IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/wdevel/v182y2024ics0305750x24001797.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The short-term effects of visa restrictions on migrants’ legal status and well-being: A difference-in-differences approach on Venezuelan displacement

Author

Listed:
  • Hammoud-Gallego, Omar

Abstract

Most countries across the globe introduce visa restrictions to regulate immigration, yet little is known about their effect on migrants’ decision to migrate and their well-being. I study the mass displacement of Venezuelan nationals, and through a difference-in-differences research design, I compare the effectiveness of introducing visa restrictions in reducing overall migration flows in certain countries across South America. I use a data set of 85,000 migrants and refugees − mostly Venezuelans − surveyed by the UNHCR. Findings suggest that visa restrictions increased the likelihood of irregular entry and irregular visa status for migrants while also leading to changes in their priorities. Unexpectedly, I do not find evidence of increased violence suffered by migrants who switch towards irregular entry channels in specific countries. This research contributes to the academic and policy debate on the effectiveness of visa restrictions on migratory flows, as well the literature on the effects of migration policies on migrants’ well-being.

Suggested Citation

  • Hammoud-Gallego, Omar, 2024. "The short-term effects of visa restrictions on migrants’ legal status and well-being: A difference-in-differences approach on Venezuelan displacement," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 182(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:182:y:2024:i:c:s0305750x24001797
    DOI: 10.1016/j.worlddev.2024.106709
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305750X24001797
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.worlddev.2024.106709?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jean-Louis Arcand & Linguère M'Baye, 2013. "Braving the waves: the role of time and risk preferences in illegal migration from Senegal," CERDI Working papers halshs-00855937, HAL.
    2. Blair, Christopher W. & Grossman, Guy & Weinstein, Jeremy M., 2022. "Liberal Displacement Policies Attract Forced Migrants in the Global South," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 116(1), pages 351-358, February.
    3. Hammoud-Gallego, Omar & Freier, Luisa Feline, 2023. "Symbolic Refugee Protection: Explaining Latin America’s Liberal Refugee Laws," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 117(2), pages 454-473, May.
    4. Michael Clemens & Cindy Huang & Jimmy Graham, 2018. "The Economic and Fiscal Effects of Granting Refugees Formal Labor Market Access," Working Papers 496, Center for Global Development.
    5. Samuel Bazzi & Gordon Hanson & Sarah John & Bryan Roberts & John Whitley, 2021. "Deterring Illegal Entry: Migrant Sanctions and Recidivism in Border Apprehensions," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 13(3), pages 1-27, August.
    6. Simone Bertoli & Jesus Fernandez-Huertas Moraga & Francesc Ortega, 2011. "Immigration Policies and the Ecuadorian Exodus," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 25(1), pages 57-76, March.
    7. Michel Beine & Anna Boucher & Brian Burgoon & Mary Crock & Justin Gest & Michael Hiscox & Patrick McGovern & Hillel Rapoport & Joep Schaper & Eiko Thielemann, 2016. "Comparing Immigration Policies: An Overview from the IMPALA Database," International Migration Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(4), pages 827-863, December.
    8. Erin Hartman & F. Daniel Hidalgo, 2018. "An Equivalence Approach to Balance and Placebo Tests," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 62(4), pages 1000-1013, October.
    9. Mathias Czaika & Hein de Haas, 2017. "The Effect of Visas on Migration Processes," International Migration Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 51(4), pages 893-926, December.
    10. Kirill Borusyak & Xavier Jaravel & Jann Spiess, 2024. "Revisiting Event-Study Designs: Robust and Efficient Estimation," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 91(6), pages 3253-3285.
    11. Ariella Kahn-Lang & Kevin Lang, 2020. "The Promise and Pitfalls of Differences-in-Differences: Reflections on 16 and Pregnant and Other Applications," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 38(3), pages 613-620, July.
    12. David Roodman & James G. MacKinnon & Morten Ørregaard Nielsen & Matthew D. Webb, 2019. "Fast and wild: Bootstrap inference in Stata using boottest," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 19(1), pages 4-60, March.
    13. Sun, Liyang & Abraham, Sarah, 2021. "Estimating dynamic treatment effects in event studies with heterogeneous treatment effects," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 225(2), pages 175-199.
    14. Mathias Czaika & Hein De Haas, 2013. "The Effectiveness of Immigration Policies," Population and Development Review, The Population Council, Inc., vol. 39(3), pages 487-508, September.
    15. Evren Ceritoglu & H. Burcu Gurcihan Yunculer & Huzeyfe Torun & Semih Tumen, 2017. "The impact of Syrian refugees on natives’ labor market outcomes in Turkey: evidence from a quasi-experimental design," IZA Journal of Labor Policy, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 6(1), pages 1-28, December.
    16. Blair, Christopher W. & Grossman, Guy & Weinstein, Jeremy M., 2022. "Forced Displacement and Asylum Policy in the Developing World," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 76(2), pages 337-378, February.
    17. Barthel, Fabian & Neumayer, Eric, 2015. "Spatial dependence in asylum migration," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 64187, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    18. Callaway, Brantly & Sant’Anna, Pedro H.C., 2021. "Difference-in-Differences with multiple time periods," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 225(2), pages 200-230.
    19. Bahar, Dany & Ibáñez, Ana María & Rozo, Sandra V., 2021. "Give me your tired and your poor: Impact of a large-scale amnesty program for undocumented refugees," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 151(C).
    20. Mathias Czaika & Hein de Haas & María Villares‐Varela, 2018. "The Global Evolution of Travel Visa Regimes," Population and Development Review, The Population Council, Inc., vol. 44(3), pages 589-622, September.
    21. Rosario Aldunate & Gabriela Contreras & Claudia De la Huerta & Matías Tapia, 2019. "Characterization of the Recent Immigration to Chile," Working Papers Central Bank of Chile 830, Central Bank of Chile.
    22. Sak, Güven & Kaymaz, Timur & Kadkoy, Omar & Kenanoglu, Murat, 2018. "Forced migrants: Labour market integration and entrepreneurship," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 12, pages 1-13.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Hammoud Gallego, Omar, 2024. "The short-term effects of visa restrictions on migrants’ legal status and well-being: a difference-in-differences approach on Venezuelan displacement," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 124093, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    2. Zhou, Yang-Yang & Grossman, Guy & Ge, Shuning, 2023. "Inclusive refugee-hosting can improve local development and prevent public backlash," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 166(C).
    3. Wang, Zhen & Chu, Erming, 2024. "The path toward urban carbon neutrality: How does the low-carbon city pilot policy stimulate low-carbon technology?," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 954-975.
    4. Damian Clarke & Kathya Tapia-Schythe, 2021. "Implementing the panel event study," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 21(4), pages 853-884, December.
    5. Arold, W. Benjamin & Woessmann, Ludger & Zierow, Larissa, 2022. "Can Schools Change Religious Attitudes? Evidence from German State Reforms of Compulsory Religious Education," IZA Discussion Papers 14989, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    6. Clément de Chaisemartin & Xavier D’Haultfœuille, 2023. "Two-way fixed effects and differences-in-differences with heterogeneous treatment effects: a survey," The Econometrics Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 26(3), pages 1-30.
    7. Kamila Cygan-Rehm, 2022. "Lifetime Consequences of Lost Instructional Time in the Classroom: Evidence from Shortened School Years," CESifo Working Paper Series 9892, CESifo.
    8. Kuhnt, Jana, 2019. "Literature review: drivers of migration. Why do people leave their homes? Is there an easy answer? A structured overview of migratory determinants," IDOS Discussion Papers 9/2019, German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS).
    9. Shibashish Mukherjee & Sorin M.S. Krammer, 2024. "When the going gets tough : Board gender diversity in the wake of a major crisis," Post-Print hal-04522722, HAL.
    10. Gregory Faletto, 2023. "Fused Extended Two-Way Fixed Effects for Difference-in-Differences With Staggered Adoptions," Papers 2312.05985, arXiv.org, revised Oct 2024.
    11. Sarah Gust, 2024. "(Not) Going to School in Times of Climate Change: Natural Disasters and Student Achievement," ifo Working Paper Series 413, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich.
    12. Jack (Peiyao) Ma & Andrea Mantovani & Carlo Reggiani & Annette Broocks & Néstor Duch-Brown, 2024. "The Price Effects of Prohibiting Price Parity Clauses: Evidence from International Hotel Groups," Economics Series Working Papers 1043, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    13. Kayaoglu, Aysegul, 2022. "Do refugees cause crime?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    14. Nilsen, Øivind A. & Raknerud, Arvid, 2024. "Dynamics of first-time patenting firms," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 53(8).
    15. Jiménez, Bruno & Rendon, Silvio, 2023. "Does employment protection unprotect workers? The labor market effects of job reinstatements in Peru," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 80(C).
    16. Lichter, Andreas & Löffler, Max & Isphording, Ingo E. & Nguyen, Thu-Van & Poege, Felix & Siegloch, Sebastian, 2021. "Profit Taxation, R&D Spending, and Innovation," IZA Discussion Papers 14830, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    17. Eli Ben‐Michael & Avi Feller & Jesse Rothstein, 2022. "Synthetic controls with staggered adoption," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series B, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 84(2), pages 351-381, April.
    18. Alexander Karaivanov & Dongwoo Kim & Shih En Lu & Hitoshi Shigeoka, 2022. "COVID-19 vaccination mandates and vaccine uptake," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 6(12), pages 1615-1624, December.
    19. Dami'an Vergara, 2022. "Minimum Wages and Optimal Redistribution," Papers 2202.00839, arXiv.org, revised Dec 2022.
    20. Joakim A. Weill & Matthieu Stigler & Olivier Deschenes & Michael R. Springborn, 2021. "Researchers' Degrees-of-Flexibility and the Credibility of Difference-in-Differences Estimates: Evidence From the Pandemic Policy Evaluations," NBER Working Papers 29550, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Migration; Forced Displacement; Visa Restrictions; Venezuela; South America; Borders;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F22 - International Economics - - International Factor Movements and International Business - - - International Migration
    • K37 - Law and Economics - - Other Substantive Areas of Law - - - Immigration Law
    • O15 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Economic Development: Human Resources; Human Development; Income Distribution; Migration
    • R23 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Household Analysis - - - Regional Migration; Regional Labor Markets; Population

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:182:y:2024:i:c:s0305750x24001797. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/worlddev .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.