Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- List of tables
- Foreword
- Acknowledgements
- List of conference participants
- 1 Trade and migration: an introduction
- PART ONE INSIGHTS FROM THEORY
- PART TWO QUANTIFYING THE LINKS BETWEEN TRADE AND MIGRATION
- 6 Trade and migration: a production-theory approach
- Discussion
- 7 Migration, dual labour markets and social welfare in a small open economy
- Discussion
- 8 Globalisation and migratory pressures from developing countries: a simulation analysis
- Discussion
- PART THREE HISTORICAL AND CONTEMPORARY EVIDENCE
- Index
Discussion
from PART TWO - QUANTIFYING THE LINKS BETWEEN TRADE AND MIGRATION
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 May 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- List of tables
- Foreword
- Acknowledgements
- List of conference participants
- 1 Trade and migration: an introduction
- PART ONE INSIGHTS FROM THEORY
- PART TWO QUANTIFYING THE LINKS BETWEEN TRADE AND MIGRATION
- 6 Trade and migration: a production-theory approach
- Discussion
- 7 Migration, dual labour markets and social welfare in a small open economy
- Discussion
- 8 Globalisation and migratory pressures from developing countries: a simulation analysis
- Discussion
- PART THREE HISTORICAL AND CONTEMPORARY EVIDENCE
- Index
Summary
Chapter 8 by Faini et al. is very interesting. It adds to the ongoing debate on whether it is possible to reduce migration through trade liberalisation. It begins with the premise that the countries of destination would like, if possible, to find a way of reducing immigration pressures. Before I consider the specific case described in the chapter, it is necessary to point out that if this assumption is generally true, in the future it will be less tenable in the case of Europe, where the population is ageing rapidly. In fact, generational factors in Europe will create a short-term demand for immigrants. In Northern Italy, the area with the highest proportion of aged people, there will be one-and-a-half jobs available for every young person who enters the labour market in 2006, because of the number of workers reaching retirement age at that date. Thus, if the participation rate does not change dramatically and technological change does not cause the number of available jobs to fall by more than 30 per cent, then there will be a relatively strong demand for immigrant labour.
Let us return to the Faini et al. model. It provides a useful framework but suffers some weaknesses.:
First, as with all simulation models,the results are strictly determined by the parameters of the specification.
Second, it explains migratory flows only in terms of supply-side decisions, in fact the destination model is very static. For instance, the skill composition of emigrants' pull will be determined only by changes in the pattern of production induced by ‘trade policies’ adopted in the country of origin and not by changes in the demand in the country of arrival.
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- Information
- MigrationThe Controversies and the Evidence, pp. 221 - 224Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1999