| Description |
Considering immigration processes and home country characteristics together from a gendered perspective, this dissertation examines the effect of home country characteristics on the labor market success of migrants and the decision to migrate to the U.S., focusing on female immigrants. In order to reflect cultural and institutional conditions that shape gender inequalities in the immigrants' home country, two gender related indices, GDI (Gender Development Index) and GEM (Gender Empowerment Measure), are included in the analysis. The GEM reflects women's access to leadership positions and economic wealth, while the GDI indicates the basic living standard of women. Utilizing the one percent sample of the 2006 American Community Survey (ACS), I find the substantial effect of cultural based gender status on the earning capacity of immigrants in the U.S. across 42 countries of origin. The GEM and the GDI show different effects on women and men. The GEM has a positive effect on wages of both female and male immigrants, but it has greater effect on women than men. The GDI has a positive effect on male immigrants' wages but it has a small negative effect on female immigrants' wages. Selectivity is determined by calculating the Net Different Index (NDI) which compares differences in educational attainment between immigrants in the U.S. and nonmigrants in the home country using the 2006 ACS and the Barro-Lee Educational Attainment Measure. By modeling this selectivity measures as a function of home country characteristics, such as GDI, and GEM, the systematic relations between interaction of these conditions and the pattern of self-selection of immigrants are tested. U.S. immigrants from 42 source countries are positively selected. The results indicate that GEM does not affect the degree of positive selectivity when distance and Gini coefficient measures, reflecting migration cost and income distribution of source countries, are taken into account. In general, the level of positive selectivity is mostly determined by the migration costs and income inequality in the home country. This provides the evidence of the home country conditions on the selectivity of immigrants, which follows conventional income maximizer hypothesis in self-selection. |
