The University of Southampton
University of Southampton Institutional Repository

Return migrants and the wage premium: does the legal status of migrants matter?

Return migrants and the wage premium: does the legal status of migrants matter?
Return migrants and the wage premium: does the legal status of migrants matter?
This paper examines the impact of the legal status of overseas migrants on their wages upon return to the home country. Using unique data from Egypt, which allows us to distinguish between return migrants according to whether their international migration was documented or undocumented, we examine the impact of illegal status on wages upon return. Relying on a conditional mixed process model, which takes into account the selection into emigration, into return, and into the legal status of temporary migration, we find that, upon return, undocumented migrants experience a wage penalty compared with documented migrants, as well as relative to non-migrants. Our results are the first to show the impact of undocumented migration on the migrant upon return to the country of origin.
Egypt, Illegality, Return migration, Undocumented migration, Wages
0933-1433
1631–1685
Elmallakh, Nelly
f8651a26-caf9-4135-aae2-0f7e8bf8b0fd
Wahba, Jackline
03ae9304-c329-40c6-9bfc-d91cfa9e7164
Elmallakh, Nelly
f8651a26-caf9-4135-aae2-0f7e8bf8b0fd
Wahba, Jackline
03ae9304-c329-40c6-9bfc-d91cfa9e7164

Elmallakh, Nelly and Wahba, Jackline (2021) Return migrants and the wage premium: does the legal status of migrants matter? Journal of Population Economics, 35 (4), 1631–1685. (doi:10.1007/s00148-021-00872-z).

Record type: Article

Abstract

This paper examines the impact of the legal status of overseas migrants on their wages upon return to the home country. Using unique data from Egypt, which allows us to distinguish between return migrants according to whether their international migration was documented or undocumented, we examine the impact of illegal status on wages upon return. Relying on a conditional mixed process model, which takes into account the selection into emigration, into return, and into the legal status of temporary migration, we find that, upon return, undocumented migrants experience a wage penalty compared with documented migrants, as well as relative to non-migrants. Our results are the first to show the impact of undocumented migration on the migrant upon return to the country of origin.

Text
Elmallakh-Wahba2021_Article_ReturnMigrantsAndTheWagePremiu - Version of Record
Available under License Creative Commons Attribution.
Download (1MB)

More information

Accepted/In Press date: 9 July 2021
e-pub ahead of print date: 7 October 2021
Published date: 7 October 2021
Additional Information: Publisher Copyright: © 2021, The Author(s).
Keywords: Egypt, Illegality, Return migration, Undocumented migration, Wages

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 451911
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/451911
ISSN: 0933-1433
PURE UUID: b79ec7a9-f7a8-4afb-921a-6f8beb9c2905
ORCID for Jackline Wahba: ORCID iD orcid.org/0000-0002-0002-3443

Catalogue record

Date deposited: 03 Nov 2021 17:31
Last modified: 17 Mar 2024 02:42

Export record

Altmetrics

Contributors

Author: Nelly Elmallakh
Author: Jackline Wahba ORCID iD

Download statistics

Downloads from ePrints over the past year. Other digital versions may also be available to download e.g. from the publisher's website.

View more statistics

Atom RSS 1.0 RSS 2.0

Contact ePrints Soton: eprints@soton.ac.uk

ePrints Soton supports OAI 2.0 with a base URL of http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/cgi/oai2

This repository has been built using EPrints software, developed at the University of Southampton, but available to everyone to use.

We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you continue without changing your settings, we will assume that you are happy to receive cookies on the University of Southampton website.

×