Mobility and migration of labour in the European Union

Abstract

"This report deals with cross-border mobility of workers in the European Union. A theoretical section looks into the question why mobility is useful from an economic point of view, what determinants are important, what obstacles there are, and which groups are more likely to migrate than others. This is followed by the inclusion of international migration movements. What do foreign trade theory and integration theory say about the need for labour movements? Is it possible to derive explanations as to why there are relatively few migrations within the EU? In the next, empirical section the movements of labour between the countries of the EU are presented in development and structure. The trends in European labour migration are compared with the migration determinants named in economic theory, such as foreign trade relations, differences in income or unemployment. Here an important role is played by whether there are converging or diverging tendencies, firstly between the States and secondly between regions within particular EU States. This inclusion of regional developments and disparities within the Member States seems to be important in order to see whether external and internal migrations develop unequally. From this it is possible to derive explanations as to the extent to which it might not be worth moving to another country in spite of differences in income or in unemployment (value of immobility). The connection between the migration of labour and the European Monetary Union is dealt with in a further chapter. In a closing chapter the results are summarized once again from a theoretical and an empirical point of view, and it is shown what sort of migrations can be expected between the countries of the EU in the future. Here attention is paid to barriers which are still in existence and the possibilities of eliminating them." (author's, abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

Cite article

Tassinopoulos, A. & Werner, H., Werner, H., Tassinopoulos, A. & Kristensen, S. (sonst. bet. Pers.) (1998): Mobility and migration of labour in the European Union. In: Europäisches Zentrum für die Förderung der Berufsbildung, Thessaloniki (Hrsg.) (1998): Mobility and migration of labour in the European Union and their specific implications for young people, p. 5-98.