Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/46105 
Year of Publication: 
2011
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 5441
Publisher: 
Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
This paper studies the educational investment decisions of returning migrants while abroad in the context of their decisions about the choice of activity upon returning and the duration of migration. The theoretical model builds on Dustmann (1999), Dustmann and Kirchkamp (1992) and Mesnard (2004). Using data from the MIREM database we explore whether the type of skills acquired by migrants while abroad is related to the activity chosen upon return and the duration of migration. The results suggest that the type of education plays a significant role in the migration decisions of those returning as wage earners or self-employed. In particular, there is a clear positive relationship between being self-employed and having previously invested in vocational education in the host country. There is also a strong positive relationship between investing in university education abroad and becoming a wage earner. As international migration facilitates skill transfers between developed and developing countries, the economic development of the latter will increasingly depend on migrants' ability to access educational and vocational training in the developed world aside from university education. Returning migrants with vocational and professional training tend to be self-employed after returning home, and by so doing they contribute to reducing poverty in the host country.
Subjects: 
return migration
human capital
education
duration of migration
JEL: 
F2
J6
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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