Immigration and labor market integration in Germany: A long view

Objective: This paper draws on data from the Microcensus to provide a long-term overview of the labor market performance of different arrival cohorts of female and male migrants to Germany. Background: Whereas there is a large body of research on the labor market outcomes of migrants to Germany, a more descriptive long-term and gender-specific overview is missing. Method: We provide descriptive analyses for the employment rates, working hours, and occupational status levels of different arrival cohorts by gender, calendar year, and duration of stay. The data cover the time period 1976-2015. Results: With the exception of the earliest cohort, migrant women and men have been consistently less likely to be employed than their German counterparts. While the average working hours of migrant women of earlier cohorts were longer than those of German women, the average working hours of migrant women declined considerably across subsequent cohorts. The occupational status levels of female and male migrants have increased across arrival cohorts, corresponding to increasing levels of education. Analyses by duration of stay indicate that the occupational status of arrival cohorts have tended to decline during their initial years of residence and then to stagnate thereafter, which may be due in part to selective outmigration and the naturalization of migrants with higher skill levels. Conclusion: Our results clearly show that the labor market performance of immigrants has varied greatly by arrival cohort, reflecting the conditions and policy contexts during which they entered Germany. This conclusion applies to both genders, but especially to women.

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Double Jeopardy: How Refugees Fare in One European Labor Market

IZA Journal of Development and Migration ◽

10.2478/izajodm-2019-0008 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 10 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Dries Lens ◽

Ive Marx ◽

Sunčica Vujić

Keyword(s):

Labor Market ◽

Market Integration ◽

Market Access ◽

Labor Migrants ◽

Long Run ◽

Employment Rates ◽

Labor Market Access ◽

First Job ◽

Work Histories ◽

Longitudinal Dataset

AbstractThis paper examines the labor market trajectories of refugees who arrived in Belgium between 1999 and 2009. Belgium offers a relatively easy formal labor market access to refugees and other types of migrants but they face many other barriers in this strongly regulated and institutionalized labor market. Based on a longitudinal dataset that links respondents’ information from the Belgian Labor Force Survey with comprehensive social security data on their work histories, we estimate discrete-time hazard models to analyze refugees’ entry into and exit out of the first employment spell, contrasting their outcomes with family and labor migrants of the same arrival cohort. The analysis shows that refugees take significantly longer to enter their first employment spell as compared with other migrant groups. They also run a greater risk of exiting out of their first employment spell (back) into social assistance and into unemployment. The low employment rates of refugees are thus not only due to a slow integration process upon arrival, but also reflect a disproportional risk of exiting the labor market after a period in work. Our findings indicate that helping refugees into a first job is not sufficient to ensure labor market participation in the long run, because these jobs may be short-lived. Instead, our results provide clear arguments in favor of policies that support sustainable labor market integration.

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The long-term impact of employment bans on the economic integration of refugees

Science Advances ◽

10.1126/sciadv.aap9519 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 4 (9) ◽

pp. eaap9519 ◽

Cited By ~ 12

Author(s):

Moritz Marbach ◽

Jens Hainmueller ◽

Dominik Hangartner

Keyword(s):

Labor Market ◽

Economic Integration ◽

Asylum Seekers ◽

Long Term Effects ◽

Waiting Period ◽

Employment Gap ◽

Welfare Expenditures ◽

Employment Rates ◽

Long Term Impact

Many European countries impose employment bans that prevent asylum seekers from entering the local labor market for a certain waiting period upon arrival. We provide evidence on the long-term effects of these employment bans on the subsequent economic integration of refugees. We leverage a natural experiment in Germany, where a court ruling prompted a reduction in the length of the employment ban. We find that, 5 years after the waiting period was reduced, employment rates were about 20 percentage points lower for refugees who, upon arrival, had to wait for an additional 7 months before they were allowed to enter the labor market. It took up to 10 years for this employment gap to disappear. Our findings suggest that longer employment bans considerably slowed down the economic integration of refugees and reduced their motivation to integrate early on after arrival. A marginal social cost analysis for the study sample suggests that this employment ban cost German taxpayers about 40 million euros per year, on average, in terms of welfare expenditures and foregone tax revenues from unemployed refugees.

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Different Patterns of Labor Market Integration by Migration Motivation in Europe: The Role of Host Country Human Capital

International Migration Review ◽

10.1177/0197918318767929 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 53 (1) ◽

pp. 59-89 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Wouter Zwysen

Keyword(s):

Human Capital ◽

Labor Market ◽

Host Country ◽

Market Integration ◽

Ad Hoc ◽

Labour Force ◽

Occupational Status ◽

Substantial Part ◽

Market Outcomes ◽

Labor Market Integration

We study whether the acquisition of host country human capital, such as obtaining equivalent qualifications, good language skills, or naturalization, explains differences in labor market integration between migrants depending on their initial motivation. We use cross-national European data from the 2008 ad hoc module of the Labour Force Survey to analyze migrant gaps in labor market participation, employment, occupational status, and precarious employment. We find that different rates of and returns to host country human capital explain a substantial part of the improvements in labor market outcomes with years of residence, particularly for noneconomic migrants who experience faster growth on average.

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Europe’s promise for jobs?

Youth Labor in Transition ◽

10.1093/oso/9780190864798.003.0014 ◽

2018 ◽

pp. 419-442

Author(s):

Thees F. Spreckelsen ◽

Janine Leschke ◽

Martin Seeleib-Kaiser

Keyword(s):

Labor Market ◽

Labor Markets ◽

Market Integration ◽

Southern Europe ◽

Labor Market Integration ◽

Nonstandard Employment ◽

Migrant Youth ◽

Before And After ◽

Institutional Differences ◽

Employment Rates

This chapter examines the labor market integration of recent migrant youth from Central and Eastern Europe (EU8) countries, Bulgaria and Romania (EU2), Southern Europe, and the remaining European Union in the German and UK labor markets. The chapter measures levels of employment, income, marginal employment, fixed-term employment, (solo) self-employment, and the skills/qualification mismatch of each group compared to nationals before and after the financial crisis. Despite institutional differences, young EU citizens are well integrated into the respective labor markets (especially in the United Kingdom) in terms of employment rates. However, EU youth migrants’ qualitative labor market integration seems to mirror the existing stratification across regions of Europe: EU8 and EU2 citizens often work in precarious and nonstandard employment, youth from Southern Europe take a middle position, and youth from the remaining EU countries do as well or better on several indicators compared to their native peers.

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Arbeitsmarktintegration: Spielt Der Geburtsort Eine Rolle? Eine Empirische Untersuchung Mit Daten Des SOEP Zum Zusammenhang Zwischen Geburtsort Und Arbeitsmarkterfolg Von Migranten in Deutschland (Labor Market Integration: Does Birthplace Matter? An Empirical Analysis with Data of the SOEP on the Role of Birthplace and Labor Market Performance of Migrants in Germany)

SSRN Electronic Journal ◽

10.2139/ssrn.2614512 ◽

2015 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Michael Kostmann

Keyword(s):

Labor Market ◽

Empirical Analysis ◽

Market Integration ◽

Market Performance ◽

Empirische Untersuchung ◽

Labor Market Integration

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Occupational Differences in the Dispersion of Wages and Working Hours: Labor Market Integration in the United States, 1890-1903

Explorations in Economic History ◽

10.1006/exeh.1993.1016 ◽

1993 ◽

Vol 30 (4) ◽

pp. 379-408 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

William A. Sundstrom ◽

Joshua L. Rosenbloom

Keyword(s):

United States ◽

Labor Market ◽

Market Integration ◽

Working Hours ◽

The United States ◽

Labor Market Integration ◽

Occupational Differences

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Starting Points: Divergent Trajectories of Labor Market Integration among U.S. Lawful Permanent Residents

Social Forces ◽

10.1093/sf/soy128 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 98 (2) ◽

pp. 849-884 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

A Nicole Kreisberg

Keyword(s):

Labor Market ◽

Market Integration ◽

Legal Status ◽

Refugee Status ◽

Labor Market Integration ◽

Permanent Residence ◽

Short And Long Term ◽

Nationally Representative ◽

Permanent Residents

AbstractLegal status is a growing dimension of inequality among immigrants in the U.S. Scholars have suggested that the legal status with which immigrants enter the country stratifies their short- and long-term opportunities for labor market integration. However, much quantitative immigration scholarship modeling the relationship between legal status and labor market integration treats legal status as static. In reality, immigrants change statuses dynamically throughout their lives. This article uses a dynamic conceptualization of legal status, as well as nationally representative data and regression and propensity score weighting techniques, to examine whether five initial legal statuses are associated with divergent labor market trajectories even after those statuses change. I find that initial legal statuses—which I refer to as starting points—are associated with ordered differences in immigrants’ occupational positions immediately after immigrants change status to lawful permanent residence. These differences persist over time. Five years after all immigrants share lawful permanent residence, employment visa holders maintain more prestigious jobs; immigrants with family reunification and diversity status are in the middle; and immigrants with refugee status and undocumented experience have less prestigious jobs. This article demonstrates aggregate, longitudinal patterns of stratification among a nationally representative sample of permanent residents. The findings suggest the importance of modeling legal status as a dynamic rather than static category to reflect the continued influence of legal status starting points on immigrants’ labor market integration.

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The Labor Market Integration of Refugee Migrants in High-Income Countries

The Journal of Economic Perspectives ◽

10.1257/jep.34.1.94 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 34 (1) ◽

pp. 94-121 ◽

Cited By ~ 9

Author(s):

Courtney Brell ◽

Christian Dustmann ◽

Ian Preston

Keyword(s):

Labor Market ◽

Labor Markets ◽

Market Integration ◽

Language Skills ◽

High Income ◽

Significant Heterogeneity ◽

Host Countries ◽

Factors Affecting ◽

Labor Market Integration ◽

Employment Rates

We provide an overview of the integration of refugees into the labor markets of a number of high-income countries. Discussing the ways in which refugees and economic migrants are differently selected and so might be expected to perform differently in a host country’s labor market, we examine employment and wages for these groups over time after arrival. There is significant heterogeneity between host countries, but in general, refugees experience persistently worse outcomes than other migrants. While the gaps between the groups can be seen to decrease on a timescale of a decade or two, this is more pronounced in employment rates than it is in wages. We also discuss how refugees are distinct in terms of other factors affecting integration, including health, language skills, and social networks. We provide a discussion of insights for public policy in receiving countries, concluding that supporting refugees in early labor market attachment is crucial.

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