This paper studies the growth dynamics of a developing country under migration. Assuming that human capital formation is subject to a strong enough, positive intertemporal externality, the prospect of migration will increase growth in the home country in the long run. If the external effect is...

In a haystack-type representation of a heterogeneous population that is evolving according to a payoff structure of a prisoner's dilemma game, migration is modeled as a process of swapping" individuals between heterogeneous groups of constant size after a random allocation fills the haystacks,...

We propose a new microeconomic explanation for the divergent experiences of economies in forming human capital. We suggest that the positive effect of a longer life expectancy on human capital formation arises from two separate effects: a life expectancy effect and a prolonged intergenerational...

This paper considers a setting in which the acquisition of human capital entails a change of location in social space that causes individuals to revise their comparison groups. Skill levels are viewed as occupational groups, and moving up the skill ladder by acquiring additional human capital,...

We demonstrate that a rank-preserving transfer from a richer individual to a poorer individual can exacerbate income inequality (when inequality is measured by the Gini coefficient). This happens when individuals' preferences depend negatively not only on work time (effort) but also on low...

This paper presents a set of reflections on what gives rise to remittances, which constitute a major part of the impact of migration on economic development in the migrants’ own countries. The collage of reasons presented serves to illustrate that remittance behavior is the outcome of an...

This paper considers the integration of economies as a merger of populations. The premise is that the merger of groups of people alters their social landscape and their comparators. The paper identifies the effect of the merger on aggregate distress. A merger is shown to increase aggregate...

Evidence is presented in support of the “brain gain” view that the likelihood of migrating to a destination wherein the returns to human capital (schooling) are high creates incentives to acquire human capital in migrant-sending areas. In Mexico, even though internal migrants are more...

This paper argues that an increase in the inequality of wealth prompts a stronger quest for status that in turn fosters the accumulation of wealth. It proposes a measure for an individual's want of social status. For a given level of a population's wealth, the corresponding aggregate measure of...