Self-Employment of Rural-to-Urban Migrants in China

This paper focuses on the determinants of self-employment among rural to urban migrants in China. Two self-selection mechanisms are analysed: the first relates to the manner in which migrants choose self-employment or paid work based on the potential gains from either type of employment; the second takes into account that the determinants of the migration decision can be correlated with employment choices. Using data from the 2008 Rural-Urban Migration in China and Indonesia (RUMiCI) survey, a selection model with endogenous switching is estimated. Earnings estimates are then used to derive the wage differential, which in turn is used to model the employment choice. The procedure is extended to account for migration selectivity and to compare individuals with different migration background and employment histories. The results indicate that self-employed individuals are positively selected with respect to their unobserved characteristics. Furthermore, the wage differential is found to be an important driver of the self-employment choice.self-employment, rural to urban migration, selection bias magnets, wages, European Union

Unemployment Benefits and Immigration: Evidence from the EU

The paper studies the impact of unemployment benefits on immigration. A sample of 19 European countries observed over the period 1993-2008 is used to test the hypothesis that unemployment benefit spending (UBS) is correlated with immigration flows from EU and non-EU origins. While OLS estimates reveal the existence of a moderate correlation for non-EU immigrants only, IV and GMM techniques used to address endogeneity issues yield, respectively, a much smaller and an essentially zero causal impact of UBS on immigration. All estimates for immigrants from EU origins indicate that flows within the EU are not related to unemployment benefit generosity. This suggests that the so-called "welfare migration" debate is misguided and not based on empirical evidence.unemployment benefit spending, immigration, welfare magnets, European Union

Core and Periphery in the European Monetary Union: Bayoumi and Eichengreen 25 Years Later. LEQS Discussion Paper No. 116/2016 September 2016

Bayoumi-Eichengreen (1993) establish a EMU core-periphery pattern using 1963-1988 data. We use same methodology, sample, window length (1989-2015), and a novel over-identifying restriction test to ask whether the EMU strengthened or weakened the core-periphery pattern. Our results suggest the latter

Symmetry and Convergence in Monetary Unions. LEQS Discussion Paper No. 131/2018 March 2018

This paper has three main objectives, namely to (a) propose a new framework that can support placing countries along a core-periphery continuum (beyond the more common binary treatment as either core or periphery), (b) to construct a continuous dynamic theory-based measure (the first, to the best of our knowledge) illustrating the use of this framework for a set of European countries using yearly data from 1960 to 2015, and (c) provide a first preliminary assessment, based on endogenous Optimal Currency Area (OCA) theory, of the main potential explanatory factors of the dynamics of this measure over time and across countries. Our main finding is that this new measure allows us to identify sets of countries on the basis of not only its level but also in terms of its dynamic behaviour. Using the Phillips-Sul procedure, we show the emergence a newer set of core countries (composed by Austria, Belgium, Germany, France, Italy and Netherlands), a mixed set of countries (namely Denmark, Sweden, Greece, Spain and the UK), and a set of deep-rooted periphery countries (Finland, Ireland, Norway, Portugal, and Switzerland). There are valuable lessons from the dynamics of this measure. It increases for core countries (which confirms endogenous OCA predictions), remains worrisomely constant for a periphery, and varies substantially for the intermediate set of countries. Spain (Sweden and Greece) becomes consistently more (less) core over time, Denmark’s remains constant and the UK moves in and out of the core over time. Our panel estimates on a specification suggested by endogenous OCA theory imply that euro membership and more flexible product market regulations (or trade openness) make countries more likely to be in the core

The dynamics of core and periphery in the European monetary union: a new approach

Despite numerous studies about core-periphery in monetary unions, few focus on their dynamics. This paper (i) presents new theory-based, continuous and dynamic measures of the probability of a country being classified as core or periphery; (ii) estimates the determinants of the changes in this probability over time and across countries; and (iii) uses the Phillips-Sul convergence panel framework to investigate the behaviour of core and periphery groups over time. Our main results indicate that the post-EMU decrease of the core-periphery gap that we document was mainly driven by the adoption of the euro and by increasing competition (lower mark-ups)