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Do immigrants take or create residents' jobs?

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Abstract

We estimate the causal effect of immigration on the labor market outcomes of resident employees in Switzerland, whose foreign labor force has increased by 32.8% in the last decade. To address endogeneity of immigration into different labor market cells, we develop new variants of the shift-share instrument, tailored for small-open economies, that exploit only that part in the variation of immigration which can be explained by migration push-factors in the source countries. We find that immigration has reduced unemployment of residents and has enabled them to fill more demanding jobs, while it had no adverse effect on wages and employment.

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  • Christoph Basten & Michael Siegenthaler, 2013. "Do immigrants take or create residents' jobs?," KOF Working papers 13-335, KOF Swiss Economic Institute, ETH Zurich.
    • Handle: RePEc:kof:wpskof:13-335
    DOI: 10.3929/ethz-a-009789990
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    Cited by:

    1. Andreas Beerli & Ronald Indergand, 2014. "Which Factors Drive the Skill-Mix of Migrants in the Long-Run?," Diskussionsschriften dp1501, Universitaet Bern, Departement Volkswirtschaft.
    2. Siegenthaler Michael & Graff Michael & Mannino Massimo, 2016. "Characteristics and Drivers of the Swiss “Job Miracle”," Review of Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 67(1), pages 53-89, May.
    3. Michael Graff & Massimo Mannino & Michael Siegenthaler, 2014. "The Swiss "Job Miracle"," KOF Working papers 14-368, KOF Swiss Economic Institute, ETH Zurich.
    4. Andreas Beerli & Giovanni Peri, 2015. "The Labor Market Effects of Opening the Border: Evidence from Switzerland," NBER Working Papers 21319, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Jan Ruffner & Michael Siegenthaler, 2016. "From Labor to Cash Flow? The Abolition of Immigration Restrictions and the Performance of Swiss Firms," KOF Working papers 16-424, KOF Swiss Economic Institute, ETH Zurich.
    6. Wu, Wei-ping & Chen, Zi-gui & Yang, Dong-xiao, 2020. "Do internal migrants crowd out employment opportunities for urban locals in China?—Reexamining under the skill stratification," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 537(C).

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    Keywords

    Immigration; Native employment; Labor shortage; Shift-share instrument; KOF-Key-immigration; KOF-Key-arbeitsmarkt;
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