Home, Sweet Home: Returns to Returning in the Age of Mass Migration

• Studying migrants from Sweden to the United States, we provide new evidence on return migration during the Age of Mass Migration. Focusing on a sample of migrants and stayers observed in childhood, we document limited effects on income and occupational upgrading, but large effects on wealth. Male returnees held about twice as much wealth as stayers and about 40 percent more than staying brothers. These effects were likely driven by accumulated savings overseas, rather than inheritance or an income premium back home. For female returnees, wealth effects are of similar magnitude, but appear to be realized primarily through marriage.

Ämnesord

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Ekonomi och näringsliv -- Ekonomisk historia (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Economics and Business -- Economic History (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

emigration

returnees

selection

return location

occupational and social upgrading

income and wealth

N13

F22

O15

J24

J62

Publikations- och innehållstyp

ovr (ämneskategori)

vet (ämneskategori)