluation of the effect of European integration on cross-border employment," LISER Working Paper Series 2021-07, Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER).
    4. Ahrens, Achim & FitzGerald, John & Lyons, Seán, 2020. "Commuting across the Irish border," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 190(C).
    5. Dicarlo, Emanuele, 2022. "How Do Firms Adjust to Negative Labor Supply Shocks? Evidence from Migration Outflows," IZA Discussion Papers 14994, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    6. Castelli, Chiara & Parenti, Angela, 2020. "Commuting in Europe: An Inter-regional Analysis on its Determinants and Spatial Effects," 2030 Agenda 307985, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei (FEEM).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Angela Parenti & Cristina Tealdi, 2017. "Does the abolition of border controls boost cross-border commuting? Evidence from Switzerland," Discussion Papers 2017/213, Dipartimento di Economia e Management (DEM), University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy.
    2. Jason Poulos & Andrea Albanese & Andrea Mercatanti & Fan Li, 2021. "Retrospective causal inference via matrix completion, with an evaluation of the effect of European integration on cross-border employment," LISER Working Paper Series 2021-07, Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER).
    3. Linus Holtermann & Christian Hundt, 2018. "Hierarchically structured determinants and phase related patterns of economic resilience. An empirical case study for European regions," Working Papers on Innovation and Space 2018-02, Philipps University Marburg, Department of Geography.
    4. Peter Huber, 2014. "Are Commuters in the EU Better Educated than Non-commuters but Worse than Migrants?," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 51(3), pages 509-525, February.
    5. Bruno Ferman & Cristine Pinto & Vitor Possebom, 2020. "Cherry Picking with Synthetic Controls," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 39(2), pages 510-532, March.
    6. Chad D. Meyerhoefer & Muzhe Yang, 2011. "The Relationship between Food Assistance and Health: A Review of the Literature and Empirical Strategies for Identifying Program Effects," Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 33(3), pages 304-344.
    7. Caliendo, Marco & Cobb-Clark, Deborah A. & Hennecke, Juliane & Uhlendorff, Arne, 2019. "Locus of control and internal migration," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    8. Guido W. Imbens & Jeffrey M. Wooldridge, 2009. "Recent Developments in the Econometrics of Program Evaluation," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 47(1), pages 5-86, March.
    9. Riccardo Cappelli & Fabio Montobbio & Andrea Morrison, 2021. "Unemployment resistance across EU regions: the role of technological and human capital," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 31(1), pages 147-178, January.
    10. Dorner, Matthias & Görlitz, Katja, 2020. "Training, wages and a missing school graduation cohort," IAB-Discussion Paper 202028, Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), Nürnberg [Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany].
    11. Leandro D’Aurizio & Domenico Depalo, 2016. "An Evaluation of the Policies on Repayment of Government’s Trade Debt in Italy," Italian Economic Journal: A Continuation of Rivista Italiana degli Economisti and Giornale degli Economisti, Springer;Società Italiana degli Economisti (Italian Economic Association), vol. 2(2), pages 167-196, July.
    12. Minasyan, Anna & Nunnenkamp, Peter & Richert, Katharina, 2017. "Does Aid Effectiveness Depend on the Quality of Donors?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 100(C), pages 16-30.
    13. Caliendo, Marco & Cobb-Clark, Deborah A. & Hennecke, Juliane & Uhlendorff, Arne, 2019. "Locus of control and internal migration," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    14. Christian Volpe Martincus, 2010. "Odyssey in International Markets: An Assessment of the Effectiveness of Export Promotion in Latin America and the Caribbean," IDB Publications (Books), Inter-American Development Bank, number 16458, February.
    15. Milena Nikolova & Boris Nikolaev, 2017. "Does Joining the EU Make You Happy? Evidence from Bulgaria and Romania," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 18(6), pages 1593-1623, December.
    16. van Dijk, Mathijs A. & van Dalen, Hendrik P. & Hyde, Martin, 2020. "Who bears the brunt? The impact of banking crises on younger and older workers," The Journal of the Economics of Ageing, Elsevier, vol. 17(C).
    17. Georgia Kosmopoulou & Xueqi Zhou, 2014. "Price Adjustment Policies in Procurement Contracting: An Analysis of Bidding Behavior," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 62(1), pages 77-112, March.
    18. Antje Mertens & Anette Haas, 2006. "Regionale Arbeitslosigkeit und Arbeitsplatzwechsel in Deutschland – Eine Analyse auf Kreisebene," Review of Regional Research: Jahrbuch für Regionalwissenschaft, Springer;Gesellschaft für Regionalforschung (GfR), vol. 26(2), pages 147-169, October.
    19. Julian Donaubauer & Peter Nunnenkamp, 2016. "Is Aid for Infrastructure Effective? A Difference-in-Difference-in-Differences Approach," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 36(2), pages 857-870.
    20. Dietrichson, Jens & Ellegård, Lina Maria, 2015. "Assist or desist? Conditional bailouts and fiscal discipline in local governments," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 38(C), pages 153-168.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    commuting costs; labour mobility; Schengen agreement; policy change;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D04 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Microeconomic Policy: Formulation; Implementation; Evaluation
    • J61 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Geographic Labor Mobility; Immigrant Workers
    • R10 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - General
    • R23 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Household Analysis - - - Regional Migration; Regional Labor Markets; Population

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp12754. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Holger Hinte (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.