This paper undertakes a comparative static analysis in the Harris-Todaro (H-T) model by accommodating local pollution. Unlike in the classical H-T model where migration proceeds in response to urban-rural differences in expected earnings, we consider labor movement taking place according to the difference in utility, which is influenced by the quality of the local environment. The paradoxical result is that an improvement in pollution-abatement technology gives rise to an increase in urban unemployment and has no effect on the workers' aggregate welfare. Copyright � 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

In this paper, we examine illegal migration and the capital mobility under the minimum wage legislation. The framework which we take is Ramaswami-Bond-Chen' model where there are two countries, one commodity, and two factors. In their model we introduce the assumption that the source country of illegal migration is a developing country in the sense that the government adopts Harris-Todaro minimum wage legislation. Different from the previous studies where technologies are assumed identical between countries, we assume that technologies differ between countries. Therefore, the results are somewhat different according to the factor intensity ranking between countries.

This research note extends Bond and Chen's analysis of illegal migration by assuming that the source country is a developing country in which there is a minimum wage policy. We examine how the minimum wage of the source country and enforcement by the host affect factor prices, migration, unemployment and economic welfare. We find that the enforcement effect is clear and intuitive, but the qualitative effect of the minimum wage depends on the wage elasticity of employment in the source country. Copyright (c) 2007 the author(s). Journal compilation (c) 2007 RSAI.

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