This paper links the two fields of “development traps” and “brain drain”. We construct a model which integrates endogenous international migration into a simple growth model. As a result the dynamics of the economy can feature some underdevelopment traps: an economy starting with a low...

Over the past decades, globalization has led to a huge increase in the migration of workers, as well as students. This paper develops a simple two-step model that describes the decisions of an individual vis-à-vis education and migration, and presents a unified model, wherein the two migration...

Recent theoretical studies suggest that migration prospects can raise the expected return to human capital and thus foster education investment at home or, in other words, induce a brain gain. In a recent paper (Beine, Docquier and Rapoport, Economic Journal, 2008) we used the Docquier and...

This paper examines the short and long-term impact of international migration on overall human capital formation as well as the quality of human capital formation of the left behind households in the community of origin. Exploiting a unique migration policy, we find that the time passed since...

Globalization has led to a vast flow of migration of workers but also of students. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the migration of individuals encompassing decisions already at the level of education. We present a "unified brain" drain model that incorporates the decisions of an...

Brain drain is a core economic policy problem for many developing countries today. Does relative inequality in source and destination countries influence the brain-drain phenomenon? We explore human capital selectivity during the period 1820-1909.We apply age heaping techniques to measure human...

We consider the welfare effects of the emigration of workers who produce a public good (knowledge). We distinguish between the knowledge diversion and knowledge creation effects of such emigration, and show that the remaining residents of a country can gain from emigration, even when tastes for...

In this paper I document the fact that the relationship between human capital, as measured by education, and migration choices among Mexicans is U-shaped: the highest and lowest educated tend to migrate more than the middle educated. I provide an explanation for the U-shaped relationship based...

The high outward mobility that has characterised the countries in the Western Balkan (WB) region over the past three decades is often seen as tightly linked to severe labour market imbalances and persistently low utilisation of human capital over time. To shed light on these issues, we estimate...

Immigration officials in rich countries are being asked to become overseas development officials, charged with preventing skilled workers from leaving poor countries, where their skills are needed. Some advocates urge restrictions or taxes on the emigration of doctors and engineers from...