Aging migrants, labor market transitions and the welfare state

While substantial and persistent immigrant-native disparities in labor market performance and socioeconomic status is a primary concern in the scientific as well as in the policy debate, little attention has so far been devoted to the patterns and determinants of labor market exit and retirement decisions in the growing foreign-born population.

This program aims to further our understanding by combining perspectives and approaches from economics, political science and sociology, bringing together a new constellation of researchers in a strong and very active environment.

Labor market exit can be affected by a wide range of factors, e.g. individual characteristics and labor market position, incentives and opportunities brought by the pension and social security systems, as well as factors related to the country of origin and previous work life experience.

The novelty of the contributions in part relies on applying recent methodological insights and methods on data of exceptional richness and quality. Population-wide administrative data from Sweden allow for detailed investigations of patterns of and explanations to labor market transitions over a long period of time. Comparative investigations using compilations of European-wide surveys address questions at the system level. Qualitative approaches give a deeper understanding how formal and informal institutions exert their influence.

Programme affiliated research

Read more about the research project "Patterns and determinants of immigrant labor market exit" connected to the research program.

Reseachers

Olof Åslund

Axel Cronert

Lisa Laun

Joakim Palme