Working Paper: CEPR ID: DP12735
Authors: Olivier Dagnelie; Anna Maria Mayda; Jean-Francois Maystadt
Abstract: We investigate whether entrepreneurs in the network of refugees - from the same country of origin - help refugees' labor-market integration by hiring them in their businesses. We analyze the universe of refugee cases without U.S. ties who were resettled in the United States between2005 and 2010. We address threats to identi cation due to sorting of refugees into specifi c labor markets and to strategic placement by resettlement agencies. We fi nd that the probability that refugees are employed 90 days after arrival is positively a ffected by the number of business owners in their network, but negatively a ffected by the number of those who are employees. This suggests that network members who are entrepreneurs hire refugees in their business, while network members working as employees compete with them, consistent with refugees complementing the former and substituting for the latter.
Keywords: refugees; labor market integration; entrepreneurship
JEL Codes: F22; J61
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| number of business owners in the refugees' network (M13) | probability of employment 90 days post-arrival (J68) |
| number of employees in the refugees' network (J68) | probability of employment 90 days post-arrival (J68) |