The Dynamics of Mass Migration Estimating the Effect of Income Differences on Migration in a Dynamic Model of Discrete Choice with Diffusion ∗ (original) (raw)

During the period 1881-1914, approximately 1.5 million Jews immigrated to the U.S. from the Pale of Settlement in the Russian Empire. The data generated by this event can help explain the puzzling pattern of transatlantic mass migration: while time-series evidence shows that levels of migration were very volatile and highly sensitive to business-cycle fluctuations, there is little cross-sectional evidence for a systematic effect of income on migration—poorer countries did not always send more emigrants than wealthier countries. I explain this puzzle by using a newly constructed and unique data set, linking Ellis Island individual arrival records of hundreds of thousands of Russian Jews to information from the 1897 Russian census on their towns and districts of origin. I document the evolution of their migration networks using data on the incorporation of hometown-based associations, and capture local push shocks from comprehensive data on crop yields in Russia. Using a dynamic model...