Are There Gender Differences in Immigrant Labor Market Outcomes across European Countries?

Alicia Adsera, University of Illinois at Chicago
Barry R. Chiswick, University of Illinois at Chicago

We use the 1994-2000 waves of the European Community Household Panel to analyze earnings of immigrants as compared to natives in a sample of 15 European countries. We test for any variation in earnings across gender related to duration in the destination, schooling, age at immigration, country of origin, or country of destination. We find a significant negative effect of immigrant status on individual earnings of around 40% at the time of arrival in the pooled sample (smaller for women). Differences vary across countries: migrants in Germany and Portugal fare best relative to natives and those in Sweden, Denmark, Luxembourg or Spain, the worst. Gender differences are larger among non-Europeans. By continent, Asian men followed by Latin-American and Eastern European men receive the lowest earnings. Latin-American and Eastern European women are at the bottom of the distribution. Education matters more for women in terms of explaining earnings, whereas language skills are more relevant for men.