Immigrant Earnings, Assimilation and Heterogeneity

In this study, I examine firstly the determinants of the wage earnings for immigrants from different countries, and secondly whether their wage earnings converge to those of comparable native-born Swedes. The study is based on a longitudinal dataset, and the data refers to 1991 and 1995, respectively. The empirical results indicate that immigrants in Sweden are heterogeneous, and different income determinants, such as education, cohort-specific factors and time of residence, affect different groups of immigrants in different ways. Even after 20 years of residence, almost none of the groups appear to reach the same level of earnings as natives. In particular, the earnings of immigrants from typical refugee-sending countries tend to be much lower.Immigration; immigrant earnings; earnings assimilation

Macroeconomic Uncertainty and Investment – Empirical Analysis for Romania

From a theoretical point of view, uncertainty may have an impact on investment by different channels and in different directions. Thus, the sign of its overall effect is unknown and could be found only empirically from the historical data. This paper analyzes the relation between macroeconomic uncertainty and total investment in Romania over the period 2000-2008. As a source of uncertainty, it considers different measures of volatility in prices and exchange rate from autoregressive conditional heteroskedastic (GARCH) models. These measures are introduced as a linear and a quadratic term in the investment equation. The results prove a nonlinear effect of uncertainty on investment.investment, uncertainty, irreversibility, economic instability, inflation, exchange rate

Married immigrant women and employment.The role of family investments

This study examines whether the transition probability from employment to non-employment among married immigrant women is consistent with the Family Investment Hypothesis (FIH). A dynamic random effects model is used and the estimations are based on a longitudinal database covering the period 1990-1996. The results indicate that the relationship between the transition probability from employment to non-employment and the family’s time of residence in Sweden, considered here as an indication of the husband’s need for host country-specific human capital, does not seem to be consistent with the interpretation of the FIH. Further, when immigrant women married to native-born Swedes are used as a comparison group, the corresponding relationship is similar despite the fact that this group should not need to apply family investment strategy.Immigrant women; family investment; international migration

Transforming Conflict with an Economic Dividend: The Sri Lankan Experience

Sri Lanka, conflict resolution, economic dividend, foreign aid

Vector bundles on toric varieties

CORRECTION. One of the main results in this paper contains a fatal error. We cannot conclude the existence of nontrivial vector bundles on X from the nontriviality of its K-group. The K-group that is computed here is the Grothendieck group of perfect complexes and not vector bundles. Since the varieties are not quasi-projective, existence of nontrivial perfect complexes says nothing about the existence of nontrivial vector bundles. We thank Sam Payne for drawing our attention to the error and Christian Haesemeyer for explanations about the K-theory. Abstract: Following Sam Payne's work, we study the existence problem of nontrivial vector bundles on toric varieties. The first result we prove is that every complete fan admits a nontrivial conewise linear multivalued function. Such functions could potentially be the Chern classes of toric vector bundles. Then we use the results of Corti\~nas, Haesemeyer, Walker and Weibel to show that the (non-equivariant) Grothendieck group of the toric 3-fold studied by Payne is large, so the variety has a nontrivial vector bundle. Using the same computation, we show that every toric 3-fold X either has a nontrivial line bundle, or there is a finite surjective toric morphism from Y to X, such that Y has a large Grothendieck group.Comment: There is an error in one of the main conclusions of the paper. Please see the abstract for more detail

Internal migration and income of immigrant families

Using a longitudinal dataset from the years 1995 and 2000, respectively, this study examines whether migration within the host country of Sweden generates higher total annual income for (two-earner) immigrant families. The empirical findings indicate that internal migration generates a positive outcome in terms of higher family income for newly arrived refugee-immigrant families. Further, with the length of residence in the host country, the monetary gain accruing from internal migration decreases. On the other hand, I could not find similar results for immigrant families from the Nordic countries, Europe and Asia.Internal migration; family income; immigrant; family migration

Immigrants' Income and Family Migration

This thesis consists of three papers studying the economic situation of immigrants in Sweden in terms of wage earnings, labor participation and family internal migration. Paper [I] studies the determinants of the wage earnings for immigrants from different countries, and secondly whether their wage earnings converge to those of comparable native-born Swedes. The study is based on a longitudinal dataset, and the data refers to 1991 and 1995, respectively. The empirical results indicate that immigrants in Sweden are heterogeneous, and different income determinants, such as education, cohort-specific factors and time of residence, affect different groups of immigrants in different ways. Even after 20 years of residence, almost none of the groups appear to reach the same level of earnings as natives. In particular, the earnings of immigrants from typical refugee-sending countries tend to be much lower. Paper [II] examines whether the transition probability from employment to non-employment among married immigrant women is consistent with the Family Investment Hypothesis (FIH). A dynamic random effects model is used and the estimations are based on a longitudinal database covering the period 1990-1996. The results indicate that the relationship between the transition probability from employment to non-employment and the family’s time of residence in Sweden, considered here as an indication of the husband’s need for host country-specific human capital, does not seem to be consistent with the interpretation of the FIH. Further, when immigrant women married to native-born Swedes are used as a comparison group, the corresponding relationship is similar despite the fact that this group should not need to apply family investment strategy. Paper [III] uses a longitudinal dataset from the years 1995 and 2000, respectively, this study examines whether migration within the host country of Sweden generates higher total annual income for (two-earner) immigrant families. The empirical findings indicate that internal migration generates a positive outcome in terms of higher family income for newly arrived refugee-immigrant families. Further, with the length of residence in the host country, the monetary gain accruing from internal migration decreases. On the other hand, I could not find similar results for immigrant families from the Nordic countries, Europe and Asia.Immigrant; wage earnings; labor participation; family income; family investments; internal migration; immigrant women; family migration