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The Impact of Family Size and Sibling Structure on the Great Mexico-U.S. Migration

Author

Listed:
  • Bratti, Massimiliano
  • Fiore, Simona
  • Mendola, Mariapia

Abstract

We investigate how fertility and demographic factors affect migration at the household level by assessing the causal effects of sibship size and structure on offspring's international migration. We use a rich demographic survey on the population of Mexico and exploit presumably exogenous variation in family size induced by biological fertility and infertility shocks. We further exploit cross-sibling differences to identify birth order, sibling-sex, and sibling-age composition effects on migration. We find that large families per se do not boost offspring out-migration. Yet, the likelihood of migrating is not equally distributed within a household, but is higher for sons and decreases sharply with birth order. The female migration disadvantage also varies with sibling composition by age and gender.

Suggested Citation

  • Bratti, Massimiliano & Fiore, Simona & Mendola, Mariapia, 2019. "The Impact of Family Size and Sibling Structure on the Great Mexico-U.S. Migration," GLO Discussion Paper Series 392, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:glodps:392
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    Cited by:

    1. Charlene Marie Kalenkoski & Sabrina Wulff Pabilonia, 2023. "Parental disability and teenagers’ time allocation," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 21(4), pages 1379-1407, December.
    2. Simen Markussen & Marte Strøm, 2022. "Children and labor market outcomes: separating the effects of the first three children," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 35(1), pages 135-167, January.
    3. Bertoli, Simone & Gautrain, Elsa & Murard, Elie, 2020. "Left Behind, but Not Alone: Changes in Living Arrangements and the Effects of Migration and Remittances in Mexico," IZA Discussion Papers 13917, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    4. Olivier Bargain & Jordan Loper & Roberta Ziparo, 2024. "Women's Empowerment and Husband's Migration: Evidence from Indonesia," Working Papers hal-04409953, HAL.
    5. Christine Ho & Kathleen McGarry, 2025. "Brothers, sisters, and support to older parents: separate spheres across and within support types?," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 38(1), pages 1-38, March.
    6. Travis Baseler, 2025. "Migration Spillovers Within Families: Evidence from Thailand," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 55, January.
    7. Longjunjiang Huang & Xian Liang & Lishan Li & Hui Xiao & Fangting Xie, 2023. "Influence of language use on migrant workers’ willingness to Urban settlement-based on the CLDS 2016 survey data," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 18(11), pages 1-13, November.
    8. Cuong Nguyen & Anh Tran, 2020. "Are children an incentive or a disincentive for migration? Evidence from Vietnam," Economics of Transition and Institutional Change, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 28(3), pages 467-485, July.
    9. Gokul P. Paudel & Trung Thanh Nguyen & Ulrike Grote, 2025. "Trade‐offs between labour migration and agricultural productivity: Evidence from smallholder wheat systems in Nepal," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 37(1), pages 202-229, January.
    10. Jan Priebe, 2020. "Quasi-experimental evidence for the causal link between fertility and subjective well-being," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 33(3), pages 839-882, July.
    11. Heidland, Tobias & Jannsen, Nils & Groll, Dominik & Kalweit, René & Boockmann, Bernhard, 2021. "Analyse und Prognose von Migrationsbewegungen," Kieler Beiträge zur Wirtschaftspolitik 34, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    12. David Mckenzie & Simone Bertoli & Elie Murard, 2023. "Migration, families and counterfactual families," Post-Print hal-04310187, HAL.
    13. Yu Bai & Yanjun Li & Pak Hung Lam, 2023. "Quantity-quality trade-off in Northeast China during the Qing dynasty," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 36(3), pages 1657-1694, July.

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    Keywords

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    JEL classification:

    • J13 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth
    • F22 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - International Migration
    • O15 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Economic Development: Human Resources; Human Development; Income Distribution; Migration

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