Template-Type: ReDIF-Paper 1.0
Author-Name: Ljubica Nedelkoska
Author-Email: ljubica_nedelkoska@hks.harvard.edu
Author-Workplace-Name: Center for International Development at Harvard University
Author-Name: Diego A. Martin
Author-Workplace-Name: Harvard's Growth Lab
Author-Name: Alexia Lochmann
Author-Email: alexia_lochmann@hks.harvard.edu
Author-Workplace-Name: Center for International Development at Harvard University
Author-Name: Dany Bahar
Author-Workplace-Name: Center for International Development at Harvard University
Author-Person: pba1149
Author-Name: Ricardo Hausmann
Author-Email: ricardo_hausmann@harvard.edu
Author-Workplace-Name: Harvard's Growth Lab
Author-Person: pha552
Author-Name: Muhammed A. Yildirim
Author-Workplace-Name: Center for International Development at Harvard University
Title: De Facto Openness to Immigration
Abstract: Various factors influence why some countries are more open to immigration than others. Policy is only one of them. We design country-specifc measures of openness to immigration that aim to capture de facto levels of openness to immigration, complementing existing de jure measures of immigration, based on enacted immigration laws and policy measures. We estimate these for 148 countries and three years (2000, 2010, and 2020). For a subset of countries, we also distinguish between openness towards tertiary-educated migrants and less than tertiary-educated migrants. Using the measures, we show that most places in the World today are closed to immigration, and a few regions are very open. The World became more open in the first decade of the millennium, an opening mainly driven by the Western World and the Gulf countries. Moreover, we show that other factors equal, countries that increased their openness to immigration, reduced their old-age dependency ratios, and experienced slower real wage growth, arguably a sign of relaxing labor and skill shortages.
Creation-Date: 2025-02
Classification-JEL: F22 , O15 , J15
Keywords: Openness to immigration, measurement, aging, wages
Number: 245
Handle: RePEc:glh:wpfacu:245
File-Url: https://growthlab.hks.harvard.edu/sites/projects.iq.harvard.edu/files/2025-02-glwp-245-openness-to-immigration.pdf
File-Format: application/pdf