When Immigrants Meet Exporters: A Reassessment of the Immigrant Wage Gap

Arbeitspapier

We use French employer-employee data to reassess the wage gap between native and foreign workers. We find that the wage gap varies with the export intensity of the firm and the occupation of the worker. A model with heterogeneous firms and workers shows that our findings are consistent with white-collar immigrants capturing an informational rent. The evidence supports this mechanism. First, we show that the wage gap is positively correlated with the complexity of the firm export activity. Second, we show that wages react to changes in export intensity when the export destination coincides with the origin of foreign workers.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: CESifo Working Paper ; No. 10092

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Empirical Studies of Trade ; International Migration ; Trade and Labor Market Interactions
• Subject: export ; firm ; immigrants ; wage inequality

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Marchal, Léa ; Ourens, Guzmán ; Sabbadini, Giulia
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Center for Economic Studies and ifo Institute (CESifo)
• (where): Munich
• (when): 2022

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/267324
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:47 AM CET