The labour-market performance of recent migrants

Migrant workers constitute a vital component of many Western labour markets. Although migrants can benefit greatly by moving to higher-wage economies, it is important to compare their labour-market outcomes with those of native-born workers. In this paper, we discuss factors that have been found to influence labour-market success in the receiving country and examine the actual performance of recent migrants to the UK. The UK provides a good case study for conducting such an exercise because of the very large increases in immigration that have been seen over the past decade. We find that labour-market performance varies greatly between migrant groups and that outcomes have changed noticeably following the UK government's decision to allow migrants from Poland and other Central and Eastern European countries more or less free access to the labour market after EU enlargement in 2004.