How does persecution affect who migrates?

Ran Abramitzky (), Travis Baseler and Isabelle Sin
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Ran Abramitzky: Stanford University

No 22_07, Working Papers from Motu Economic and Public Policy Research

Abstract: We analyze migrants’ self-selection out of the USSR and its satellite states before and after the collapse of Communism using census microdata from the three largest destination countries: Germany, Israel, and the United States. We find that migrants arriving before and around the time of the collapse (who were more likely to have moved because of persecution) were more educated and had better labor market outcomes in the destination than those arriving later. This change is not fully explained by the removal of emigration restrictions in the Communist Bloc. Instead, we show that this pattern is consistent with more positive self-selection of migrants who are motivated by persecution. When the highly educated disproportionately forgo migrating to enjoy the amenities of their home country, persecution can induce them to leave.

Keywords: Migration:; persecution (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F22 J6 N30 N32 N34 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 64 pages
Date: 2022-07
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-his and nep-ure
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:mtu:wpaper:22_07

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