The labour market impacts of female internal migration: Evidence from the end of Apartheid

Abstract

Women often migrate within developing countries for different reasons than men and female migrants tend to be very differently distributed across economic sectors as compared to male migrants. This paper provides some of the first evidence on the labour market impacts of female internal migration, examining effects in both the productive and household sectors.I merge large sample migration data from South African censuses with detailed labour force survey data, and exploit substantial time-variation in female migrant inflows into over 200 districts. To identify the causal effects of migration on labour market outcomes, I make use of the unique history of South Africa to construct a plausibly exogenous shift-share instrument for female migrant concentration based on earlier male migration flows from reserves during the Apartheid period. I firstly find that this migration increases the employment and hours worked of high-skilled women (but not men). I demonstrate that this effect is driven by substitution in household work as many female migrants find work as domestic helpers.I also find that female migration leads to a (short-term) reduction in the employment of low-skilled female non-migrants suggesting an increase in competition at the bottom of the economic ladder.

Nexus between financial inclusion, workers’ remittances, and unemployment rate in Asian economies

“…Remittances may cause recipients' reservations wages to rise, their labor supply to decline, and their desire for relaxation to rise (Azizi 2018). According to Sharp (2021), an increase in the rate of the reservation will have two effects on the labor supply: (1) it will result in fewer employees entering the labor force, and (2) it will result in fewer hours worked per week.…”