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The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in border closures in many countries and a sharp reduction in overall international mobility. However, this disruption of legal pathways to migration has raised concerns that potential migrants may turn to irregular migration routes as a substitute. We examine how the pandemic has changed intentions to migrate from The Gambia, the country with the highest pre-pandemic per-capita irregular migration rates in Africa. We use a large-scale survey conducted in 2019 and 2020 to ask about changes in intentions to migrate to Europe and to neighbouring Senegal. We find that youth say that the pandemic has reduced the intention to migrate to both destinations, with approximately one-third of young males expressing less intention to migrate. The largest reductions in migration intentions are for individuals who were unsure of their intent pre-pandemic and for poorer individuals who are no longer able to afford the costs of migrating at a time when these costs have increased and their remittance income has fallen. Nevertheless, despite these decreases in intentions, the overall desire to migrate the backway to Europe remains high, highlighting the need for legal migration pathways to support migrants and divert them from the risks of backway migration.

The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in border closures in many countries and a sharp reduction in overall international mobility. However, this disruption of legal pathways to migration has raised concerns that potential migrants may turn to irregular migration routes as a substitute. We examine how the pandemic has changed intentions to migrate from The Gambia, the country with the highest pre-pandemic per-capita irregular migration rates in Africa. We use a large-scale panel survey conducted in 2019 and 2020 to compare changes in intentions to migrate to Europe and to neighboring Senegal. We find the pandemic has reduced the intention to migrate to both destinations, with approximately one-third of young males expressing less intention to migrate. The largest reductions in migration intentions are for individuals who were unsure of their intent pre-pandemic, and for poorer individuals who are no longer able to afford the costs of migrating at a time when these costs have increased and their remittance income has fallen. We also introduce the methodology of priming experiments to the study of migration intentions, by randomly varying the salience of the COVID-19 pandemic before eliciting intentions to migrate. We find no impact of this added salience, which appears to be because knowledge of the virus, while imperfect, was already enough to inform migration decisions. Nevertheless, despite these decreases in intentions, the overall desire to migrate the backway to Europe remains high, highlighting the need for legal migration pathways to support migrants and divert them from the risks of backway migration.

The predictions of different classic migration theories are tested by using incentivized laboratory experiments to investigate how potential migrants decide between working in different destinations. First, the authors test theories of income maximization, migrant skill-selection, and multi-destination choice as they vary migration costs, liquidity constraints, risk, social benefits, and incomplete information. The standard income maximization model of migration with selection on observed and unobserved skills leads to a much higher migration rate and more negative skill-selection than is obtained when migration decisions take place under more realistic assumptions. Second, these lab experiments are used to investigate whether the independence of irrelevant alternatives assumption holds. The results show that it holds for most people when decisions just involve wages, costs, and liquidity constraints. However, once the risk of unemployment and incomplete information is added, independence of irrelevant alternatives no longer holds for about 20 percent of the sample.

This paper estimates the Heckscher-Ohlin (HO) model of international specialization with a panel of 44 developing and developed countries between 1976 and 2000. As Schott (2003), our empirical model includes multiple cones and recasts industry-level data in theoretically appropriate HO aggregates, i.e. sets of goods with similar factor intensities. The time dimension enables us to obtain better estimates of international total factor productivity differences and of the development path of each country. We correct for international differences in factor qualities and prices. For capital, we use the results of Eaton-Kortum (2001) who find a higher cost of capital in poor countries. Consistent with neoclassical theory, the estimated values for the marginal product of capital are on average higher in poorer countries. Nevertheless, once we adjust for the fact that capital is more expensive in these countries, we find that the financial rate of return of capital investment is rather similar in rich and poor countries, thereby explaining the Lucas (1990) paradox.

Does emigration really drain human capital accumulation in origin countries? This paper explores a unique household survey purposely designed and conducted to answer this specific question for the case of Cape Verde - the African country with the largest fraction of tertiary educated population living abroad, despite also having a fast-growing stock of human capital. Unlike previous literature, our tailored survey allows us to adjust existing inflated brain drain numbers for educational upgrading of emigrants after migration. We do so by combining our survey data on current, return and non-migrants with information from censuses of the destination countries. Our micro data also enables us to propose a novel, explicit test of brain gain arguments according to which the possibility of own future emigration positively impacts educational attainment in the origin country. Crucially, the innovative empirical strategy we propose hinges on the ideal characteristics of our survey, namely on full histories of migrants and on a new set of exclusion restrictions to control for unobserved heterogeneity of emigrants. Our results point to a very substantial impact of the brain gain” channel on the educational attainment of those left behind. Alternative channels (namely remittances, family disruption, and general equilibrium effects at the local level) are also considered, but these do not seem to play an important role. Overall, we find that there may be substantial human capital gains from allowing free migration and encouraging return migration.

Who uses mobile money, and what do people do with it? This paper describes mobile money adoption patterns following the experimental introduction of mobile money for the first time in rural areas of Southern Mozambique. We use administrative and household survey data to characterize adopters as well as their mobile money usage patterns over three years. Adopters of mobile money (and early adopters in particular) are more educated than nonadopters, and they are also more likely to already hold a bank account. Positive self-selection of adopters should be considered when introducing mobile money as a tool for rapid financial inclusion.

Are return migrants more entrepreneurial? Existing literature has not addressed how estimating the impact of return migration on entrepreneurship is affected by double unobservable migrant self-selection, both at the initial outward migration and at the final inward return migration stages. This paper exploits exogenous variation provided by the civil war and the incidence of agricultural plagues in Mozambique, as well as social unrest and other shocks in migrant destination countries. The results lend support to overall negative unobservable return migrant self-selection, which results in an under-estimation of the effects of return migration on entrepreneurial outcomes when using a ‘naive’ estimator that does not control for self-selection at both the initial migration and at the final return migration stages.

Funding sponsor: Princeton University and International Growth Centre What is the role of international migrants and, more specifically, of migrant networks in shaping political attitudes and behavior in migrant sending countries? We propose that migration might change social norms for political participation, while it may also improve knowledge about better quality political institutions. Hence, international migration might increase political awareness and participation both by migrants and by other individuals in their networks. To test this hypothesis, we use detailed data on different types of migrant networks, namely geographic, kinship and chatting networks, as well as several different measures of political participation and electoral knowledge – namely, self-reports, behavioral and actual voting measures. These data were purposely collected around the time of the 2009 elections in Mozambique, a country with substantial emigration to neighboring countries and with one of the lowest political participation rates in the southern Africa region. The empirical results show that the number of migrants an individual is in close contact through regular chatting within a village significantly increases political participation of residents in that village – more so than family links to migrants. Our findings are consistent with both improved knowledge about political processes, and increased intrinsic motivation for political participation being transmitted through migrant networks. These results are robust to controlling for self-selection into migration as well as endogenous network formation. Our work is potentially relevant for the many contexts of South-South migration where both countries of origin and destination are imperfect political systems. It shows that even in this context there may be domestic gains arising from international emigration. authorsversion published

In this paper, we study information sharing through text messages among rural Mozambicans with access to mobile money. For this purpose, we conducted a lab-in-the-field experiment involving exogeneously assigned information links. In the base game mobile money users receive an SMS containing information on how to redeem a voucher for mobile money. They are then given an opportunity to share this information with other subjects. We find that participants have a low propensity to redeem the voucher. They nonetheless share the information with others, and many subjects share information they do not use themselves, consistent with warm glow. We observe that there is more information sharing when communication is entirely anonymous, and we uncover no evidence of homophily in information sharing. We introduce various treatments: varying the cost of information sharing; being shamed for not sending vouchers; and allowing subjects to appropriate (part of) the value of the shared information. All these treatments decrease information sharing. The main implication is that, to encourage information sharing, the best is to keep it simple.

How do risk preferences affect migrant remittance behaviour? Examination of this relationship has only begun to be explored. Using a tailored representative survey of 1,354 immigrants in the Greater Dublin Area, Ireland, we find a positive and significant relationship between risk aversion and migrant remittances. Risk-averse individuals are more likely to send remittances home and are, on average, likely to remit a higher amount, after controlling for a broad range of individual and group characteristics. The evidence we obtain, that more remittances are sent by riskaverse immigrants who face higher wage risks and to individuals with more financial resources, is consistent with self-insurance although we cannot, with our data, rule out other exchange motives.

Does emigration really drain human capital accumulation in origin countries? This paper explores a unique household survey designed and conducted to answer this research question. We analyze the case of Cape Verde, a country with allegedly the highest ‘brain drain’ in Africa, despite a marked record of income and human capital growth in recent decades. We propose the first explicit test of ‘brain drain’ arguments, according to which the prospects of own future migration can positively impact educational attainment. Our most conservative estimates using individual specific variation in economic conditions at the destination indicate that a 10 pp increase in the probability of own future migration improves the probability of completing intermediate secondary schooling by nearly 4 pp for individuals who do not migrate before age 16. These findings are robust to the choice of instruments and econometric specification. Counterfactual simulations point to significant human capital gains from lowering migration barriers.

Can international migration promote better institutions at home by raising the demand for political accountability? A behavioral measure of the population's desire for better governance was designed to examine this question. A postcard was distributed to households promising that if enough postcards were mailed back, results from a survey module on perceived corruption would be published in the national media. Data from a tailored household survey were used to examine the determinants of this behavioral measure of demand for political accountability (undertaking the costly action of mailing the postcard) and to isolate the positive effect of international emigration using locality-level variation. The estimated effects are robust to the use of instrumental variables, including past migration and macro shocks in the destination countries. The estimated effects can be attributed mainly to migrants who emigrated to countries with better governance, especially migrants who return home. Copyright , Oxford University Press.

Andreia Ascenso,1 Sara Raposo,1 Cátia Batista,2 Pedro Cardoso,2 Tiago Mendes,2 Fabíola Garcia Praça,3 Maria Vitória Lopes Badra Bentley,3 Sandra Simões1 1Instituto de Investigação do Medicamento (iMed.ULisboa), 2Faculdade de Farmácia, Universidade de Lisboa, Lisboa, Portugal; 3Faculdade de Ciências Farmacêuticas de Ribeirão Preto, Universidade de São Paulo, Monte Alegre, Ribeirão Preto, São Paulo, Brazil Abstract: Ultradeformable vesicles (UDV) have recently become a promising tool for the development of improved and innovative dermal and transdermal therapies. The aim of this work was to study three related UDV: transfersomes, ethosomes, and transethosomes for the incorporation of actives of distinct polarities, namely, vitamin E and caffeine, and to evaluate the effect of the carrier on skin permeation and penetration. These actives were incorporated in UDV formulations further characterized for vesicles imaging by transmission electron microscopy; mean vesicle size and polydispersity index by photon correlation spectroscopy; zeta potential by laser-Doppler anemometry; deformability by pressure-driven transport; and incorporation efficiency (IE) after actives quantification by high-performance liquid chromatography. Topical delivery studies were performed in order to compare UDV formulations regarding the release, skin permeation, and penetration profiles. All UDV formulations showed size values within the expected range, except transethosomes prepared by “transfersomal method”, for which size was smaller than 100 nm in contrast to that obtained for vesicles prepared by “ethosomal method”. Zeta potential was negative and higher for formulations containing sodium cholate. The IE was much higher for vitamin E- than caffeine-loaded UDV as expected. For flux measurements, the following order was obtained: transethosomes (TE) > ethosomes (E) ≥ transfersomes (T). This result was consistent with the release and skin penetration profiles for Vitamin E-loaded UDV. However, the releasing results were totally the opposite for caffeine-loaded UDV, which might be explained by the solubility and thermodynamic activity of this active in each formulation instead of the UDV deformability attending to the higher non-incorporated fraction of caffeine. Anyway, a high skin penetration and permeation for all caffeine-loaded UDV were obtained. Transethosomes were more deformable than ethosomes and transfersomes due to the presence of both ethanol and surfactant in their composition. All these UDV were suitable for a deeper skin penetration, especially transethosomes. Keywords: lipid vesicles, topical delivery studies, vitamin E, caffeine

How does factor accumulation affect the pattern of international specialization and returns to capital? We provide a new integrated treatment to this question using a panel of 44 developing and developed countries over the period 1976-2000. We confirm the Heckscher-Ohlin prediction that, with sufficient differences in country endowments, there is no factor price equalization and countries specialize in different subsets of goods. Innovatively, we obtain the returns to capital implied by this model: these are consistent with the Lucas paradox, which we explain after accounting for cross-country differences in the cost of capital goods. We also find that, along their development path, countries have often experienced structural change in the form of intra-industry specialization. Our findings are consistent with Ventura's hypothesis that growth can be promoted in this way through "beating the curse of diminishing returns" – indeed we find no decrease in the return to capital at any given capital-labor ratio despite capital accumulation by most countries within a cone of diversification.

Does return migration affect entrepreneurship? This question has important implications for the debate on the economic development effects of migration for origin countries. The existing literature has, however, not addressed how the estimation of the impact of return migration on entrepreneurship is affected by double unobservable migrant self-selection, both at the initial outward migration and at the final inward return migration stages. This paper uses a representative household survey conducted in Mozambique in order to address this research question. We exploit variation provided by displacement caused by civil war in Mozambique, as well as social unrest and other shocks in migrant destination countries. The results lend support to negative unobservable self-selection at both and each of the initial and return stages of migration, which results in an under-estimation of the effects of return migration on entrepreneurial outcomes when using a 'naïve' estimator not controlling for self-selection. Indeed, 'naïve' estimates point to a 13 pp increase in the probability of owning a business when there is a return migrant in the household relative to non-migrants only, whereas excluding the double effect of unobservable self-selection, this effect becomes significantly larger – between 24 pp and 29 pp, depending on the method of estimation and source of variation used.

Do migrants send remittances as a way of obtaining insurance? While this motive is theoretically suggested in the literature, the question of identifying this relationship empirically has only begun to be explored. Using a unique representative survey of 1500 immigrants in the Greater Dublin Area, Ireland, we find a positive and significant relationship between risk aversion and remittance behavior. Risk-averse individuals are more likely to send remittances home and are, on average, likely to remit a higher amount, after controlling for a broad range of individual and group characteristics. Consistent with a "purchase of self-insurance" motive to remit, we also provide evidence of more remittances sent by risk averse immigrants facing higher wage risks and remitting to individuals with more financial resources.

Estimates of remittance flows to developing countries reached $406 billion in 2012 and are forecast to grow at a rate of 8% over the next two years. The aim of this chapter is to analyse the impact of remittances on recipient households and countries. We start by surveying the economics literature on the effect of remittances on poverty and consumption of remittance recipients. Next, we explore the recent evidence on whether and how remittances are invested in human capital and entrepreneurial activities. Finally, we discuss the likely impact of more stringent immigration rules and rising unemployment rates in developed countries on future remittance flows.

Do information flows matter for remittance behavior? We design and implement a randomized control trial to quantitatively assess the role of communication between migrants and their contacts abroad on the extent and value of remittance flows. In the experiment, a random sample of 1,500 migrants residing in Ireland was offered the possibility of contacting their networks outside the host country for free over a varying number of months. We find a sizable, positive impact of our intervention on the value of migrant remittances sent. Our results exclude that the remittance effect we identify is a simple substitution effect. Instead, our analysis points to this effect being a likely result of improved information via factors such as better migrant control over remittance use, enhanced trust in remittance channels due to experience sharing, or increased remittance recipients’ social pressure on migrants. NORFACE Research Programme “Migration in Europe - Social, Economic, Cultural and Policy Dynamics”, Department of Economics and the Arts and Social Sciences Benefactions Fund at Trinity College Dublin, Nova Forum at Nova University of Lisbon

Recent research has documented a U-shaped industrial concentration curve over an economy’s development path. How far can neoclassical trade theory take us in explaining this pattern? We estimate the production side of the Heckscher–Ohlin model using industry data on 44 developed and developing countries for the period 1976–2000. Decomposing the implied changes in industrial concentration over time shows that at least one third of these changes seems to be explained by a Rybczynski effect. This result suggests that capital accumulation led poor countries to diversify their industrial production, while rich countries made their production more concentrated in highly capital-intensive industries.

We investigate the determinants of giving in a lab-in-the-field experiment with large stakes. Study participants in urban Mozambique play dictator games where their counterpart is the closest person to them outside their household. When given the option, dictators do a large fraction of giving in kind (in the form of goods) rather than cash. In addition, they share more in total when they have the option of giving in kind, compared to giving that can only be in cash. Qualitative post-experiment responses suggest that this effect is driven by a desire to control how recipients use gifted resources. Standard economic determinants such as the rate of return to giving and the size of the endowment also affect giving, but the effects of even large changes in these determinants are significantly smaller than the effect of the in-kind option. Our results support theories of giving where the utility of givers depends on the composition (not just the level) of gift-recipient expenditures, and givers thus seek control over transferred resources.

The limitations of access to finance in Africa, together with the recent boom in cell phone use in that continent, created high expectations regarding the introduction of mobile money in many African countries. The success story of M-PESA in Kenya raised the bar further. We designed and conducted a field experiment to assess the impact of randomized mobile money dissemination in rural Mozambique. For this purpose we benefit from the fact that mobile money was only recently launched in the country, allowing for the identification of a pure control group. This paper reports on the first results of this ongoing project after the first wave of dissemination efforts in rural locations, which included the recruitment and training of mobile money agents, community meetings and theaters, as well as individual rural campaigning. Administrative and behavioral data both show clear adherence to the services in the treatment group. Financial literacy and trust outcomes are also positively affected by the treatment. We present behavioral evidence that the marginal willingness to remit was increased by the availability of mobile money. Finally, we observe a tendency for mobile money to substitute traditional alternatives for both savings and remittances. International Growth Centre (IGC), INOVA, Nova Forum, NOVAFRICA

We investigate the determinants of giving in a lab-in-the-field experiment with large stakes. Study participants in urban Mozambique play dictator games where their counterpart is the closest person to them outside their household. Dictators share more with counterparts when they have the option of giving in kind (in the form of goods), compared to giving that must be in cash. Qualitative post-experiment responses suggest that this effect is driven by a desire to control how recipients use gifted resources. Standard economic determinants such as the rate of return to giving and the size of the endowment also affect giving, but the effects of even large changes in these determinants are significantly smaller than the effect of the in-kind option. Our results support theories of giving where the utility of givers depends on the composition (not just the level) of gift-recipient expenditures, and givers thus seek control over transferred resources.

With the imminent arrival of Digital TV in the Brazilian schools, this research investigated the perceptions of teachers about the possibility of producing educational materials for that media inside the school. There were 50 participants among regent teachers, teachers who have already been producing educational materials and future pedagogues that participated in the survey through interviews and questionnaires. The results show an average of 80% who realize digital television is as a vast repository of contents. Although they have skills to use different media, technological devices, tools for communication and social interaction, the possibility of producing audio-visual educational content is not yet clearly considered as important by most of them. From the data, it was possible to reach two conditioning factors that can contribute for teachers´ audiovisual training.

Does emigration really drain human capital accumulation in origin countries? This paper explores a unique household survey purposely designed and conducted to answer this research question. We analyze the case of Cape Verde, a country with allegedly the highest 'brain drain' in Africa, despite a marked record of income and human capital growth in recent decades. Our micro data enables us to propose the first explicit test of 'brain gain' arguments according to which the prospects of own future migration can positively impact educational attainment. According to our results, a 10pp increase in the probability of own future migration may improve the average probability of completing intermediate secondary schooling by 8pp for individuals who do not migrate before age 16. Strikingly, this same 10pp increase may raise the probability of completing intermediate secondary schooling by 11pp for an individual whose parents were both non migrants when the educational decision was made. Our findings are robust to the choice of instruments and econometric model. Overall, we find that there may be substantial human capital gains from lowering migration barriers.

How does factor accumulation affect the pattern of international specialization and returns to capital? We provide a new integrated treatment to this question using a panel of 44 developing and developed countries over the period 1976-2000. We confirm the Heckscher-Ohlin prediction that, with sufficient differences in country endowments, there is no factor price equalization and countries specialize in different subsets of goods. Innovatively, we obtain the returns to capital implied by this model: these are consistent with the Lucas paradox, which we explain after accounting for cross-country differences in the cost of capital goods. We also find that, along their development path, countries have often experienced structural change in the form of intra-industry specialization. Our findings are consistent with Ventura's hypothesis that growth can be promoted in this way through "beating the curse of diminishing returns" – indeed we find no decrease in the return to capital at any given capital-labor ratio despite capital accumulation by most countries within a cone of diversification.

Does emigration really drain human capital accumulation in origin countries? This paper explores a unique household survey purposely designed and conducted to answer this research question. We analyze the case of Cape Verde, a country with allegedly the highest ‘brain drain’ in Africa, despite a marked record of income and human capital growth in recent decades. Our micro data enables us to propose the first explicit test of ‘brain gain’ arguments according to which the prospects of own future migration can positively impact educational attainment. According to our results, a 10pp increase in the probability of own future migration improves the average probability of completing intermediate secondary schooling by 8pp. Our findings are robust to the choice of instruments and econometric model. Overall, we find that there may be substantial human capital gains from lowering migration barriers.

Does emigration really drain human capital accumulation in origin countries? This paper explores a unique household survey purposely designed and conducted to answer this specific question for the case of Cape Verde. This is allegedly the African country suffering from the largest "brain drain", despite also having a fast-growing stock of human capital. Our micro data enables us to propose a novel, explicit test of "brain gain" arguments according to which the possibility of own future emigration positively impacts educational attainment in the origin country. The innovative empirical strategy we propose hinges on the ideal characteristics of our survey, namely on full histories of migrants and on a new set of exclusion restrictions. Our results point to a very substantial impact of the “brain gain” channel on the educational attainment of those who do not emigrate. Alternative channels (namely remittances, family disruption, and general equilibrium effects at the local level) are also considered, but do not seem to play an important role. Our findings are robust to the choice of instruments and the empirical model.

Does emigration really drain human capital accumulation in origin countries? This paper explores a unique household survey designed and conducted to answer this specific question for the case of Cape Verde - the sub-Saharan African country with the largest fraction of tertiary-educated population living abroad, despite also having a fast-growing stock of human capital. Unlike previous literature, the ideal characteristics of our tailored survey allow us to explicitly test brain gain arguments according to which the possibility of own future emigration positively contributes to educational attainment in the origin country. In particular, we introduce a new method to estimate this effect by using full histories of current and return migrants (which enable controlling for migrant selection on unobservables), and a new set of exclusion restrictions both at the regional and household levels. Our results are robust to the inclusion of controls for remittances, family disruption, and general equilibrium effects of emigration. In constructing a counterfactual distribution of skills to answer our research question, we combine the survey data with information from censuses of the destination countries to account for the characteristics of the labour force that is (permanent and temporarily) lost due to emigration. Our results point to commonly used brain drain figures to be significantly exaggerated, whereas there may be substantial brain gains from allowing free migration and encouraging return migration.

Recent research has documented a U-shaped industrial concentration curve over an economy's development path. How far can neoclassical trade theory take us in explaining this pattern? Building on Schott (2003), we estimate the production side of the Heckscher-Ohlin (HO) model with industry data on 51 developed and developing countries covering the period 1975-1995. We allow for multiple cones of specialization, and give special attention to intra-industry factor heterogeneity and to the potentially indeterminate nature of production. For each year, goods are grouped in one of two HO aggregates: an aggregate of labor-intensive goods, and an aggregate of capital-intensive goods. Decomposing changes in industrial concentration over time, we show that at least a third of these changes is explained by the diversification or concentration patterns at the HO-aggregate level. As the relative price of the two aggregates is fairly stable over time, the mechanism is the one of the textbook Rybczynski effect: poor countries accumulating capital have diversified their industrial production by producing more of the capital-intensive goods, while rich countries accumulating capital have made their production more concentrated by specializing in the production of the capital-intensive goods.

Numerous reports have noted that the IMF's medium-term growth projections are overly optimistic, raising questions as to how these can be improved. To this end, we estimate a growth model and examine its out-of-sample forecasting properties relative to those of IMF projections. The model's projections outperform those of the IMF in all regions and among most income groups-projections are less biased (one-quarter of the IMF bias) and have smaller standard errors (20 percent lower root mean squared errors) even after controlling for the IMF's macroeconomic assumptions. The paper does not attempt to address the criticisms that have been leveled against the empirical growth literature, but the results suggest that benefits can be derived from bringing systematic analysis to bear on cross-country information.

International migration flows are shaping world politics in a variety of ways. This chapter summarizes existing evidence on the mechanisms through which these flows affect political attitudes and participation in the countries from where the migrants originate. A comparison is made between the effects of international migration on political institutions in Cape Verde and Mozambique, which both have strong migratory traditions. Emigration from Cape Verde is characterized by relatively high-skilled migration to Portugal and other Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, while emigration from Mozambique is mostly driven by unskilled labor flows into South Africa. The results that we describe show that international migration substantially increases political participation in both settings. The demand for political accountability and electoral participation substantially increases after being exposed to better democratic political norms and knowledge about electoral processes. This effect grows with citizens’ social proximity, which is characterized as opportunities for personal interaction. Overall, we provide evidence that both South–North as well as South–South international migration strengthen democracy in the poorest countries.

Do more risk loving migrants opt for self-employment? We use a novel vignette-adjusted measure of risk preferences to investigate the link between risk aversion and entrepreneurship in migrant communities. Using an original representative household survey of the migrant population in the Greater Dublin Area, we find a significant negative relationship between risk aversion and entrepreneurship. Our results show that the use of vignettes improves the significance of the results, as they simultaneously correct for differential item functioning (where respondents interpret the self-evaluation scale in different ways) between entrepreneurs and non-entrepreneurs, and correct for variation in the use of self-evaluation scales between migrants from different countries of origin. This finding may help explaining the variability in results on the correlation between risk preferences and entrepreneurship reported in previous studies. JEL: F22; J01; J15; J61; L26

Investment in improved agricultural inputs is infrequent for smallholder farmers in Africa. One barrier may be limited access to formal savings. This is the first study to use a randomized controlled trial to evaluate the impact of using mobile money as a tool to promote agricultural investment. For this purpose, we designed and conducted a field experiment with a sample of smallholder farmers in rural Mozambique. This sample included a set of primary farmers and their closest farming friends. We work with two cross-randomized interventions. The first treatment gave access to a remunerated mobile savings account. The second treatment targeted closest farming friends and gave them access to the exact same interventions as their primary farmer counterparts. We find that the remunerated mobile savings account raised mobile savings, but only while interest was being paid. It also increased agricultural investment in fertilizer, although there was no change in investment in other complementary inputs that were not directly targeted by the intervention, unlike fertilizer. These results suggest that fertilizer salience in the remunerated savings treatment may have been important to focus farmers’ (limited) attention on saving some of their harvest proceeds, rather than farmers being financially constrained by a lack of alternative ways to save. Our results also suggest that the network intervention where farming friends had access to non-remunerated mobile money accounts decreased incentives to save and invest in agricultural inputs, likely due to network free-riding because of lower transfer costs within the network. Overall this research shows that tailored mobile money products can be used effectively to improve modern agricultural technology adoption in countries with very low agricultural productivity like Mozambique.

The purpose of this thesis is to contribute to a better understanding of the drivers of international migration. In Chapter 1, we document that immigrants in Portugal face a high incidence of occupational-skill mismatch, and show how it affects the selection into migration. We find that the incidence of over-education leads to negative selection while correct occupational-skill matches lead to positive selection. In Chapter 2, we rely on a lab-in-the-field experiment to understand the willingness to migrate illegally of young males aged 15 to 25 in The Gambia. We first show that potential migrants overestimate both the risk of dying en route to Europe, and the probability of obtaining legal residency status. The experimental results suggestthat the willingness to migrate illegally is affected by information on the chances of dying en route and of obtaining a legal residence permit. Providing providing potential migrants with official numbers on both probabilities thus affect their likelihood of migrating. This has the potential to help migrants make informed decisions and perhaps save lives. In Chapter 3, we investigate the impact of family structure on international migration decisions. We find that children of mothers in polygynous unions are more likely to migrate internationally. We provide further evidence suggesting that this result is due to sibling rivalry: having full- or half-siblings in migration increases the likelihood of migrating. Our evidence suggests that co-wives’ rivalry as documented elsewhere trickles down to children’s rivalry in migration, suggesting that while neglected in the literature, family structure is crucial to understanding migration.; Cette thèse vise à contribuer à une meilleure compréhension des facteurs qui agissent sur la décision de migrer des individus. Dans le chapitre 1, nous montrons qu’au Portugal, les immigrés occupent souvent des postes pour lesquels ils sont surqualifiés, et que cette non-adéquation entre profils et emplois occupés influence la sélection dans la migration. Les phénomènes de surqualification, plus marqués chez les individus les plus qualifiés, entrainent une sélection négative des migrants, tandis qu’une bonne adéquation entre profils et emplois conduit à une sélection positive.Dans le chapitre 2, nous tirons profit d’une expérimentation sur le terrain pour comprendre comment les décisions de migrer illégalement vers l’Europe des jeunes gambiens sont influencées par l’information qu’ils ont sur les risques associés à cette mobilité. Nous montrons d’abord que les participants au jeu surestiment à la fois le risque de périr en route et la probabilité d’obtenir un statut légal en Europe. Nos résultats suggèrent par ailleurs que la décision de migrer illégalement est influencée par l’une et l’autre probabilité. Informer les candidats au départ sur les risques réels encourus pourrait ainsi les aider à prendre des décisions en connaissance de cause et contribuerait peut-être à sauver des vies. Dans le chapitre 3, nous examinons les liens entre structure familiale et migration, en étudiant l’influence du type d’union des mères sur le comportement migratoire de leurs enfants. Nous trouvons que les enfants nés de mères en union polygame sont plus enclins à migrer vers l’étranger. Nous expliquons ce résultat par la rivalité fraternelle qui en découle.

The purpose of this thesis is to contribute to a better understanding of the drivers of international migration. In Chapter 1, we document that immigrants in Portugal face a high incidence of occupational-skill mismatch, and show how it affects the selection into migration. We find that the incidence of over-education leads to negative selection while correct occupational-skill matches lead to positive selection. In Chapter 2, we rely on a lab-in-the-field experiment to understand the willingness to migrate illegally of young males aged 15 to 25 in The Gambia. We first show that potential migrants overestimate both the risk of dying en route to Europe, and the probability of obtaining legal residency status. The experimental results suggestthat the willingness to migrate illegally is affected by information on the chances of dying en route and of obtaining a legal residence permit. Providing providing potential migrants with official numbers on both probabilities thus affect their likelihood of migrating. This has the potential to help migrants make informed decisions and perhaps save lives. In Chapter 3, we investigate the impact of family structure on international migration decisions. We find that children of mothers in polygynous unions are more likely to migrate internationally. We provide further evidence suggesting that this result is due to sibling rivalry: having full- or half-siblings in migration increases the likelihood of migrating. Our evidence suggests that co-wives’ rivalry as documented elsewhere trickles down to children’s rivalry in migration, suggesting that while neglected in the literature, family structure is crucial to understanding migration.; Cette thèse vise à contribuer à une meilleure compréhension des facteurs qui agissent sur la décision de migrer des individus. Dans le chapitre 1, nous montrons qu’au Portugal, les immigrés occupent souvent des postes pour lesquels ils sont surqualifiés, et que cette non-adéquation entre profils et emplois occupés influence la sélection dans la migration. Les phénomènes de surqualification, plus marqués chez les individus les plus qualifiés, entrainent une sélection négative des migrants, tandis qu’une bonne adéquation entre profils et emplois conduit à une sélection positive.Dans le chapitre 2, nous tirons profit d’une expérimentation sur le terrain pour comprendre comment les décisions de migrer illégalement vers l’Europe des jeunes gambiens sont influencées par l’information qu’ils ont sur les risques associés à cette mobilité. Nous montrons d’abord que les participants au jeu surestiment à la fois le risque de périr en route et la probabilité d’obtenir un statut légal en Europe. Nos résultats suggèrent par ailleurs que la décision de migrer illégalement est influencée par l’une et l’autre probabilité. Informer les candidats au départ sur les risques réels encourus pourrait ainsi les aider à prendre des décisions en connaissance de cause et contribuerait peut-être à sauver des vies. Dans le chapitre 3, nous examinons les liens entre structure familiale et migration, en étudiant l’influence du type d’union des mères sur le comportement migratoire de leurs enfants. Nous trouvons que les enfants nés de mères en union polygame sont plus enclins à migrer vers l’étranger. Nous expliquons ce résultat par la rivalité fraternelle qui en découle.