This essential volume examines the influence of immigrants on the process of international economic integration – specifically, their influences on bilateral and multilateral trade flows. It extends beyond the identification and explanation of the immigrant–trade link and offers a more expansive treatment of the subject matter, making it the most comprehensive volume of its kind. The authors present abundant evidence that confirms the positive influences of immigrants on trade between their home and host countries; however the immigrant–trade link may not be universal. The operability of the link is found to depend on a variety of factors related to immigrants’ home countries, their host countries, the types of goods and services being traded and the anthropogenic characteristics of the immigrants themselves.
Applying the augmented gravity model to data on trade and migration, International Migration and Economic Integration provides answers to the following questions:
• Do immigrants exert positive influences on trade between their respective host and home countries? Are the effects of immigrants on trade homogenous across different immigrant entry classifications? Do the influences of immigrants on trade in goods extend to trade in services? Are these influences homogenous across product types and industry/sector classifications?
• Do differences in relative levels of economic and/or social development for immigrants’ host and/or home countries affect the existence or the magnitude of the immigrant–trade link? Have immigration policies and changes in such policies influenced the immigrant–trade relationship?
• Do cultural differences between immigrants’ home and host countries inhibit trade flows and, if so, to what extent do the pro-trade influences of immigrants counter the trade-inhibiting effects of cultural distance?
• Is there variation in the pro-trade influences of immigrants across migration corridors? Is the influence of immigrants on trade conditional on the volume of trade taking place between their host and home countries? Are the effects of immigrants (emigrants) on trade universal? What factors/conditions correlate with the existence and operability of the immigrant–trade relationship?
Though ideally suited to advanced undergraduate and graduate students in international trade, international economics, public policy, sociology and international relations and their professors, this engaging work will also be relevant for anyone outside of academia who is interested in public policy, immigration, or international relations.