A literature review
Does immigration affect wages? The empirical evidence has been inconclusive, argue Aubry et al. To further investigate the question, in this paper they run a meta-analysis of the literature based on 2,146 estimates from 64 studies published between 1972 and 2019. They find that:
- On average, the literature reports a negative and close to zero effect of immigration on native wages. This result holds for both low/medium-skilled and high-skilled native individuals;
- Structural and method heterogeneity determine the immigration effect. Differences across country setups and the structure of the data explain, in part, why the estimated wage effects of immigration vary across studies;
- Research published in leading academic journals provides more negative estimates of the impact of immigration on native wages, as compared to research published in other outlets!
We believe this result is important from a policy perspective. Although results from leading journals are likely to receive more attention, they may differ from the average result in the literature. This feature may have non-negligible implications for the policy debate.
Does Immigration Affect Wages? A Meta-Analysis
Authors: Amandine Aubry, Jérôme Héricourt, Léa Marchal, Clément Nedoncelle
From: Université de Normandie—CREM, Univ. Lille, Pantheon-Sorbonne University (Paris 1), Université Paris-Saclay
Technological change and wages of immigrants and natives: the exception to the rule?
In this paper Giesing and Rude analyze the effect of two different automation technologies, industrial robots and artificial intelligence (AI) on immigrants’ wages. They focus on Germany, as it is one of the main robot adopters globally and has been subject to large immigration flows during recent decades. Among their findings:
- Industrial robots decrease the unemployment rate of middle-skilled migrants, which could be due to complementarity effects. Migrants might take over complementing tasks, such as the operation or supervision of machines. But robotics create a wage gap between migrants and natives for all skill-groups, with the latter experiencing wage increases and the former experiencing wage decreases. Could this be evidence of productivity effects for natives?
- AI has a similar effect: in local labor markets with elevated AI skill demands, migrants’ wages decrease while natives’ wages increase. These labor markets are also characterized by an increase in the unemployment rate of middle- and low-skilled migrants.
Technological Change and Immigration – A race for talent or of displaced workers
Authors: Yvonne Giesing, Britta Rude
From: ifo Institute
