Immigrant Participation in Welfare Benefits in the Netherlands

The efficiency of Dutch welfare system is at the heart of debate as long as immigrants are overrepresented in social welfare benefits during the working age period. This paper examines the degree of participation in social assistance, disability and unemployment benefits across ethnic groups using register data of the entire population in the Netherlands. The analysis shows that migrants are drastically more likely to have a benefit, in particular social assistance and disability benefits. A large part of migrants' dependence can be explained by their background characteristics and immigration history but still a significant unexplained residual is left. Most notably, the probability of welfare use of non-western second generation is about twice as high as the probability of western immigrants, which is a true challenge for policy makers.ethnic minorities, benefits, inactivity

Ethnic Disparities in the Graduate Labour Market

This paper examines ethnic wage differentials for the entire population of students enrolled in 1996 using unique administrative panel data for the period 1996 to 2005 from the Dutch tertiary education system. The study decomposes wage differentials into two components: a component which can be explained by the observed characteristics and unexplained component. The analysis provides novel evidence for the magnitude and the origin of ethnic wage differentials by gender. In general, ethnic wage gap is larger for migrant women than migrant men and larger for Western and Caribbean migrants than Mediterranean migrants. Ethnic minority students appear to have large wage surplus which is almost entirely explained from their favourable observed characteristics. Most notably, Mediterranean female graduates have significant positive wage discrimination while Western female graduates seem to face a small wage penalty.college, university, wages, qualifications, dropout

Who Leaves the City? The Influence of Ethnic Segregation and Family Ties

In the last three decades, the population of Amsterdam has been ‘coloured’ due to immigration flows from abroad and a low outflow rate among these immigrants and their descendants. The question is to what extent differences in spatial mobility behaviour of migrants and natives are generated by neighbourhood characteristics – among which the level of ethnic segregation – and family ties? This article examines spatial mobility process of Amsterdam population using administrative individual data covering the entire population of the city. The analysis shows that Caribbean (Surinamese and Antillean) migrants have a higher probability of moving to suburbs while Moroccans and Turks tend to rearrange themselves within the city. The estimates reveal that neighbourhood ‘quality’ has only a modest impact on the probability of moving while family ties significantly hamper the out-mobility of all individuals. The impact of family ties is the largest for Turkish and Moroccan migrants.migrants, residential mobility, family ties

WP 64 - Struggling for a proper job: recent immigrants in the Netherlands

This article concerns the employment performance of recent immigrants in the Netherlands. The analysis shows different patterns of adjustment in the Dutch labour market for Western and non-Western immigrants. The entry of Western immigrants into the labour market follows a smooth pattern, while non-Western immigrants have relatively low employment and relatively high unemployment upon arrival. In addition, they often start with semi-skilled or unskilled jobs. The labour market position of non-Western immigrants improves significantly over time. However, a considerable proportion of the disadvantages remains and seems to be persistent over time. Among non-Western immigrants, especially the Turks and Moroccans seem to face difficulties in the labour market, while the Surinamese and Antilleans are able to compensate for a large part of their substantial initial disadvantage. The relative success of the last group is probably a result of their familiarity with Dutch society.Immigrants, Employment, Unemployment, Quality of jobs JEL Classification: J15, J21, J24

Ethnic Disparities in Degree Performance

Using unique administrative individual data, this paper examines ethnic differences in degree performance in Dutch colleges and universities. The paper estimates parametric duration models and accounts for unobserved heterogeneity to assess the sources of ethnic disparities. The analysis shows that ethnic minorities from non-western countries have a significantly lower degree performance and higher risk of dropping-out. Especially, Turkish, Moroccan and Caribbean students are less likely to graduate, and graduates among them need much more time to complete their study. There is no evidence that this disadvantage stems from poor parental socioeconomic position and the choice of study subject.tertiary education, drop-out

Occupational Adjustment of Immigrants

This paper examines the speed of the occupational adjustment of immigrants using Labour Force Surveys 2004 and 2005 from Statistics Netherlands. The analysis provides new evidence that immigrants start with jobs at the lower levels of skill distribution. Their occupational achievement improves significantly with the duration of residence. The extent of this initial disadvantage and the rate of adjustment vary across immigrant groups according to the transferability of skills associated with their cultural and linguistic distance from Dutch society as predicted by the theory of immigrant occupational mobility. Most notably, Turks and Moroccans face the greatest initial dip and achieve the highest rate of adjustment while the opposite holds for Caribbean and Western immigrants. Our results are robust to three alternative measures of occupational status.ethnic minorities, quality of jobs

Employment Assimilation of Immigrants in the Netherlands: Catching Up and the Irrelevance of Education

Using two Dutch labour force surveys, employment assimilation of immigrants is examined. We observe marked differences between immigrants by source country. Non-western immigrants never reach parity with native Dutch. Even second generation immigrants never fully catch up. Caribbean immigrants, who share a colonial history with the Dutch, assimilate relatively quick compared to other non-western immigrants but they still suffer from high unemployment. The study also documents that the quality of jobs is significantly lower for immigrants, especially for those who are at larger cultural distance to Dutch society. Job quality of immigrants increases with the duration of stay but again, does not reach parity with natives. The western immigrants seem to face no considerable difficulties in the Dutch labour market. The most remarkable conclusion is the irrelevance of education for socio-economic position of immigrants once the country of origin has been controlled for.immigrants, employment, unemployment, job quality

The effect of immigration on wages in three European countries

We extend the Altonji and Card (1991) framework for analysing the impact of immigrants on natives’ wages from two to three labour types and estimate reduced form wage equations for The Netherlands, United Kingdom and Norway. We find very small effects on natives’ wages and no dominant robust patterns of substitution and complementarity. Effects on wages of earlier immigrants are larger but less reliable. Further work should focus on these own effects.

Wage effects of motherhood: a double selection approach

Wage differentials between mothers and childless women are estimated correcting for the selectivity bias resulting from two double selection processes: firstly, the motherhood decision and the employment decision, and secondly the motherhood decision and the decision to be employed in a less demanding job. We use Dutch data on women’s wages and construct an indicator for less demanding jobs. Our estimations indicate that the motherhood decision is strongly correlated with both employment and having a less demanding job. This suggests that ignoring these correlations will lead to inconsistent parameter estimations of wage equations. The selectivity corrected estimation of women’s wage differentials indicate that a large part of the wage differential is composed by discrimination compared to estimations without correction for selectivity.

Location Choices of Migrant Nest-Leavers: Spatial Assimilation or Continued Segregation?

We examine ethnic differences in the ethnic composition of the destination neighbourhood upon leaving the parental home using administrative data for the entire birth cohort 1983 living in the Netherlands. The analysis provides little evidence of a clear intergenerational break in the location choices of young men and women from a non-western origin compared to their parents. The neighbourhood choice pattern of those who leave the parental home for independent and shared living arrangements does not differ markedly from that of their parents, while nest-leavers for union formation are more likely to move to neighbourhoods with a relatively small proportion of non-western inhabitants. A decomposition analysis indicates that an overwhelmingly large part of neighbourhood choice is explained by differences in background variables. Particularly, the origin neighbourhood type of nest-leavers seems to be a driving force underlying the choice of destination neighbourhood, given individual and parental socioeconomic characteristics.leaving home, spatial assimilation, migrants