Liberalization and Incentives for Labor Migration: Theory with Applications to NAFTA

James Markusen and Steven Zahniser

No 6232, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: One of the motivations for NAFTA from the US point of view was to reduce the" incentives for Mexican migration into the US. Unskilled rural males are a primary source of" illegal immigration and also Mexico's relatively abundant factor. This group should therefore" be made better off by trade and investment liberalization according to the traditional" Heckscher-Ohlin model. Existing evidence, along with best guesses of many experts in the" area, suggest that NAFTA is unlikely to have a significant positive impact on this group least not within the time frame of several decades. We draw on a number of recent theoretical" contributions in order to offer reasons why NAFTA may not raise the wages of unskilled" Mexican workers.

JEL-codes: F15 F22 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1997-10
Note: ITI
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (21)

Published as Trade and Factor Mobility, deMelo, J., R. Faini and K. Zimmerman, eds., London: Cambridge University Press, 1999, pp. 263-294.

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