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Ethnic concentration and language fluency of immigrants: Evidence from the guest-worker placement in Germany

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  • Danzer, Alexander M.
  • Yaman, Firat

Abstract

This paper analyses the impact of regional ethnic concentration on the language proficiency and language use of immigrants. It solves the endogeneity of immigrants’ location choices by exploiting a peculiar episode of the German immigration history: the exogenous placement of guest-workers after WWII, one of the largest guest-worker programs on record. The econometric approach accounts for several sources of measurement error and provides a falsification exercise that hypothetically relocates the most language proficient immigrants into ethnic enclaves to test the extent of cross-regional sorting necessary to render the results purely spurious. The results show a robust negative effect of ethnic concentration on immigrants’ language ability which is driven by differences in contact rates with natives and not by differences in the willingness to integrate. The paper discusses these findings against the background of a language production function and in the light of feasible policy options to foster the language acquisition of immigrants.

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  • Danzer, Alexander M. & Yaman, Firat, 2016. "Ethnic concentration and language fluency of immigrants: Evidence from the guest-worker placement in Germany," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 131(PA), pages 151-165.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jeborg:v:131:y:2016:i:pa:p:151-165
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2016.08.012
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    Cited by:

    1. Kai Ingwersen & Stephan L. Thomsen, 2021. "The immigrant-native wage gap in Germany revisited," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 19(4), pages 825-854, December.
    2. Amelie F. Constant & Simone Schüller & Klaus F. Zimmermann, 2024. "Ethnic spatial dispersion and immigrant identity," Journal of Chinese Economic and Business Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 22(2), pages 205-230, April.
    3. Brücker, Herbert & Hauptmann, Andreas & Jaschke, Philipp, 2020. "Beschränkungen der Wohnortwahl für anerkannte Geflüchtete: Wohnsitzauflagen reduzieren die Chancen auf Arbeitsmarktintegration (Restrictions on the choice of residence for recognized refugees: Residen," IAB-Kurzbericht 202003, Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), Nürnberg [Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany].
    4. Berbée, Paul & Stuhler, Jan, 2023. "The Integration of Migrants in the German Labor Market: Evidence over 50 Years," CEPR Discussion Papers 18452, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    5. Alexander M. Danzer & Carsten Feuerbaum & Marc Piopiunik & Ludger Woessmann, 2022. "Growing up in ethnic enclaves: language proficiency and educational attainment of immigrant children," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 35(3), pages 1297-1344, July.
    6. Stips, Felix & Kis-Katos, Krisztina, 2020. "Ethnic Networks and the Employment of Asylum Seekers: Evidence from Germany," IZA Discussion Papers 12903, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    7. Yu Aoki & Lualhati Santiago, 2024. "Where to live? English proficiency and residential location of UK migrants," French Stata Users' Group Meetings 2024 27, Stata Users Group.
    8. María Tomé-Fernández & Christian Fernández-Leyva & Eva María Olmedo-Moreno, 2020. "Exploratory and Confirmatory Factor Analysis of the Social Skills Scale for Young Immigrants," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(17), pages 1-20, August.
    9. Di Giacomo Marina & Perucca Giacomo & Piacenza Massimiliano & Turati Gilberto, 2024. "Immigrants' Clusters and Unequal Access to Healthcare Treatments," Working papers 095, Department of Economics, Social Studies, Applied Mathematics and Statistics (Dipartimento di Scienze Economico-Sociali e Matematico-Statistiche), University of Torino.
    10. Monteiro, Stein, 2021. "Cultural Assimilation: Learning and Sorting," MPRA Paper 110997, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    11. Gelan, Ayele & Al-Shamali, Shaima & Awadh, Wafa, 2023. "Economic and welfare effects of immigration policy: Lessons from the experience of Kuwait," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 45(5), pages 1015-1035.
    12. Laliberté, Jean-William, 2019. "Language skill acquisition in immigrant social networks: Evidence from Australia," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 35-45.
    13. Eric Schuss, 2020. "Do Ethnic Networks Ameliorate Education–Occupation Mismatch?," LABOUR, CEIS, vol. 34(4), pages 441-476, December.
    14. Aoki, Yu & Santiago, Lualhati, 2024. "Where to live? English proficiency and residential location of UK migrants," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 221(C), pages 73-93.
    15. Danzer, Alexander M. & Feuerbaum, Carsten & Gaessler, Fabian, 2024. "Labor supply and automation innovation: Evidence from an allocation policy," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 235(C).

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Guest-worker program; Enclave; Ethnic concentration; Human capital; Immigrant; Migrant sorting; Integration; Misclassification error; Hypothetical relocation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J61 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Geographic Labor Mobility; Immigrant Workers
    • R23 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Household Analysis - - - Regional Migration; Regional Labor Markets; Population
    • F22 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - International Migration

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