{
  "title": "Addressing the Debate over the Economic Impact of Migration Remarks for the Conference on “Can Migration Work for All in Europe?”",
  "publication": "IMF News, January 9, 2017",
  "sourceUrl": "https://www.imf.org/en/news/articles/2017/01/09/fdmd_europen_migration_keynote_speech_bruegel",
  "canonical": "https://www.imf.org/en/news/articles/2017/01/09/fdmd_europen_migration_keynote_speech_bruegel",
  "overlayPath": "/en/news/articles/2017/01/09/fdmd_europen_migration_keynote_speech_bruegel/index.md",
  "summary": "Speaker: David Lipton, First Deputy Managing Director, IMF.",
  "publishDate": "2017-01-09",
  "sections": [
    {
      "heading": "Context and purpose",
      "content": "- Speaker: David Lipton, First Deputy Managing Director, IMF.\n- Location and date: Brussels, Belgium; January 9, 2017.\n- Objective: Reconcile the academic consensus on migration’s economic benefits with the strong public and political backlash; inform policy discussion and IMF work on migration’s economic impacts."
    },
    {
      "heading": "Core economic arguments and analytical framing",
      "content": "- Partial equilibrium view (public perception):\n  - Immigration raises the supply of labor, exerting downward pressure on wages for native workers of similar skill levels.\n  - This perspective is salient in public opinion and political debate.\n- General equilibrium and dynamic effects (economists’ response):\n  - Immigrant workers may complement, rather than substitute, for native workers.\n  - Immigrants spend much of what they earn, raising demand and the derived demand for labor, boosting wages and creating jobs.\n  - Businesses invest to equip immigrants with capital, raising productivity and reducing downward wage pressure.\n  - Native-born workers retrain and relocate to stronger labor markets or attain higher-paying jobs.\n- Analogy with trade debates:\n  - Like trade, immigration can create winners and losers.\n  - Dynamic adjustment and business responses take time; there can be transitional losers.\n  - Affected natives may need retraining or relocation.\n  - Multiple concurrent forces (global financial crisis, labor-saving technological change) complicate attribution of declining living standards."
    },
    {
      "heading": "Empirical findings reported by the IMF",
      "content": "- Overall conclusion: The Fund’s work aligns with the view that the economic impact of migration on receiving countries is generally positive.\n- Specific empirical findings:\n  - Immigration has significantly increased GDP per capita in advanced economies—because skill levels and complementarities boost labor productivity, and because influxes of working-age migrants help counteract labor shortages from demographic developments.\n  - Although the top 10 percent benefit most, the gains from migration are shared across all income groups.\n  - Inequality does not increase as a result of the entry of migrants into the workforce.\n  - No significant negative effects were found on the middle or lower income groups in receiving countries.\n- Skill composition effects:\n  - Both high- and low-skilled migrants can raise labor productivity.\n  - High-skilled migrants: bring knowledge, increase innovation, and boost productivity of native-born counterparts.\n  - Low-skilled migrants: increase efficiency by taking jobs with applicant shortages and can prompt increases in skill levels among natives.\n- Caveats and observed exceptions from other studies:\n  - Some U.S. studies show migrants have negative wage effects on earlier generations of immigrants and native-born high school dropouts.\n  - Some studies show immigration reduces hours worked by native-born teenagers.\n  - These effects warrant investigation in the European context."
    },
    {
      "heading": "Areas identified for further research",
      "content": "- Re-examine findings as experience accumulates, especially given \"huge new flows in Europe.\"\n- Better understand assimilation outcomes:\n  - Rapid integration observed for many Eastern Europeans.\n  - Need clearer understanding of assimilation for refugees and migrants from the Middle East and Africa.\n  - Need data-driven assessment of second- and third-generation outcomes, particularly for cohorts from developing countries; existing comprehensive datasets in some countries (for example, Norway) are useful.\n- More granular research on:\n  - Which native groups are hurt by migration, and through what mechanisms.\n  - Whether low-skilled migrants’ positive effects on native skill upgrading are as certain or significant as those from high-skilled migrants.\n  - Impacts on labor markets, public services, and fiscal finances over longer timeframes."
    },
    {
      "heading": "Policy implications and recommendations",
      "content": "- Governments can greatly affect short- and long-run migration impacts through policy choices:\n  - Selection criteria, settlement services, work rules, educational opportunities, and cultural/assimilation policies all matter.\n- Social welfare and fiscal policy considerations:\n  - Determine the right balance of social welfare policies to avoid moral hazard and welfare shopping; this requires detailed understanding of migrant experiences and incentive structures.\n  - Anecdotal evidence: perceived misalignment of social benefits contributed to political backlash (example cited around the Brexit vote where unemployed UK workers perceived delays in benefits relative to new migrants’ access).\n  - Native perceptions of competition for limited welfare resources (public transport, health care, overcrowded schools) can exacerbate tensions—policy adjustments informed by better evidence could reduce social friction.\n- Practical priorities for policymakers:\n  - Be frank about winners and losers and the need for transition assistance (retraining, relocation).\n  - Obtain more granular evidence to guide social welfare, labor market, and assimilation policies.\n  - Continue to reassess policy responses as new evidence emerges."
    },
    {
      "heading": "Conclusion and institutional role",
      "content": "- The IMF’s role:\n  - Assist member countries (the 189 member countries of the IMF) in real time to design policies that integrate migrants into the mainstream.\n  - Continue conducting research and learning to help countries chart courses that bring economic benefits to all and address disadvantaged groups.\n- Final policy message:\n  - Economic benefits of migration are well established, but more work is needed to clarify distributional impacts, transition dynamics, and effective policy responses to mitigate harms and maximize shared gains.\n\nSource: David Lipton, \"Addressing the Debate over the Economic Impact of Migration,\" Remarks for the Conference on “Can Migration Work for All in Europe?”, Brussels, January 9, 2017.\n\n---\n\n\n References\n\n- David Lipton\n- Belgium and the IMF\n- Norway and the IMF\n- Speeches\n- PRESS CENTER\n- https://www.imf.org/en/home\n\nSource: https://www.imf.org/en/news/articles/2017/01/09/fdmdeuropenmigrationkeynotespeechbruegel"
    }
  ],
  "bullets": [
    "[Markdown version](/en/news/articles/2017/01/09/fdmd_europen_migration_keynote_speech_bruegel/index.md)",
    "[Structured JSON version](/en/news/articles/2017/01/09/fdmd_europen_migration_keynote_speech_bruegel/index.json)",
    "[Bundle manifest](/en/news/articles/2017/01/09/fdmd_europen_migration_keynote_speech_bruegel/bundle-manifest.json)",
    "Published: January 9, 2017",
    "Speaker: David Lipton, First Deputy Managing Director, IMF.",
    "Location and date: Brussels, Belgium; January 9, 2017.",
    "Objective: Reconcile the academic consensus on migration’s economic benefits with the strong public and political backlash; inform policy discussion and IMF work on migration’s economic impacts.",
    "Partial equilibrium view (public perception):",
    "General equilibrium and dynamic effects (economists’ response):",
    "Analogy with trade debates:",
    "Overall conclusion: The Fund’s work aligns with the view that the economic impact of migration on receiving countries is generally positive.",
    "Specific empirical findings:",
    "Skill composition effects:",
    "Caveats and observed exceptions from other studies:",
    "Re-examine findings as experience accumulates, especially given \"huge new flows in Europe.\"",
    "Better understand assimilation outcomes:",
    "More granular research on:",
    "Governments can greatly affect short- and long-run migration impacts through policy choices:",
    "Social welfare and fiscal policy considerations:",
    "Practical priorities for policymakers:",
    "The IMF’s role:",
    "Final policy message:",
    "[David Lipton](http://www.imf.org/external/np/omd/bios/dl.htm)",
    "[Belgium and the IMF](http://www.imf.org/external/country/BEL/index.htm)",
    "[Norway and the IMF](http://www.imf.org/external/country/NOR/index.htm)",
    "[Speeches](https://www.imf.org/en/news/searchnews)",
    "[PRESS CENTER](http://presscenter.imf.org/)",
    "[https://www.imf.org/en/home](https://www.imf.org/en/home)"
  ],
  "alternates": {
    "markdown": "/en/news/articles/2017/01/09/fdmd_europen_migration_keynote_speech_bruegel/index.md",
    "json": "/en/news/articles/2017/01/09/fdmd_europen_migration_keynote_speech_bruegel/index.json",
    "bundleManifest": "/en/news/articles/2017/01/09/fdmd_europen_migration_keynote_speech_bruegel/bundle-manifest.json"
  },
  "generatedAtUtc": "2026-09-25T20:29:31.031Z"
}