Bounding the Price Equivalent of Migration Barriers - Working Paper 428

Michael Clemens, Claudio Montenegro and Lant Pritchett

No 428, Working Papers from Center for Global Development

Abstract: Large international differences in the price of labor can be sustained by differences between workers, or by natural and policy barriers to worker mobility. We use migrant selection theory and evidence to place lower bounds on the ad valorem equivalent of labor mobility barriers to the United States, with unique nationally-representative microdata on both US immigrant workers and workers in their 42 home countries. The average price equivalent of migration barriers in this setting, for low-skill males, is greater than $13,700 per worker per year. Natural and policy barriers may each create annual global losses of trillions of dollars.

Keywords: migration; labor mobility; migrant selection theory; migration barriers; policy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F22 J61 J71 O15 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 49 pages
Date: 2016-07
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dem, nep-int and nep-mig
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cgd:wpaper:428

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