Migration 10 years after: EU enlargement, closed borders, and migration to Germany

Abstract

Almost a decade has passed since the Eastern enlargement of the European Union (EU) in 2004. Germany has been a special case among the old member states of the EU for at least two reasons. First, the country restricted access to its labor markets for workers from the New Member States (NMS) until 2011, and second, the German labor market weathered the Great Recession without an increase in unemployment. In this chapter, we analyze how both events ‘ the EU enlargement and the economic crisis ’ have shaped migration flows to Germany. This paper is a revised version of Elsner/Zimmermann (2013), 10 Years After: EU Enlargement, Closed Borders, and Migration to Germany, IZA Discussion Paper No. 7130. We would like to thank an anonymous referee and the editors for helpful comments and suggestions that helped to improve this chapter significantly. All remaining errors are ours.