The cross-occupational effects of immigration on native wages in the UK

Marco Alfano (), Ross McKenzie () and Graeme Roy ()
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Marco Alfano: Department of Economics, University of Strathclyde
Ross McKenzie: Department of Economics, University of Strathclyde
Graeme Roy: Department of Economics, University of Strathclyde

No 2011, Working Papers from University of Strathclyde Business School, Department of Economics

Abstract: This paper estimates the effect of immigration into an occupation on the wages of natives working in other, better paid occupations. Using Annual Population Survey data from the UK we rank occupations by real hourly wage and _find that increasesin the migrant/native ratio raise average wages of natives working in the next higher paid occupation by around 0.13 percent. We find that these effects operate through migrants' higher educational attainments raising workplace productivity more broadly and supporting specialization in tasks. Our findings have important implications for policy and public discourse. They suggest that debates over the economic impacts of migration often ignore the potential spill-over benefits that a migrant can bring to the outcomes for native workers elsewhere in the wage distribution, particularly in lower wage occupations.

Keywords: immigration; impact; wage distribution (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J21 J31 J61 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 34 pages
Date: 2020-08
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-eur, nep-lab, nep-mig and nep-ure
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