The institutional and ethnic view on migration decisions : Evidence from the Ottoman migration to the United States during the early twentieth century

After the development of Atlantic trade in the nineteenth century, the United States of America (US) became economically important place, attracting to a labour flow from neighbouring countries and other continents. Meanwhile, serious economic and political shocks were experienced by the Ottoman Empire. The Ottoman citizens of various ethnic origins, such as Turk, Jew, and Armenian, Arab, moved to different countries and the US to find jobs and escape political problems. Our study examines the effects of events during constitutional reform of the Ottoman Empire in 1908 on migration decision of different ethnic groups, with an econometric and labour market perspective. Our paper uses the data on US census in 1910 when the immigration to the US peaked. Our empirical results provide light on decreasing probability for some group of non-Muslim migrants, such as Arab and Armenian, which could imply the positive effects of granting equality by democratic improvement among the Ottoman citizens