Abstract
Employing the basic model of illegal migration by Bond and Chen (J Int Econ 23:315−328, 1987) and Yoshida (Indian Econ Rev 28:111−115, 1993), we study the recent trends of illegal migrants in Europe. Initially, they cross the border of marginal countries (e.g., Greece or Italy), which are part of a large economic bloc (i.e., the European Union), with the intention of moving within the bloc to find good job opportunities in more developed countries (e.g., Germany); this is facilitated by a lack of passport controls among member countries. Particularly, we focus on the optimal policies of a highly developed country, as the final destination of immigrants from two different routes (i.e., via one country with border control or via another country without any restriction). We find one available policy that encourages a border country to enhance the level of restriction is not sustainable. On the other hand, introducing border control between border countries without any restriction will be welfare improving under certain reasonable conditions.
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Notes
- 1.
According to the Washington Post (by Griff Witt, May 18, 2015), the European border control agency – Frontex – reported that 283,532 illegal border crossings were detected in 2014. Syrians fleeing civil war accounted for the largest group of migrants or almost one in three. People from sub-Saharan Africa constituted the next largest group. The number of illegal crossings in 2015 was more than double than in the same period a year before.
- 2.
According to the Washington Post (e.g., Witte 2015), the number of migrants seeking asylum in Europe has more than tripled since 2008. Germany, Sweden, Italy, and France together received more than half of all new asylum applications in 2014.
- 3.
We reasonably assume that the main industry of medium developed Country G is agriculture and the primary factors of production are land and labor. Internal labor mobility from rural to urban occurs by excess supply of labor, but due to the insufficient job opportunities, quite a lot of workers remain unemployed in the urban area. Without necessary infrastructure, there is no modern manufacturing industry in Country G, and this is the reason why no capital inflow from Country D or I.
- 4.
Applying two gains-from-trade theorems, the gainfulness of trade for a single free-trading country and the existence of gainful custom unions, Kemp (1993) deduced general propositions about the gains from international migration.
- 5.
The illegal immigrants detected must return to Country I; however, the same numbers of immigrants return, and we have the exact same equilibrium in the next period.
- 6.
The level of enforcement is usually determined considering several complex factors. Maximizing national welfare or income of the host country seems the most reasonable. In the usual case, national welfare includes the term of social safety or stability, which is considered a decreasing function of the number of illegal immigrants . This is the reason why host countries restrict immigration, which causes negative effects on national income. Moreover, concerning international harmony or global welfare, this self-complacent policy , which usually obtains profits from detecting illegal immigrants, might not be favored by foreign countries. Here, instead, we introduce financial balance as a more acceptable and sustainable restriction policy target.
- 7.
In our model, z is exogenously given and fixed. By simple calculation, it is easy to obtain dw/dz > 0 and dW/dz > 0. However, we dare to exclude the availability of this policy because it is based on the exploitation which implies further wage gap between domestic workers and illegal immigrants even though their productivities are the same.
- 8.
- 9.
As we do not consider the penalty charge which should be paid by the illegal immigrants detected at the border, there is no revenue-neutrality constraint of Country I. Country I determines the level of B or α exogenously to fit political target.
- 10.
We need to remark that M < N, which implies that not all illegal immigrants from Country S to I migrate to Country D.
- 11.
It might be necessary to mention that this political cooperation is costless for Country D. If Country D should spend public fund to support Country I’s restriction policy, due to the revenue-neutrality condition, which will reduce the level of possible internal enforcement . As a result, the probability of political gain will shrink.
- 12.
In 2016, Sweden temporarily introduced border control with Denmark to prevent the free inflow of refugees already inside the Schengen area.
- 13.
As mentioned in Introduction, it is quite difficult for illegal immigrants to find job opportunities in Country G, and therefore w ∗∗ is quite low level, and it might be lower than \( \underline{w} \). In that case, we may consider the possibility that all returned immigrants prefer to go back to Country S, and in this case, instead of w ∗∗, we need to apply the failed workers’ wage rate is \( \underline{w} \), and there is no motivation for Country G to introduce any reaction toward Country D regardless of introduction of border control. If we consider another case that Country D pays necessary money and makes Country G to introduce border control. Also in this case, the failed workers expected wage is \( \underline{w} \).
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Acknowledgment
I am grateful to Murray C. Kemp, Ngo Van Long, Binh Tran-Nam, Nicola D. Coniglio, and an anonymous reviewer for their helpful comments. This work was supported by Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research (no. 16 K03676). All remaining errors are my own.
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Kondoh, K. (2018). International Immigration via Two Different Types of Midstream Countries. In: Tran-Nam, B., Tawada, M., Okawa, M. (eds) Recent Developments in Normative Trade Theory and Welfare Economics. New Frontiers in Regional Science: Asian Perspectives, vol 26. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-8615-1_9
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