Martin Kahanec – författare

This highly accessible book illustrates how policy makers can address and nurture the effects of growing ethnic diversity in European labor markets. The contributors present an unprecedented large-scale study on ethnic diversity in European labor markets via a combination of hard data analysis with expert evaluation of integration practices and policy options. Key questions explored include: Does ethnic diversity in European labor markets lead to poor socio-economic outcomes for some ethnic groups in the face of fierce competition for jobs and welfare?Can labor immigration and improved integration of all ethnic groups provide a solution to the challenges posed by a shrinking population, an aging workforce, skill shortages and other bottlenecks that constrain the innovative potential of the EU?What can policy makers do to nurture and encourage the benefits of ethnic diversity in the EU?This indispensable guide will be warmly welcomed by academics, students, policy makers, analysts and researchers with an interest in economics, European studies and labor studies. It will be especially insightful for those with a particular commitment to managing ethnic diversity in European labor markets.Contributors: A.F. Constant, S. de la Rica, D. Fougère, V. Ghetau, T.J. Hatton, M. Hazans, M. Kahanec, Z. Kántor, P.J. Pedersen, M. Vasecka, H.D. von Loeffelholz, A. Zaiceva, K.F. Zimmermann

Selected by Princeton University as Noteworthy Book in Industrial Relations and Labor Economics for 2010.Are immigrants from the new EU member states a threat to the Western welfare state? Do they take jobs away from the natives? And will the source countries suffer from severe brain drain or demographic instability? In a timely and unprecedented contribution, this book integrates what is known about post-enlargement migration and its effects on EU labor markets. Based on rigorous analysis and hard data, it makes a convincing case that there is no evidence that the post-enlargement labor migrants would on aggregate displace native workers or lower their wages, or that they would be more dependent on welfare. While brain drain may be a concern in the source countries, the anticipated brain circulation between EU member states may in fact help to solve their demographic and economic problems, and improve the allocative efficiency in the EU. The lesson is clear: free migration is a solution rather than a foe for labor market woes and cash-strapped social security systems in the EU.

Selected by Princeton University as Noteworthy Book in Industrial Relations and Labor Economics for 2010. Are immigrants from the new EU member states a threat to the Western welfare state?

This volume extends and deepens our knowledge about cross-border mobility and its role in an enlarged EU. More specifically, its main purpose is to enlighten the growing and yet rather uninformed debate about the role of post-enlargement migration for economic adjustment in the crisis-stricken labor markets of the Eurozone and the EU as a whole. The book addresses the political economy aspects of post-enlargement migration, including its broader political contexts, redistributive impacts, but also nationalization of the enlargement agenda. It also covers the experience of receiving and sending countries with post-enlargement migration and its role during the current crisis. Renowned experts in the field study, whether and how post-enlargement mobility has enabled the EU to absorb asymmetric economic shocks, how it has affected the European welfare systems, and whether it has contributed to the sustainability of the Eurozone. The authors also evaluate brain circulation as a sought-aftervehicle of improved allocative efficiency of EU labor markets and propose a policy agenda for mobility in an enlarged EU.