Cuban Migration to the United States and the Educational Self-Selection Problem

Abstract

The aim of this article is to study the educational self-selection problem of Cuban migration to the US. For this analysis, we specify and estimate a binary logit model to analyse the observable covariates that explain migration probability. The data used in the study came from the 2010 Census of Population and Housing in the US and from the 2002 Cuba Census of Population and Housing, both data set have been provided by IPUMS (2010) and IPUMS International (2011). The results indicate that education, age and occupational covariates explain migration probability. Moreover, there is a positive educational self-selection problem, that is, those people with a higher education migrate. The principal contribution of this article is to demonstrate how high-level education increases the probability of Cubans emigrating. The positive educational self-selection problem has significant negative consequences, for example, loss of human capital.

Gender Dissimilarities in Human Capital Transferability of Cuban Immigrants in the US: A Clustering Quantile Regression Coefficients Approach with Consideration of Implications for Sustainability

“…Cuban immigrants have positively self-selected in terms of educational level, in their migration decision to move to the US; that is, people with the highest levels of education tend to migrate [16]. On the other hand, under the Cuban Adjustment Act (CAA) of 1966, Cuban immigrants in the US have enjoyed a migrant status with more facilities for integration than any other group of immigrants has had, which has been a determining factor in their integration and assimilation process.…”