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Miserable Migrants? Natural Experiment Evidence on International Migration and Objective and Subjective Well-Being

Author Info

Listed author(s):
  • Stillman, Steven

    ()

    (Free University of Bozen/Bolzano)

  • Gibson, John

    ()

    (University of Waikato)

  • McKenzie, David

    ()

    (World Bank)

  • Rohorua, Halahingano

    ()

    (University of Waikato)

Abstract

Over 200 million people worldwide live outside their country of birth and typically experience large gains in material well-being by moving to where incomes are higher. But effects of migration on subjective well-being are less clear, with some studies suggesting that migrants are miserable in their new locations. Observational studies are potentially biased by the self-selection of migrants so a natural experiment is used to compare successful and unsuccessful applicants to a migration lottery in order to experimentally estimate the impact of migration on objective and subjective well-being. The results show that international migration brings large improvements in objective well-being, in terms of incomes and expenditures. Impacts on subjective well-being are complex, with mental health improving but happiness declining, self-rated welfare rising if viewed retrospectively but static if viewed experimentally, self-rated social respect rising retrospectively but falling experimentally and subjective income adequacy rising. We further show that these changes would not be predicted from cross-sectional regressions on the correlates of subjective well-being in either Tonga or New Zealand. More broadly, our results highlight the difficulties of measuring changes in subjective well-being when reference frames change, as likely occurs with migration.

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Paper provided by Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) in its series IZA Discussion Papers with number 6871.

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Length: 36 pages
Date of creation: Sep 2012
Publication status: published in: World Development, 2013, [Online First]
Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp6871
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Keywords: subjective well-being; natural experiment; lottery; immigration; Tonga; Pacific Islands;

Other versions of this item:

Find related papers by JEL classification:
  • I31 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - General Welfare, Well-Being
  • J61 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Geographic Labor Mobility; Immigrant Workers

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References listed on IDEAS
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  1. John Gibson & Steven Stillman & David McKenzie & Halahingano Rohorua, 2013. "Natural Experiment Evidence On The Effect Of Migration On Blood Pressure And Hypertension," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 22(6), pages 655-672, 06.
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  16. repec:pri:cheawb:deaton_income_health_and_wellbeing_around_the_world_evidence_%20from_gall is not listed on IDEAS
  17. David McKenzie & John Gibson & Steven Stillman, 2010. "How Important Is Selection? Experimental vs. Non-Experimental Measures of the Income Gains from Migration," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 8(4), pages 913-945, 06.
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  20. John Gibson & David McKenzie & Halahingano Rohorua, 2008. "How Pro-Poor is the Selection of Seasonal Migrant Workers from Tonga Under New Zealand's Recognised Seasonal Employer (RSE) Program?," CReAM Discussion Paper Series 0807, Centre for Research and Analysis of Migration (CReAM), Department of Economics, University College London.
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  22. Gibson, John & McKenzie, David & Rohorua, Halahingano, 2008. "How pro-poor is the selection of seasonal migrant workers from Tonga under New Zealand's recognized seasonal employer program ?," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4698, The World Bank.
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Blog mentions

As found by EconAcademics.org, the blog aggregator for Economics research:
  1. Are international migrants happier after their move?
    by Economic Logician in Economic Logic on 2012-11-16 15:30:00
  2. Migration and happiness
    by Inaki Villanueva in Applied economist on 2013-11-01 17:33:00
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