IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/gii/giihei/heidwp09-2014.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

International Migration of Skilled Workers with Endogenous Policies

Author

Abstract

We study the interaction between the optimal immigration policy of a host country and education policy of a source country in a model of international migration of skilled workers. Acquisition of human capital is driven by the academic and career opportunities at home and abroad. Greater opportunities to migrate are found to increase the source country's net stock of human capital only under very stringent conditions concerning the shape of the utility function and of the production function for human capital, the country's emigration rate, and the international wage differential. We use the model to examine the effects of technological improvements in the educational sector, changes in the academic curricula in the source country, and attitudes to immigration in the host country. Of key interest are the implications for the optimal spending on education in the source country and the optimal immigration quota of the host country.

Suggested Citation

  • Slobodan Djajić & Michael S. Michael, 2014. "International Migration of Skilled Workers with Endogenous Policies," IHEID Working Papers 09-2014, Economics Section, The Graduate Institute of International Studies.
    • Handle: RePEc:gii:giihei:heidwp09-2014
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://repec.graduateinstitute.ch/pdfs/Working_papers/HEIDWP09-2014.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Docquier, Frederic & Rapoport, Hillel, 2004. "Skilled migration: the perspective of developing countries," Policy Research Working Paper Series 3382, The World Bank.
    2. Miyagiwa, Kaz, 1991. "Scale Economies in Education and the Brain Drain Problem," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 32(3), pages 743-759, August.
    3. Richard Blundell & Alan Duncan & Costas Meghir, 1998. "Estimating Labor Supply Responses Using Tax Reforms," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 66(4), pages 827-862, July.
    4. Beine, Michel & Docquier, Frédéric & Oden-Defoort, Cecily, 2011. "A Panel Data Analysis of the Brain Gain," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 39(4), pages 523-532, April.
    5. Yvonni Markaki & Simonetta Longhi, 2012. "What Determines Attitudes to Immigration in European Countries? An Analysis at the Regional Level," RF Berlin - CReAM Discussion Paper Series 1233, Rockwool Foundation Berlin (RF Berlin) - Centre for Research and Analysis of Migration (CReAM).
    6. Djajić, Slobodan & Michael, Michael S. & Vinogradova, Alexandra, 2012. "Migration of skilled workers: Policy interaction between host and source countries," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(11), pages 1015-1024.
    7. Michèle V. K. Belot & Timothy J. Hatton, 2012. "Immigrant Selection in the OECD," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 114(4), pages 1105-1128, December.
    8. Chand, Satish & Clemens, Michael A., 2023. "Human capital investment under exit options: Evidence from a natural quasi-experiment," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 163(C).
    9. Wong, Kar-yiu & Yip, Chong Kee, 1999. "Education, economic growth, and brain drain," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 23(5-6), pages 699-726, April.
    10. Giovanni Facchini & Anna Maria Mayda, 2008. "From individual attitudes towards migrants to migration policy outcomes: Theory and evidence [‘Immigration policy, assimilation of immigrants and natives’ sentiments towards immigrants: Evidence fr," Economic Policy, CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po;CES;MSH, vol. 23(56), pages 652-713.
    11. Michel Beine & Frédéric Docquier & Hillel Rapoport, 2007. "Measuring International Skilled Migration: A New Database Controlling for Age of Entry," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 21(2), pages 249-254, June.
    12. Docquier, Frédéric & Faye, Ousmane & Pestieau, Pierre, 2008. "Is migration a good substitute for education subsidies?," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(2), pages 263-276, June.
    13. Michael Clemens & Claudio Montenegro & Lant Pritchett, 2008. "The Place Premium: Wage Differences for Identical Workers across the U.S. Border," Working Papers 148, Center for Global Development.
    14. Raj Chetty, 2006. "A New Method of Estimating Risk Aversion," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(5), pages 1821-1834, December.
    15. Gibson, John & McKenzie, David, 2011. "The microeconomic determinants of emigration and return migration of the best and brightest: Evidence from the Pacific," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(1), pages 18-29, May.
    16. Justman, Moshe & Thisse, Jacques-Francois, 1997. "Implications of the mobility of skilled labor for local public funding of higher education," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 55(3), pages 409-412, September.
    17. Michel Beine & Frédéric Docquier & Hillel Rapoport, 2010. "On the Robustness of Brain Gain Estimates," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 97-98, pages 143-165.
    18. Frédéric Docquier & Hillel Rapoport, 2012. "Globalization, Brain Drain, and Development," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 50(3), pages 681-730, September.
    19. Long, N.V. & Wong, K.Y., 1996. "Endogenous Growth and International Trade: A Survey," Discussion Papers in Economics at the University of Washington 96-07, Department of Economics at the University of Washington.
    20. Beine, Michel & Docquier, Frederic & Rapoport, Hillel, 2001. "Brain drain and economic growth: theory and evidence," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(1), pages 275-289, February.
    21. Michel Beine & Fréderic Docquier & Hillel Rapoport, 2008. "Brain Drain and Human Capital Formation in Developing Countries: Winners and Losers," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 118(528), pages 631-652, April.
    22. Stark, Oded & Wang, Yong, 2002. "Inducing human capital formation: migration as a substitute for subsidies," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(1), pages 29-46, October.
    23. Grogger, Jeffrey & Hanson, Gordon H., 2011. "Income maximization and the selection and sorting of international migrants," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(1), pages 42-57, May.
    24. repec:adr:anecst:y:2010:i:97-98:p:07 is not listed on IDEAS
    25. Manon Domingues Dos Santos & Fabien Postel-Vinay, 2003. "Migration as a source of growth: The perspective of a developing country," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 16(1), pages 161-175, February.
    26. Stark, Oded & Wang, Yong, 2002. "Inducing human capital formation: migration as a substitute for subsidies," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(1), pages 29-46, October.
    27. Bertoli, Simone & Brücker, Herbert, 2011. "Selective immigration policies, migrants' education and welfare at origin," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 113(1), pages 19-22, October.
    28. Bhagwati, Jagdish & Hanson, Gordon H (ed.), 2009. "Skilled Immigration Today: Prospects, Problems, and Policies," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780195382433, Decembrie.
    29. Robert E.B. Lucas, 2005. "International Migration and Economic Development," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 3826, December.
    30. Bhagwati, Jagdish & Hamada, Koichi, 1974. "The brain drain, international integration of markets for professionals and unemployment : A theoretical analysis," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 1(1), pages 19-42, April.
    31. Satish Chand & Michael A. Clemens, 2008. "Skilled emigration and skill creation: A quasi-experiment," International and Development Economics Working Papers idec08-05, International and Development Economics.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Slobodan DJADJIC & Frédéric DOCQUIER & Michael S. MICHAEL, 2019. "Optimal Education Policy and Human Capital Accumulation in the Context of Brain Drain," JODE - Journal of Demographic Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 85(4), pages 271-303, December.
    2. Frédéric Docquier & Hillel Rapoport, 2012. "Globalization, Brain Drain, and Development," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 50(3), pages 681-730, September.
    3. Antwi, James & Phillips, David C., 2013. "Wages and health worker retention: Evidence from public sector wage reforms in Ghana," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 102(C), pages 101-115.
    4. Beine, Michel & Docquier, Frédéric & Oden-Defoort, Cecily, 2011. "A Panel Data Analysis of the Brain Gain," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 39(4), pages 523-532, April.
    5. Djajić, Slobodan & Michael, Michael S. & Vinogradova, Alexandra, 2012. "Migration of skilled workers: Policy interaction between host and source countries," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(11), pages 1015-1024.
    6. Narcisse Cha'Ngom & Christoph Deuster & Frédéric Docquier & Joël Machado, 2023. "Selective Migration and Economic Development: A Generalized Approach," LISER Working Paper Series 2023-06, Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER).
    7. Björn NILSSON, 2019. "Education and migration: insights for policymakers," Working Paper 23ca9c54-061a-4d60-967c-f, Agence française de développement.
    8. Docquier, Frédéric & Iftikhar, Zainab, 2019. "Brain drain, informality and inequality: A search-and-matching model for sub-Saharan Africa," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 109-125.
    9. repec:hal:journl:hal-00779716 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. Naiditch, Claire & Vranceanu, Radu, 2013. "A two-country model of high skill migration with public education," ESSEC Working Papers WP1301, ESSEC Research Center, ESSEC Business School.
    11. Dustmann, Christian & Glitz, Albrecht, 2011. "Migration and Education," Handbook of the Economics of Education, in: Erik Hanushek & Stephen Machin & Ludger Woessmann (ed.), Handbook of the Economics of Education, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 0, pages 327-439, Elsevier.
    12. Gordon H. Hanson, 2009. "The Economic Consequences of the International Migration of Labor," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 1(1), pages 179-208, May.
    13. Simona Monteleone, 2009. "Brain drain e crescita economica: Una rassegna critica sugli effetti prodotti," Working Papers 2_2009, D.E.S. (Department of Economic Studies), University of Naples "Parthenope", Italy.
    14. Anelí Bongers & Carmen Díaz-Roldán & José L. Torres, 2022. "Brain drain or brain gain? International labor mobility and human capital formation," The Journal of International Trade & Economic Development, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 31(5), pages 647-671, July.
    15. Docquier, Frederic & Rapoport, Hillel, 2004. "Skilled migration: the perspective of developing countries," Policy Research Working Paper Series 3382, The World Bank.
    16. Hatton, Timothy J., 2014. "The economics of international migration: A short history of the debate," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 43-50.
    17. Mountford, Andrew & Rapoport, Hillel, 2011. "The brain drain and the world distribution of income," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(1), pages 4-17, May.
    18. Clemens Michael A., 2014. "A Case Against Taxes and Quotas on High-Skill Emigration," Journal of Globalization and Development, De Gruyter, vol. 5(1), pages 1-39, June.
    19. John Gibson & David McKenzie, 2012. "The Economic Consequences of ‘Brain Drain’ of the Best and Brightest: Microeconomic Evidence from Five Countries," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 122(560), pages 339-375, May.
    20. Mariele Macaluso, 2022. "The influence of skill-based policies on the immigrant selection process," Economia Politica: Journal of Analytical and Institutional Economics, Springer;Fondazione Edison, vol. 39(2), pages 595-621, July.
    21. Baran Siyahhan & Hamed Ghoddusi, 2022. "Optimal investment in human capital under migration uncertainty," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(2), pages 422-449, May.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Migration of skilled workers; immigration policy; education policy;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F22 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - International Migration
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
    • O15 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Economic Development: Human Resources; Human Development; Income Distribution; Migration

    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:gii:giihei:heidwp09-2014. 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: Dorina Dobre (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ieheich.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.