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Open research questions in Migration and Labor Dynamics

1,029 unresolved questions extracted from the limitations and future-work sections of 12,980 Migration and Labor Dynamics papers in our library. Each links back to the study that raised it.

What the literature leaves open

  • The paper identifies a gap in understanding the experiences of refugees in un(der)paid and low-paid labor. It highlights the need to challenge dominant narratives of active citizenship and to examine the impact of labor policies on refugees' lives. The study argues that current research has not adequately addressed the issue of precarity, exhaustion, and disposability among refugees in the Netherlands.

    Between active citizenship and exploitation: understanding exhaustion and disposability in un(der)paid and low-paid labor by refugees in the Netherlands · 2026 · DOI

  • Further research could investigate the effects of different welfare systems on natives' preferences for immigrants, - Research could examine the impact of job insecurity concerns on natives' preferences for immigrants, - Studies could explore the relationship between institutional design and political preferences regarding immigration policy

    Welfare state and natives’ preferences for immigrants’ types · 2026 · DOI

  • The literature has not fully explored how the welfare system affects natives' preferences for immigrants' types. There is a gap in understanding how self-interested natives respond to fiscal incentives embedded in welfare state institutions. The study aims to fill this gap by providing a theoretical argument and empirical evidence.

    Welfare state and natives’ preferences for immigrants’ types · 2026 · DOI

  • The analysis of employment effects is based on full- and part-time workers, with part-time work down-weighted into full-time equivalent units. The wage analysis is based only on full-time employees due to lack of information on hours worked. The study only considers German nationals (\"natives\") as of June 30th for the years 1986 to 1995. The study excludes civil servants, the self-employed, and military personnel from the sample.

    The Effects of Immigration on Places and People – Identification and Interpretation · 2025 · DOI

  • Most existing literature relies on repeated cross-sectional data, which cannot separately identify distinct mechanisms. The parameters typically identified using such data are composite effects, which cannot be separately identified in cross-sectional settings. There is a need for a novel decomposition technique to identify underlying effects.

    The Effects of Immigration on Places and People – Identification and Interpretation · 2025 · DOI

  • The challenge of accurately measuring wage effects that incorporate internal migration. The difficulty of accounting for the impact of trade openness on regional wage differentials. The need to address the potential biases in the data, such as the failure to count migrants who might have left and returned over the five years.

    The effect of NAFTA on Mexico's wage gap · 2024 · DOI

  • The gap between the expected increase in wages of low-skilled workers due to trade liberalization and the anecdotal evidence suggesting it increased the gap between rich and poor in Mexico. The lack of accurate measures of wage effects that incorporate internal migration. The need to consider the impact of trade openness on regional wage differentials.

    The effect of NAFTA on Mexico's wage gap · 2024 · DOI

  • The paper identifies a gap in understanding how young women develop skills to manage the challenges of Lira City. There is a lack of understanding of the concept of 'exposure' among young women in Lira City. The authors identify a need for a collaborative ethnography approach to study the lives of young women in Lira City.

    Decent exposure: young women mixing schooling and sharpness in Lira City · 2024 · DOI

  • ABSTRACT Research on migrant social integration has focused mainly on international migration, leaving internal migration, especially in the Global South, underexplored as a site of theory‑building.

    Reconceptualising Social Integration: Experiences of Internal Youth Migrants in Ghana · 2026 · DOI

  • Research on immigrant remittances and gender is dominated by qualitative studies focusing on specific groups of immigrants; meanwhile, quantitative analysis is scarce due to data limitations.

    Immigrants’ Gendered Remittance‐Sending Patterns and Purposes: The Role of Marital Status · 2026 · DOI

  • This article explores the experiences of Filipino schoolteachers in Southern Thailand, focusing on their migration within the peripheries of Global South countries—a topic that remains underexplored in migration studies.

    Middling Migrants in an Asian Periphery: Filipino Teachers and Alternative Mobility Pathways in Southern Thailand · 2026 · DOI

  • ABSTRACT Limited research has explored the sources, heterogeneity, and implications of a shrinking yet persistent gender gap in educational attainment in rural areas.

    Catching Up Yet Still Falling Behind: Sources, Heterogeneity, and Implications of the Modest Female Educational Disadvantage in Rural China · 2025 · DOI

  • We contribute to this literature by examining refugees, an understudied group in demographic research.

    Gendered Migration Patterns and Fertility Among Refugees En Route · 2025 · DOI

  • While scholarship has largely focused on immigration to EU core countries, emigration—particularly from Central and Eastern Europe (CEE)— remains underexplored.

    Core‐Periphery Inequalities in Liberal Migration Regimes: A Comparative Political Economy Approach · 2025 · DOI

  • This shift has rendered children of migrants remaining in urban China understudied.

    In the Best Interest of Children? Unpacking the Dynamics of Parental Migration and Children's Life Satisfaction in Urban Northeast China · 2025 · DOI

  • While HSM neighbourhood choices have been sparsely researched, this study focuses in on how the atmospheres of these neighbourhoods lead HSM to feeling included or excluded.

    Inclusion and Exclusion of High‐Skilled Migrants in Copenhagen—The Effect of Neighbourhood Atmospheres · 2025 · DOI

  • While the influence of co‐ethnic networks has been well‐documented in the context of international migration, its impact on internal migrants in multi‐ethnic countries remains underexplored.

    Co‐Ethnic Networks in Ethnic Minority's Migration Destination Choices · 2025 · DOI

  • Yet what exactly constitutes a well‐functioning relationship remains to be defined at a large‐scale, and especially for the case of African parents migrating to Europe.

    Transnational Relationships Between African Migrant Parents in Europe and Caregivers in Africa · 2025 · DOI

  • Although childbearing significantly influences female labour force participation, the interrelationship between fertility and employment changes among migrant populations is poorly understood.

    Origin, Generation, and Destination Country Context: Employment Changes and Childbearing Among Female Immigrants and Their Descendants in the UK, France, and Germany · 2025 · DOI

  • However, our knowledge about the factors shaping this remarkable, yet puzzling, development remains scarce.

    Bridging Migrants’ Social Protection Gap: Understanding The Incomplete Revolution Of International Social Security Coordination · 2025 · DOI

  • Despite their growing volume, the use of remittances in productive areas such as financial assets, consumption, and investment remains under-researched.

    Impact of remittances on financial asset accumulation and business investment in Nepal · 2025 · DOI

  • However, the mechanism influencing the spatial distribution of the migrant population in the hinterland of the GBA is underexplored.

    Patterns of spatial concentration and drivers of China’s migrant population: evidence from the Greater Bay Area hinterland · 2025 · DOI

  • Despite the impressive financial and political resources the involved actors mobilize to reach this goal, little is known about the effects of this strategy on their target states and populations.

    The Transit Fix—Border Externalization and the Interplay of Capital and Race in the Transit “Migration” State · 2024 · DOI

  • Employers are central, yet understudied, actors in the immigrant work authorization process.

    The Need for Speed: The Role of Employers in Immigrant Work Visa Regulatory Prioritization · 2024 · DOI

  • Abstract Despite obvious consequences of pandemics on human mobility, attempts to quantify the migratory impact of COVID‐19 remained scarce, largely due to a general lack of data necessary for such assessments.

    The migratory impact of COVID‐19: The role of time and distances in the migration decisions of Hungarians during the COVID‐19 pandemic · 2024 · DOI

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1,029 open questions have been extracted from the limitations and future-work passages of 12,980 Migration and Labor Dynamics papers in our library. Each one below links back to the study that raised it, so you can read the original claim in context.

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