Immigrant Networks and Remittances: Cheaper together?

Ainoa Aparicio and Zoe Kuehn ()

No 497, Carlo Alberto Notebooks from Collegio Carlo Alberto

Abstract: We estimate the causal effects of immigrant networks on individuals' remittance sending behavior for migrants from many different countries residing in Spain. Our methodology addresses typical issues that arise when estimating network effects: reverse causality, common unobserved factors, and self-selection. In particular, we instrument the size of networks by predicting the number of migrants in each lo- cation using the location's accessibility by distinct methods of transportation and information about how migrants from each country arrived in Spain. Our findings show that immigrants from above-average remitting countries remit more if they live in larger networks. Testing for mechanisms of network e ects, we also find that these migrants are more likely to send remittances via bank transfers, which sug- gests that large networks of individuals who remit a lot might be better at sharing information about cheaper remittance channels (bank transfers compared to money orders in post offices or agencies). In line with this hypothesis, we find that due to network effects migrants shy away from the most expensive remittance channels, potentially freeing resources for additional remittances. Furthermore, cost spreads between the most expensive and cheapest providers are lower for countries charac- terized by high remittances and stronger networks, suggesting that network effects might be competition-enhancing.

Keywords: immigrant networks; remittances; migration; Spain (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A14 F22 F24 J61 O15 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: pages 36
Date: 2017
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-int, nep-mig, nep-net and nep-soc
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Journal Article: Immigrant networks and remittances: Cheaper together? (2018)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cca:wpaper:497

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