You can go home again: Evidence from longitudinal data

Abstract

In this paper we analyze the economic and demographic factors that influence return migration, focusing on generation 1.5 immigrants. Using longitudinal data from the 1979 youth cohort of the National Longitudinal Surveys (NLSY79), we track residential histories of young immigrants to the United States and analyze the covariates associated with return migration to their home country. Overall, return migration appears to respond to economic incentives, as well as to cultural and linguistic ties to the United States and the home country. We find no role for welfare magnets in the decision to return, but we learn that welfare participation leads to lower probability of return migration. Finally, we see no evidence of a skill bias in return migration, where skill is measured by performance on the Armed Forces Qualifying Test.

Self-selection, earnings, and out-migration: A longitudinal study of immigrants to Germany

“…Likewise, Lindstrom and Massey (1994) found that Mexican emigrants were negatively selected with respect to both wages and human capital, but Chiswick (1986b) found little evidence that emigration was selective, at least with respect to schooling. Reagan and Olsen (2000) likewise found no evidence for a skill bias in return migration.…”

“…He found that migrants from the island were generally negatively selected, but that returnees were drawn from the most skilled among them. Reagan and Olsen's (2000) study of both male and female out-migrants did not find any gender differentials, but they did find a lower likelihood of emigration among those who arrived at younger ages, those with higher potential wages, those with more years of U.S. residence, and those who had participated in U.S. social welfare programs. They also found that Mexicans and immigrants with a college degree were more likely to emigrate.…”

“…Second, it is also important to take selective emigration into account when measuring the economic effect of immigration on natives. Third, selective patterns of emigration may have significant fiscal implications (Reagan and Olsen 2000;Duleep 1994), as the characteristics of immigrants are tied to use of the social welfare system. Finally, more accurate research on emigration can improve the ability to forecast trends in immigration.…”

Una metodología para la estimación de la emigración internacional a partir del registro administrativo de control de fronteras de Migración Colombia

“…Otro aspecto a destacar es que, en su mayor parte, en la literatura existente sobre emigración se utilizan datos de carácter transversal que obvian las historias migratorias cada vez más complejas de los individuos. Con el fin de superar esas limitaciones, en algunas investigaciones se aprovechó la visión longitudinal que ofrecen distintos tipos de registros administrativos para averiguar el estatus migratorio de las personas en cada momento (Jasso y Rosenzweig, 1982;Reagan y Olsen, 2000, Van Hook y otros, 2006. En el contexto actual de globalización de los flujos migratorios, la idea de un solo cambio de país de residencia ha quedado obsoleta (McCann, Poot y Sanderson, 2010).…”

Modeling Migration Dynamics of Immigrants: The Case of the Netherlands

“…Therefore, a more common approach is to estimate a probit or logit model for the probability to return (see a.o., Reagan and Olsen (2000) and Constant and Massey (2003)). In a probit model part of the migration dynamics is discarded because only the whereabouts of the migrants at fixed points in time are considered.…”