Migrants and multinational firms: The role of institutional affinity and connectedness in FDI

We examine how, and to what extent, migrants in a host country attract foreign direct investment (FDI) from firms based in their country of origin (CO). Introducing the notion of institutional affinity, we argue that increased institutional affinity and increased connectedness of institutional environments of migrants’ CO and country of residence, make a location attractive to CO firms. Empirical analysis of FDI and migration panel data shows that in addition to the traditional factors influencing FDI patterns, there is a collective migrant effect on FDI, and this effect is statistically significant and economically meaningful for migrants from developing countries.     

金属食品包装罐中三聚氰胺迁移规律的研究

系统研究了金属食品包装罐中三聚氰胺在食品模拟物中的迁移规律。考察了4种典型样品在不同食品模拟物、灭菌时间、灭菌温度、货架存放以及高温运输条件下三聚氰胺迁移量的变化情况,采用高效液相色谱法测定其迁移量。结果表明三聚氰胺在酸性食品中迁移风险最高,而且在金属罐装食品的实际生产运输时,需严格控制高温灭菌温度、时间以及避免高温长时间运输,以降低金属食品包装罐中三聚氰胺向所接触食品发生迁移的风险。     

Pathways out of poverty in lagging regions: evidence from rural western China

How to reduce poverty in lagging regions remains much debated and underserved with solid empirical evidence. This study illustrates an empirical methodology to analyze the pathways households followed out of poverty and to explore their potential in the future using 2000–2004 rural household panel data from two lagging provinces of China, Inner Mongolia and Gansu. It finds that rising labor productivity in agriculture has been key in understanding poverty reduction in rural lagging areas of these provinces and that it still holds much promise. Circular migration has also been important in Gansu, though less so in Inner Mongolia. On average, rural diversification has not proven to contribute much to poverty reduction and income transfers and agricultural tax abolishment have only helped at the margin. The findings from these two case studies highlight that the scope for reducing poverty in rural lagging regions can still be substantial in agriculture, also when nonagriculture drives national growth.     

Migration and technical efficiency in cereal production: evidence from Burkina Faso

This article uses a double bootstrap procedure and survey data from Burkina Faso in a two‐stage estimation to explore ways in which continental and intercontinental migration determine efficiency in cereal production of rural households. Findings suggest that continental migration has a positive relation and intercontinental migration no relation with technical efficiency. For continental migrant households, migration has removed surplus male labor, a cause for inefficiency in production. Intercontinental migration leads to a gender imbalance in the household, which cannot be compensated for by investments in farm equipment. The failure of intercontinental migration to transform cereal production from traditional to modern is attributed to an imperfect market environment.     

Urban sprawl factors in the surface water resource basins of Istanbul

This paper presents the reasons for uncontrolled land-use changes in the water resource basins of Istanbul. These changes are evaluated with a Geographical Information System (GIS), using four Landsat (1990, 1995, 2000, 2005) satellite images. Additional spatial information about capital improvement projects (highways and the Bosporus bridges), industrial land-use decisions, land ownership, and jurisdictional boundaries is also utilized. We observe that the most critical land-use changes have occurred in places with higher accessibility, mostly in close proximity to the metropolitan city center. The literature describes large public capital improvement projects (primarily the Trans European Motorway – TEM) as the primary reason for a trend of illegal occupation of public lands; however, the TEM should not be considered as the sole reason. This study explores other possible causes for these illegal developments in the water resource basins, grouped into three broad dimensions physical, socio–economic–political, and legal. Finally, we put forward possible policy suggestions for the preservation of the limited surface water resource basins in Istanbul.     

Regional development and migration in the Lower Basin of the Zambezi River. The importance of property rights

Globalization is associated with pressures and conflicts over natural resources, with migration, urbanization and development. The analyzes these phenomena focusing the Lower Basin of the Zambezi River in Mozambique where external demand over natural resources have been associated with huge projects on transport infrastructures, coal mining and agroforestry, somehow correlated with recurring conflicts. The approach proposes and uses a regional development model that highlights the impacts of the spatial allocation of property rights on income and migration. Results show the importance of resources ownership in the spatial profile of development and social unrest.     

Demand substitution across US cities: Observable similarity and home price correlation

This paper studies demand substitution in the context of US cities. Demand substitution occurs when individuals on the margin between certain city pairs affect demand patterns in the aggregate, causing certain cities to be better substitutes than others. Using a discrete model of city choice, I derive two predictions for migration flows and test them empirically using city-to-city migration data from the US Census. I show that cities which are similar on a variety of observable measures have higher levels of gross migration flows in the steady state and higher net migration flows in response to labor demand shocks. Finally, I propose pairwise correlation in metropolitan home prices as a price-based measure of substitutability and show that it contains substantial predictive power for migration flows relative to observable similarity.     

劳动力市场分割、金融市场约束与迁移人口的结构变迁

我们通过世代交叠模型来研究中国劳动力市场分割背景下的城乡迁移的长期动态规律。研究表明,中国城乡之间的劳动力市场分割、城乡迁移成本和农村的金融约束共同塑造了中国城乡迁移的长期基本特征。农村人员迁移方式的选择不仅仅是其对城乡收入差距的静态反应,更多的反映了迁移人员对不同教育投资水平的长期理性选择。我们的定量化研究表明,打破城乡劳动力市场分割,深化户籍制度改革,改善中国农村的金融环境,可以不断的优化城乡劳动力迁移的数量结构和工资结构,完善迁移人员的人力资本投资和教育水平,降低城乡收入差距和全国收入不平等的程度,加速中国二元经济转型。     

Welfare and equity impacts of cross-border factor mobility in Bangladesh: A general equilibrium analysis

We develop a dynamic computable general equilibrium model with cross-border factor mobility to assess the impacts of a foreign wage shock and the effects of counteractive policy measures in Bangladesh. The model features migration of workers and foreign direct investment (FDI) in the ready-made garments (RMG) sector. Our simulation results show that returning migrants induced by a foreign wage fall would reduce household welfare by lowering wages and increasing unemployment, particularly for unskilled workers in the domestic labor market. To counteract this negative shock, FDI promotion in the RMG sector and a human-capital development program are considered. The former policy minimizes the negative impacts of the foreign labor market shock, while a combination of both policies is more equitable.     

Migration consequences of welfare reform

We investigate whether recent changes in welfare policy affect the migration of low-educated unmarried mothers. Estimates indicate that welfare reform is associated with an increase in employment-related intrastate migration, and a decrease in non-employment related migration, both within and between states. The net effect was a small increase in intrastate migration and a small decrease in interstate migration. The close link between migration and employment suggests that welfare reform has motivated low-income women to move for economic reasons. In general, welfare policy appears to have a much larger effect on residential location because of its relationship to employment than because of benefit differences between states.