ESSAYS IN THE ECONOMICS OF MIGRATION

The phd thesis falls within the broad topic of migrants’ integration in the host countries. The first chapter of the thesis looks at the effect of access to citizenship on saving behavior of migrant households. Naturalization of migrants is probably the last step towards full integration in the host-country society. Citizenship status gives immigrants numerous possibilities such as the right to participate in (national) elections and have political influence over which politicians are elected, what policies adopted and how resources are allocated. In addition to giving inalienable right of residence, occupational freedom and freedom of movement, it also ensures the access to social security benefits during retirement and other periods of uncertainty. The empirical strategy exploits two immigration reforms in Germany that took place in 1991 and 1999 respectively. The 1991 reform defined for the first time explicit criteria for naturalization with still restrictive residency requirement of 15 years. The 1999 reform relaxed this requirement to 8 years. Using the German Socio-Economic Panel for the period 1996 to 2012, our results show that immigrants significantly reduce their propensity to save and amount saved with each additional year after naturalization. Considering only domestic savings, however, gives us an incomplete picture on the saving behavior after naturalization. This is because migrants have the option to save in their home countries. Using data on remittances, we show that access to citizenship does not affect financial transfers sent abroad. The second paper fits within the increasing literature on the role of age at migration in the socio-economic integration of migrants. The main focus has been on education, employment and social integration, finding that the earlier a migrant arrives in the host country, the better the outcomes he/she will have later in life. These findings are attributed to living condition and surrounding environment both pre and post migration. The paper, instead, looks at juvenile criminal behavior. The criminology literature suggests that immigrants may have higher crime rates as compared to natives because of their adverse early life conditions. Longer exposure to civil war or political and ethnic prosecution in the country of origin may have long lasting effects on delinquent behavior. It may cause temporary or permanent trauma in children, making them more likely to commit an offense as juveniles or adults. Using rich Danish administrative data for the period 1980-2011, we answer two main questions: Are first generation immigrant children more crime prone relative to their native born siblings? Second, can age at migration explain the first versus second generation crime gap? Results show that first generation immigrant children are significantly more likely to be charged with or convicted of a crime by age 21 as compared to their Danish-born siblings. Looking at specific types of crime, the effect is statistically significant for property crimes only. Being born abroad is associated with 22% higher chance to be convicted of a property crime. Contrary to beliefs, we do not find any difference in the propensity to be charged with or convicted of violent crimes. Looking at age at migration, our analysis suggests that children coming after school-starting age are much more likely to engage in delinquent behavior. We test for two mechanisms potentially explaining our results: education and experience of a war during childhood. While lower educational achievement of first generation explains their higher crime rate, exposure to a violent environment does not seem to play a role.