Leaving Home for a Better Life? Occupational Mobility of Skilled Immigrants: Some Empirical Comments from Spain in Light of the Current Economic Crisis.

¿Dejar el hogar para mejorar? Movilidad ocupacional de inmigrantes cualificados: Algunas observaciones empíricas desde España, antes de la crisis económica actual.

OCCUPATIONAL mobility; IMMIGRANTS; LABOR mobility; FOREIGN workers; SKILLED labor; FINANCIAL crises; LABOR market

The purpose of this paper is to study the occupational mobility experienced following migration by migrants who are university graduates or postgraduates who completed their studies before their arrival in Spain. To do so, we compared the first job they obtained in Spain with the last one held before leaving their country of origin. We identify three different types of mobility: downward mobility, lateral mobility, and upward mobility. Finally, we used logistic regression models to identify the strongest predictors of the three types of mobility previously classified. The empirical analysis was carried out using data from the Spanish National Immigrant Survey (ENI) of 2007, including information about some 15 000 individuals. Our attention will be focused on the 2 425 skilled migrants from this survey. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

El objetivo de este artículo es estudiar la movilidad ocupacional experimentada por los inmigrantes que completaron sus estudios universitarios (de grado y postgrado) antes de su llegada a España. Para ello hemos comparado la primera ocupación que tuvieron en España con la última que tuvieron antes de dejar su país de origen. Hemos identificadotres tipos diferentes de movilidad: movilidad descendente; movilidad lateral y, finalmente, movilidad ascendente. Por último, hemos usado modelos de regression logística para identificar los predictores más importantes de estos tres tipos de movilidad. El análisis empírico se hizo utilizando información aportada por la Encuesta Nacional de Inmigrantes (ENI) de 2007, que tiene información de unos 15 000 individuos. Nuestra atención se centra en 2 425 inmigrantes cualificados. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Migraciones Internacionales is the property of El Colegio de la Frontera Norte and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)