Are There Returns to Migration Experience? An Empirical Analysis using Data on Return Migrants and Non-Migrants in West Africa (original) (raw)
Does migrants' experience abroad provide an earnings premium for wage earners and/or a productivity advantage for entrepreneurs? In terms of earnings, we find that experience abroad results in a substantial wage premium for migrants returning from an OECD country but not for other return migrants. Past migration in an OECD country also results in a productive advantage for returnees who became entrepreneurs upon returning. However, the low share of return migrants in the population of WAEMU countries suggests that the effectiveness of return migration as a driver of development is only moderate. L'expérience migratoire est-elle valorisable? Une analyse empirique sur données collectées auprès de migrants de retour et de nonmigrants en Afrique de l'Ouest RÉSUMÉ-Les migrants bénéficient-ils d'une prime salariale sur le marché du travail de leur pays d'origine une fois rentrés au pays ? Qu'en est-il pour ceux qui dirigent une entreprise ou sont à leur compte? Les résultats de nos analyses suggèrent que les migrants de retour perçoivent une prime salariale forte lorsqu'ils reviennent d'un pays de l'OCDE. Le même résultat est observé pour ceux ayant le statut d'entrepreneurs. Cependant, étant donnée la faible proportion de migrants de retour dans la population des pays de la région, l'impact de la migration de retour sur le développement ne peut être que modéré. Acknowledgments: The authors thank François Roubaud and the PARSTAT project for making the data available for this work. The authors acknowledge financial support from OECD/DELSA under the Return Migration and Development Programme. They also thank Gilles Spielvogel, Ira Gang, Jacklin Wahba and three anonymous referees for their useful comments on a previous draft. The usual disclaimer applies.
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