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The Causal Impact of Migration on US Trade: Evidence from a Natural Experiment

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  • Steingress, Walter

    (Bank of Canada)

Abstract

Immigrants can increase international trade by shifting preferences towards the goods of their country of origin and by reducing bilateral transaction costs. Using geographical variations across US states for the period 1970 to 2005, we quantify the impact of immigrants on intermediate goods imports. We address endogeneity and reverse causality – which arises if migration from a country of origin to a US state is driven by trade opportunities between the two locations – by exploiting the exogenous allocation of refugees within the US refugee resettlement program. Our results are robust to an alternative identification strategy, based on the large influx of Central American immigrants to the United States after hurricane Mitch. We find that a 10 percent increase in recent immigrants to a given US state raises intermediate imports from those immigrants' country of origin by 1.5 percent.

Suggested Citation

  • Steingress, Walter, 2015. "The Causal Impact of Migration on US Trade: Evidence from a Natural Experiment," IZA Discussion Papers 9058, IZA Network @ LISER.
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp9058
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    Cited by:

    1. Walter Steingress, 2018. "The causal impact of migration on US trade: Evidence from political refugees," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 51(4), pages 1312-1338, November.
    2. Ottaviano, Gianmarco I.P. & Peri, Giovanni & Wright, Greg C., 2018. "Immigration, trade and productivity in services: Evidence from U.K. firms," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 112(C), pages 88-108.
    3. Maria Santana-Gallego & Jordi Paniagua, 2022. "Tourism and migration: Identifying the channels with gravity models," Tourism Economics, , vol. 28(2), pages 394-417, March.
    4. Michał Burzyński & Frédéric Docquier & Hillel Rapoport, 2018. "The Changing Structure of Immigration to the OECD: What Welfare Effects on Member Countries?," IMF Economic Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Monetary Fund, vol. 66(3), pages 564-601, September.
    5. Rosmaiza Abdul Ghani & Michael P. Cameron & William Cochrane & Matthew Roskruge, 2020. "The Causal Impact of Trade on Migration: A Gravity Model Estimation," Working Papers in Economics 20/01, University of Waikato.
    6. Rosmaiza A. Ghani & Michael P. Cameron & William Cochrane & Matthew Roskruge, 2019. "A Gravity Model Estimation of the Bi-Directional Relationship between International Trade and Migration," Working Papers in Economics 19/02, University of Waikato.
    7. Massimiliano Bratti & Luca De Benedictis & Gianluca Santoni, 2020. "Immigrant entrepreneurs, diasporas, and exports," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(2), pages 249-272, March.
    8. Hillel Rapoport, 2018. "Diaspora externalities: A view from the South," WIDER Working Paper Series 025, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    9. Alassane D. Yeo & Aimin Deng, 2019. "The trade policy effect in international trade: case of Pakistan," Journal of Economic Structures, Springer;Pan-Pacific Association of Input-Output Studies (PAPAIOS), vol. 8(1), pages 1-17, December.
    10. Hillel Rapoport, 2018. "Diaspora externalities: A view from the South," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2018-25, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).

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    JEL classification:

    • F14 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Empirical Studies of Trade
    • F22 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - International Migration
    • J61 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Geographic Labor Mobility; Immigrant Workers

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