Demographic change and regional competitiveness: The effects of immigration and ageing

The demographic profile of a region is usually seen as a slowly changing background phenomenon in the analysis of regional competitiveness and regional growth. However, regional demographic change can have a significant impact on regional competitiveness and such change is often more rapid and profound than at the national level. In turn, regional population size, growth, composition and distribution are endogenous to regional economic development. This paper focuses on the impact of population ageing and immigration on aspects of regional competitiveness such as innovation, entrepreneurship and productivity. Immigration and ageing trends have generated huge separate literatures but it is argued here that it is fruitful to consider these trends jointly. Theoretically, there are many channels through which immigration and population ageing can affect regional competitiveness. There is empirical evidence that population ageing reduces regional competitiveness, while immigration – particularly of entrepreneurs and highly skilled workers to metropolitan areas – enhances competitiveness. Much of the available literature is based on smallscale case studies and rigorous econometric research on the impact of demographic change at the regional level is still remarkably rare. Some directions for further research are suggested

Measuring the economic impact of immigration: A scoping paper

This discussion paper has three objectives. Firstly, it provides a brief review of recent international empirical research on the labour market impact of immigration. The synthesis of this literature is facilitated by reference to the results from a recent meta-analysis of the impact of immigration on wages. Secondly, the paper briefly reviews international research on other dimensions of the economic impact of immigration, namely productivity and technical change, trade and international relations, the fiscal impact, socio-economic impacts and externalities, and economy-wide (general equilibrium) effects. The approach adopted in considering each of these impacts is to identify the main issues associated with the particular impact, followed by key international references and, where available, New Zealand references on the particular type of impact. The gaps in NZ research are then identified along with any difficulties with the data available for replicating the international studies in New Zealand. Thirdly, the paper seeks to identify feasible (in terms of data availability) suggestions for further research that would add to our knowledge of the economic impact of immigration in New Zealand

Changes in social security eligibility and the international mobility of New Zealand citizens in Australia

This paper is concerned with the international mobility of New Zealanders who migrate to Australia. One in ten New Zealand citizens lives in Australia and their settlement and subsequent mobility is important from demographic, socio-economic and policy perspectives in both countries. Using a unique longitudinal dataset on New Zealand citizens arriving for a stay of 12 months or longer between 1 August 1999 and 31 July 2002, we track all subsequent moves of these migrants out of and back into Australia, up to July 2005. This allows us to assess the impact of the removal of labour market-related social security eligibility and some other policy changes affecting New Zealand migrants to Australia, implemented between February and June 2001. United Kingdom migrants to Australia, who were not affected by the policy changes, provide a ‘control group’. Using hazard models, we find that the policy changes increased the probability of remigration from Australia among those who had intended to settle permanently. Competing risk models suggested no difference between the impact of the policy changes on onward or return moves. Settlers arriving after the policy changes spend less time Australia and make more trips away than earlier migrants

A stochastic sub-national population projection methodology with an application to the Waikato region of New Zealand

In this paper we use a stochastic population projection methodology at the sub-national level as an alternative to the conventional deterministic cohort-component method. We briefly evaluate the accuracy of previous deterministic projections and find that there is a tendency for these to be conservative: under-projecting fast growing populations and over-projecting slow growing ones. We generate probabilistic population projections for five demographically distinct administrative areas within the Waikato region of New Zealand, namely Hamilton City, Franklin District, Thames-Coromandel District, Otorohanga District and South Waikato District. Although spatial interaction between the areas is not taken into account in the current version of the methodology, a consistent set of cross-regional assumptions is used. The results are compared to official sub-national deterministic projections. The accuracy of sub-national population projections is in New Zealand strongly affected by the instability of migration as a component of population change. Unlike the standard cohort-component methodology, in which net migration levels are projected, the key parameters of our stochastic methodology are age-gender-area specific net migration rates. The projected range of rates of population growth is wider for smaller regions and/or regions more strongly affected by net migration. Generally, the identified and modelled uncertainty makes the traditional ‘mid range’ scenario of sub-national population projections of limited use for policy analysis or planning beyond a relatively short projection horizon. Directions for further development of a stochastic sub-national projection methodology are suggested

Changes in social security eligibility and the international mobility of New Zealand citizens in Australia

This paper is concerned with the international mobility of New Zealanders who migrate to Australia. One in ten New Zealand citizens lives in Australia and their settlement and subsequent mobility is important from demographic, socio-economic and policy perspectives in both countries. Using a unique longitudinal dataset on New Zealand citizens arriving for a stay of 12 months or longer between 1 August 1999 and 31 July 2002, we track all subsequent moves of these migrants out of and back into Australia, up to July 2005. This allows us to assess the impact of the removal of labour market-related social security eligibility and some other policy changes affecting New Zealand migrants to Australia, implemented between February and June 2001. United Kingdom migrants to Australia, who were not affected by the policy changes, provide a "control group". Using hazard models, we find that the policy changes increased the probability of remigration from Australia among those who had intended to settle permanently. Competing risk models suggested no difference between the impact of the policy changes on onward or return moves. Settlers arriving after the policy changes spend less time Australia and make more trips away than earlier migrants.International Migration, International Travel, New Zealand, Australia,United Kingdom, Social Welfare, Immigration Policy, Selectivity

The impact of labour market deregulation: lessons from the "Kiwi" and "Polder" models

Unemployment remains a major economic and social problem in many developed economies. This paper provides theoretical and empirical perspectives on the impact of labour market deregulation as a means of combatting unemployment and of enhancing competitive wage determination. The paper focusses specifically on The Netherlands and New Zealand, two small open economies in which unemployment rates reduced to half their respective previous peaks during the last decade. The labour market policies that contributed to this outcome are referred to as the "Polder" model and the "Kiwi" model respectively. Despite some similarities, there are significant differences between the models. These are highlighted in the paper. Methodological issues regarding empirical tests of the impact of labour market deregulation measures are also addressed. The paper concludes with a survey of remaining research issues.

Proteins involved in the Vroman effect during exposure of human blood plasma to glass and polyethylene

The amounts of fibrinogen adsorbed to glass from various human blood plasmas have been measured as a function of time. The plasmas were 11 single donor plasmas, pooled plasma, a single donor high molecular weight kininogen (HMWK)-deficient plasma and HMWK-deficient plasma, which had been reconstituted with HMWK. For adsorption times between 1 min and 1 h more fibrinogen adsorbed from HMWK-deficient plasma compared with the amounts of fibrinogen which adsorbed from the other plasmas. This result supports the conclusion of several authors that HMWK is involved in the displacement of fibrinogen, initially adsorbed from normal human plasma to glass. Glass surfaces, pre-exposed to solutions of plasma and subsequently exposed to 1:1 diluted plasma, gives rise to a relatively high adsorption of HMWK which is independent of the plasma concentration of the precoating solution. The results indicate that HMWK from 1:1 diluted plasma is involved in the displacement of proteins from glass surfaces which had been pre-exposed to solutions with a low plasma concentration. Experiments with polyethylene as a substrate reveal that high density lipoprotein (HDL) from 1:1 diluted plasma is involved in the displacement of proteins from polyethylene surfaces which had been pre-exposed to solutions with a low plasma concentration. Moreover, evidence is presented that substantial amounts of albumin and fibrinogen, adsorbed from 1:1000 diluted plasma to glass and polyethylene, are displaced from the surfaces of these materials by proteins from 1:1 diluted plasma different from HMWK and HDL

Trans-Tasman Migration, Transnationalism and Economic Development in Australasia

This paper focuses on migration between Australia and New Zealand, which has exhibited a strong, but cyclical, net movement towards Australia since the late 1960s. A long-term historical perspective is taken. Trans-Tasman migration is also compared with inter-island migration within New Zealand. It is argued that differential economic development, driven by forces of globalisation, agglomeration and technological change, has been primarily responsible for the long-run changes in the distribution of population across the regions of Australasia. Asynchronous business cycles, demographic dynamics, perceptions, return migration and the high international mobility of New Zealanders (of whom one quarter of those aged 40-64 have lived abroad for a year or longer) are responsible for the short-run fluctuations. However, permanent and long-term migration is only a small fraction of total trans-Tasman population movement. Moreover, trans-Tasman migration has not offset New Zealand’s ability to recruit population through immigration. Over the last three decades, the outflow of half a million New Zealand citizens has been compensated by a net inflow of three-quarter million citizens from elsewhere. The number of New Zealanders in Australia is expected to continue to grow but the migration flows become increasingly diversified. One-third of the New Zealanders in Australia re-migrates within four years. Future trends will depend on New Zealand’s ability to boost productivity growth, the real cost of air travel, retirement migration and the impacts of climate change.Trans-Tasman migration, Australia, New Zealand, economic development

The impact of cultural diversity on firm innovation: evidence from Dutch micro-data

An important question for firms and policy makers is whether the recruitment of foreign workers can boost innovation. Migration studies have demonstrated positive economic impacts of cultural diversity on productivity and innovation at the regional level, but the impacts at firm level are less well known. Merging data from four different sources, provided by Statistics Netherlands, we construct and analyze a unique linked employer-employee micro dataset of 4582 firms that includes qualitative information on firm innovation. We consider both the number of immigrants these firms employ and their cultural diversity. Potential endogeneity of migrant employment is addressed by an instrumental variables approach that accounts for the past geographic distribution of immigrants and the past culinary diversity of the municipality the firm is located in. We find robust evidence that firms employing relatively more migrants are less innovative. However, there is evidence of integration in that this effect is generally less strong or even absent for second generation immigrants. Moreover, firms employing a more diverse foreign workforce are more innovative, particularly in terms of product innovations. The benefits of diversity for innovation are more apparent in sectors employing relatively more skilled immigrants