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Migraciones Internacionales e-ISSN: 2594-0279

Artículos

Vol. 12 (2021): enero-diciembre, 2021

Do minimum wages help explain declining Mexico-U.S. migration?

DOI
https://doi.org/10.33679/rmi.v1i1.2326
Publicado
2021-12-15

Resumen

This paper finds that minimum wages of the United States and Mexico measured carefully in Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) help explain the well-documented post-2010 fall in Mexico-U.S. migration. Declining inequality also plays a role since the purchasing power of the minimum wage increased relative to the average wage in Mexico. Using time-series data, we find two positive partial correlations between minimum wages and net migration: one driven by wage differentials between the two countries and the other by wage inequality in Mexico. However, these results are found to be mediated through migrant social networks. Though relative wages are a classic migration driver, this paper is the first to explore the full minimum-average wage nexus. One clear policy implication of these results is that maintaining the real purchasing power of minimum wages helps reduce migration. An in-depth analysis is needed to demonstrate the causality of these correlations.

Palabras clave

  • net migration
  • minimum wage
  • inequality
  • Mexico
  • United States

Cómo citar

Cuecuecha Mendoza, A., Fuentes-Mayorga, N., & McLeod, D. (2021). Do minimum wages help explain declining Mexico-U.S. migration?. Migraciones Internacionales, 12. https://doi.org/10.33679/rmi.v1i1.2326

Derechos de autor 2021 Migraciones Internacionales

Creative Commons License

Esta obra está bajo una licencia internacional Creative Commons Atribución-NoComercial-SinDerivadas 4.0.

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