Seminar Series: Abstract

5.30pm
March 19 2009
Finkel Theatre, Bldg 131 Garran Road, ANU

Vanishing Third World Emigrants?
Professor Jeffrey Williamson, Harvard University and the University of Wisconsin

A secular decline in emigration rates from the Third World since the 1990s has gone unnoticed. The recent rise in unemployment in high-wage countries has accelerated the secular decline. These trends have gone unnoticed partly because observers have been obsessed with immigration rates, and partly because of their belief that aging in rich countries will augment the demand for more immigrants. This lecture shows that the Third World supply side matters even more, just as the previous two centuries of history has shown. Third World migrants will begin to vanish from our midst as the 21st century unfolds.