Demographic change and housing markets (Conference report)

Professor Robert E Wright of the Department of Economics, University of Strathclyde organised a one-day workshop titled: "Demographic Change and Housing Markets", held in Glasgow on February 15, 2012. The workshop consisted of six presentations and was attended by over 40 participants from academia, government, charities and business. The workshop was funded by the Scottish Institute of Research in Economics (SIRE) and the Scottish Economic Society (SES). The workshop brought together individuals carrying out current and leading research into the major links between demographic change and housing markets

Population ageing and immigration policy

In its simplest interpretation, population ageing is the increase in the average or median age of a population. It is the process by which there is a redistribution of relative population shares away from the younger to the older age groups

Chasing graduate jobs?

This paper examines empirically the relationship between under-employment and migration amongst five cohorts of graduates of Scottish higher education institutions with micro-data collected by the Higher Education Statistical Agency. The data indicate that there is a strong positive relationship between migration and graduate employment—those graduates who move after graduation from Scotland to the rest of the UK or abroad have a much higher rate of graduate employment. Versions of probit regression are used to estimate migration and graduate employment equations in order to explore the nature of this relationship further. These equations confirm that there is a strong positive relationship between the probability of migrating and the probability of being in graduate employment even after other factors are controlled for. Instrumental variables estimation is used to examine the causal nature of the relationship by attempting to deal with the potential endogeneity of migration decisions. Overall the analysis is consistent with the hypotheses that a sizeable fraction of higher education graduates are leaving Scotland for employment reasons. In turn this finding suggests the over-education/under-employment nexus is a serious problem in Scotland

Devolved immigration policy : will it work in Scotland?

In February 2005, the then Home Secretary Charles Clarke outlined a “five year plan” aimed at changing fundamentally the way immigration to the United Kingdom is managed. What does this new system mean for Scotland, a country with a government committed to maintaining historical high levels of net-migration

Chasing Graduate Jobs?

This paper examines empirically the relationship between under-employment and migration amongst five cohorts of graduates of Scottish higher education institutions with micro-data collected by the Higher Education Statistical Agency. The data indicate that there is a strong positive relationship between migration and graduate employment—those graduates who move after graduation from Scotland to the rest of the UK or abroad have a much higher rate of graduate employment. Versions of probit regression are used to estimate migration and graduate employment equations in order to explore the nature of this relationship further. These equations confirm that there is a strong positive relationship between the probability of migrating and the probability of being in graduate employment even after other factors are controlled for. Instrumental variables estimation is used to examine the causal nature of the relationship by attempting to deal with the potential endogeneity of migration decisions. Overall the analysis is consistent with the hypotheses that a sizeable fraction of higher education graduates are leaving Scotland for employment reasons. In turn this finding suggests the over-education/under-employment nexus is a serious problem in Scotland.Scotland, under-employment, over-education, higher education graduates

An optimal internet location strategy for markets with different tax rates

The traditional view that a high sales tax rate reduces trade by driving a wedge between the purchase and sale price may not apply to internet commerce for two reasons. The first reason is that the sales tax paid by buyers purchasing via the internet is determined by the tax rate in the region of the buyer. The second reason is that a high sales tax may lower the before-tax price if sellers absorb part of the tax. Taken together, this implies that internet distributors may profitably target customers in regions with low tax rates by locating their selling addresses in high tax regions. Consequently the optimal marketing strategy for a global internet distributor may include siting selling locations in regions with high tax rates in order to target customers in regions with low tax rates. An empirical analysis of the European car market suggests that this is more than a remote theoretical possibility by demonstrating that the before-tax prices recommended by manufacturers for new cars are lower in high tax countries

Is Graduate Under-employment Persistent? Evidence from the United Kingdom

This paper examines the persistence of under-employment amongst UK higher education graduates. For the cohort of individuals who graduated in 2002/3, micro-data collected by the Higher Education Statistical Agency, are used to calculate the rates of "non-graduate job" employment 6 months and 42 months after graduation. A logit regression analysis suggests the underemployment is not a short-term phenomenon and is systematically related to a set of observable characteristics. It is also found that under-employment 6 months after graduation is positively related to under-employment 42 months after graduation, which is consistent with the view that the nature of the first job after graduation is important in terms of occupational attainment later in the life-cycle.graduates, under-employment, over-education, persistence, United Kingdom

Graduate migration flows in Scotland

This paper examines the nature of graduate migration flows in Scotland. Migration equation is estimated with micro-data from a matched dataset of Students and Destinations of Leavers from Higher Education information collected by the Higher Education Statistical Agency (HESA). The probability of migrating from Scotland is related to a set of observable characteristics. These logit regressions are estimated separately for Scotland-domiciled and rest-of-the-UK domiciled graduates and separately for under-graduates graduates and postgraduate graduates. The analysis suggests that migration is a selective process with what can be termed “high achievers” having a higher probability of leaving Scotland after graduation

The UK "Immigration Cap" : implications for Scotland

The main purpose of this paper is to consider how the Conservative Liberal-Democrats Coalition’s so-called "immigration cap" will impact on Scotland. The immigration cap is a set of not yet specified policies (working mainly through the points-based immigration system) aimed at lowering net-migration to the UK primarily by lowering immigration. While the UK Government wants to reduce net-migration to the UK, the Scottish Government wants to maintain a historically high level of net-migration in Scotland in part to achieve its population growth target and to ensure labour force growth. The two levels of government are pursuing policies that clearly conflict, since lowering net-migration to the UK will also likely lower net-migration to Scotland