Human capital accumulation and forced migration

57 Pages·2017·7.68 MB·English

Human capital accumulation
and forced migration:
evidence from the post-WWII
Polish population transfers
Sascha O. Becker
Irena Grosfeld
Nico Voigtlaender
Ekaterina Zhuravskaya
12 January 2018
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Motivation
Economists and historians have hypothesized that
•
minorities who face expulsions tend to invest more in
mobile assets such as human capital.
Brenner and Kiefer (1981): “...a discriminated-against
•
group which has had physical capital confiscated in the past
might tend to take the probability of confiscation of an asset
into consideration when making an investment. Further, a
group which had been compelled to emigrate from a country
might take the portability of an asset into consideration
when making an investment in a new country, especially if
it continues to face discriminations”.
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Motivation
For Jews, this explanation has been challenged by Botticini
•
and Eckstein (2012) as there are other important reasons
for high education among Jews
In addition, the argument about the relationship between
•
expulsions and human capital accumulation has generally
been made for groups that continue facing discrimination
However, often discrimination implies direct restrictions on
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accumulation of physical capital
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In this paper
Use historical episode of one-time expulsion of a group that
•
was not discriminated against in the destination location to
test whether forced migration permanently affects decisions
to invest in human capital
This episode allows us to isolate the effect of the
•
forced migration per se from the effect of the labor market
conditions at the destination, as we are able to compare
human capital accumulation of forced and non-forced
migrants within the same labor market
We also show that the results cannot be driven by selection
•
in either treatment or control group
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Natural experiment: After WWII, Poland
gained territories East of Oder-Neisse, called Western Territories
•
lost territories East of Curzon line, called Kresy (Eastern
•
Borderlands)
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Natural experiment
The change of borders triggered mass population movements:
WT were populated by 3.5m Germans and 1m Poles in 1945
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Before WWII, 8.5m Germans, 1m Poles, 100,000 Jews lived in WT
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1945-1949: Poles were expelled from Kresy and moved to WT
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Germans were expelled from WT and resettled in Germany
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Voluntary migrants from Central Poland moved to WT to
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benefit from housing, land, and infrastructure left by Germans
96% of WT’s total 5.6m population in 1950 were Poles, i.e.,
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Roman Catholics and Polish native speakers
The rest were Jews (380,000 Polish Jews survived WWII),
•
who subsequently left, and Ukrainians, who were forced
migrants from CP (“Operation Vistula”)
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According to 1950 census, 1000s of people
WesternTerritories(WT) CentralPoland(CP) ShareinWT
Totalpopulation,1950 5,602 19,012 22.8%
LivedinCPin1939 2,785 18,355 13.2%
(49.7%) (96.5%)
LivedinUSSRin1939 1,554 583 72.7%
(27.7%) (3.1%)
LivedinWTin1939 1,112 19 98.3%
(19.9%) (0.1%)
Livedabroad(notUSSR)in1939 152 53 74.0%
(2.7%) (0.3%)
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Kresy migrants were put on the train and brought to WT
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Kresy migrants were put on the train and brought to WT
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Migrants from CP were invited to come and explore
available resources: “ The land is waiting”
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