Qualifications, Discrimination, or Assimilation? An Extended Framework for Analysing Immigrant Wage Gaps

Helena Skyt Nielsen (), Michael Rosholm (), Nina Smith () and Leif Husted
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Leif Husted: CIM and Institute of Local Government Studies, Copenhagen

No 365, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA)

Abstract: In this paper, we analyze immigrant wage gaps and propose an extension of the traditional wage decomposition technique, which is a synthesis from two strains of literature on ethnic/immigrant wage differences, namely the ‘assimilation literature’ and the ‘discrimination literature’. We estimate separate wage equations for natives and a number of immigrant groups using panel data sample selection models. Based on the estimations, we find that the immigrant wage gap is caused by a lack of qualifications and incomplete assimilation, and that a large fraction of that gap would disappear if only immigrants could find employment and thus accumulate work experience.

Keywords: Wage assimilation; immigrants; wage gap; panel data sample selection model (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J15 J16 J31 J71 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-lab
Date: 2001-09
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Journal Article: Qualifications, discrimination, or assimilation? An extended framework for analysing immigrant wage gaps (2004)
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