THREE ESSAYS ON MIGRATION AND ORGANIZED CRIME

This doctoral thesis consists of three independent essays on the economics of international migration and organized crime. Chapter 1 explores the relationship between immigration and voting for the far-right party in Finland. I find that one percentage point increase in the share of foreign citizens in a municipality decreases Finns Party's vote share by 3.4 percentage points. The far-right votes lost to immigration are captured by the two pro-immigration parties. Turning to potential mechanisms, the negative effect is only present in municipalities with high initial exposure to immigrants. Moreover, I provide some evidence for welfare-state channel as a plausible mechanism behind the main result. Chapter 2 studies the public health effects of a recent immigrant regularization program in the United States -- the 2012 Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA). I find that DACA increased insurance coverage among eligible immigrants. Despite the increase in insurance coverage, there is no evidence of significant increases in health care use, although there is some evidence that DACA increased demand for mental health services. After 2012, DACA-eligible individuals were also more likely to report a usual place of care and less likely to delay care because of financial restrictions. Finally, I find some evidence that DACA improved self-reported health and mental health among eligible individuals. Chapter 3 analyzes the origins and consequences of the Russian Mafia (vory-v-zakone). Using a unique web scraped data, I first show that Russian Mafia originated in the Gulag - Soviet system of forced labor camps which operated in the USSR primarily during the 1920s-1950s Stalin era. Second, I document that the distance to the nearest camp is a strong negative predictor of mafia presence in Russia's communities in the early-to-mid 1990s. Finally, I show that the communities with mafia presence in the 1990s experienced a dramatic rise in crime driven by turf wars which erupted among rival clans around 1993 and lingered on until the late 1990s. This is suggested by a sharp increase in attacks against the members of Russia's economic elite in places with mafia presence

How did the COVID-19 pandemic affect cancer patients in England who had hospital appointments cancelled?

•The paper examines appointment cancellations for English cancer patients during COVID-19.•Pandemic patients waited 19 more days for rescheduled appointments than pre-pandemic.•Pandemic cohort had 14% fewer outpatient, 32% fewer inpatient visits, 50% less hospitalized.•No mortality difference suggests hospitals prioritized acute cases despite fewer resources.•Later cancellations less disruptive; provider-initiated linked to higher survival rates

Trade Networks, Heroin Markets, and the Labor Market Outcomes of Vietnam Veterans

The role of ethnic immigrant networks in facilitating international trade is a well-established phenomenon in the literature. However, it is less clear whether this relationship extends to illegal trade and unauthorized immigrants. In this paper, we tackle this question by focusing on the case of the heroin trade and unauthorized Chinese immigrants in the early 1990s United States. Between mid-1980s and mid-1990s, Southeast Asia became the dominant source of heroin in the US. Heroin from this region was trafficked into the US by Chinese organized criminals, whose presence across the country can be approximated by the location of unauthorized Chinese immigrants. Instrumenting for the unauthorized Chinese immigrant enclaves in 1990 with their 1900 counterpart, we first show that greater presence of unauthorized Chinese immigrants in a community led to a sizeable increase in local opiates-related arrests, a proxy for local heroin markets. This effect is driven by arrests for sale/manufacturing of the drugs. Next, we examine the consequences of Chinese-trafficked heroin by looking at its impact on US Vietnam-era veterans – a group particularly vulnerable to heroin addiction in the early 1990s. Using a triple-difference estimation, we find mostly small but statistically significant detrimental effects on labor market outcomes of Vietnam veterans residing in unauthorized Chinese enclaves in 1990

Dreaming of leaving the nest? immigration status and the living arrangements of DACAmented

This study investigates the effects of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) on the living arrangements and housing behavior of undocumented immigrants in the U.S. Using an event-study approach and difference-in-differences (DID) estimates, we compared immigrants above and below eligibility cutoffs and demonstrated that, after the adoption of the policy in June 2012, DACA-eligible immigrants were less likely to live with their parents or in multigenerational households (−12.5%) and more likely to live independently (＋15.5%). We also revealed that DACA-eligible immigrants were less likely to live in the same house (−2%) and more likely to quit ethnic enclaves (＋8%). Notably, these patterns are not explained by the known effects of DACA on income and employment outcomes. Lower rental costs (−3%) may have facilitated this transition into adulthood and the observed trends in living arrangements. The DACA also led to a decline in marriage rates among DACA-eligible individuals, although we found no evidence of significant effects on cohabitation, divorce, and intermarriage. We also found no evidence of a clear impact on fertility

Replication package for Bond, Giuntella, and Lonsky (European Economic Review, 2022)

This is the replication package for the main analysis in "Immigration and Work Schedules: Theory and Evidence" by Timothy N. Bond, Osea Giuntella, and Jakub Lonsky (European Economic Review, 2022

Immigration and work schedules: Theory and evidence

We develop a theoretical framework to analyze the effects of immigration on native job amenities, focusing on work schedules. Immigrants have a comparative advantage in production at, and lower disamenity cost for nighttime work, which leads them to disproportionately choose nighttime employment. Because day and night tasks are imperfect substitutes, the relative price of day tasks increases as their supply becomes relatively more scarce. We provide empirical support for our theory. Native workers in local labor markets that experienced higher rates of immigration are more likely to work day shifts and receive a lower compensating differential for nighttime work

Immigration policy and immigrants' sleep: evidence from DACA

Stress is associated with sleep problems and poor sleep is linked to mental health and depression symptoms. The stress associated with immigrant status and immigration policy can directly affect mental health. While previous studies have documented the significant relationship between immigration policy and the physical and mental health of immigrants, we know little about the effects of immigration policy on immigrants’ sleep patterns. Exploiting the approval of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program in 2012, we study how immigrants’ sleep behavior responds to a change in immigration policy. Consistent with the findings of previous research documenting the positive effects of DACA on mental health, we find evidence of a significant improvement in immigrants’ sleep in response to this policy change. However, the estimated effects of the policy disappear rapidly after 2016. While temporary authorization programs such as DACA may have beneficial impacts on immigrants’ sleep in the short term, the effects of such temporary programs can be rapidly undermined by uncertainty about their future. Thus, permanent legalization programs may be more effective at achieving long-term effects, thereby eliminating uncertainty around the legal status of undocumented immigrants

Replication package for Gihleb, Giuntella, and Lonsky (European Economic Review, 2023)

This is the replication package for main analysis in "Dreaming of Leaving the Nest? Immigration Status and the Living Arrangements of DACAmented" by Rania Gihleb, Osea Giuntella, and Jakub Lonsky (European Economic Review, 2023