Wage expectations of illegal immigrants: The role of networks and previous migration experience

Rezart Hoxhaj

International Economics, 2015, issue 142, 136-151

Abstract: In this paper, I use a unique survey on illegal immigrants apprehended in Italy to investigate migrants expected wages at the intended destination. The results show that – taking into account individual?s human capital – a large part of immigrants overestimate the wage they could earn in Italy. We find that expected wages are positively affected by migration network and previous experience. When migrating within a network, skilled migrants do not expect higher wages compared to unskilled ones probably anticipating the ‘skill waste’ associated with the illegal status.

Keywords: Illegal migration; Wage expectations; Overestimation; Italy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F22 J31 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (13)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cii:cepiie:2015-q2-142-9

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