International Migration in the Long Run: Positive Selection, Negative Selection, and Policy

Abstract

Most labor-scarce overseas countries moved decisively to restriet their immigration during the first third of the 20th century . This autarchic retreat from unrestricted immigration in the first global century before World War I to the quotas and other restrictions introduced afterwards was the result of a combination of factors, one of which was public hostility toward new immigrants with lower education and labor market skills. The paper documents the secular drift from very positive to much more negative immigrant selection which took place in the first global century after 1820 and in the second era of globalization after 1950, and seeks explanations for it. It then explores the political economy of immigrant restriction.