In this paper, we analyse the effect of emigration from Poland on Polish wages. Focusing on the 1998-2007 period for Poland, we use a unique dataset that contains information about household members who are currently living abroad, which allows us to develop region-specific emigration rates and to estimate the effect of emigration on wages using within-region variation. Our findings show that emigration led to a slight increase in wages for high-and medium-skilled workers, which are the two groups with the largest relative outmigration rates. Workers at the low end of the skill distribution might have experienced wage decreases.

[144 words]Governments around the world want to develop their ICT industries. Researchers and policymakers thus need a clear picture of digital businesses, but conventional datasets and typologies tend to lag real-world change. We use innovative 'big data' resources to perform an alternative analysis for all active companies in the UK, focusing on ICT-producing firms. Exploiting a combination of observed and modelled variables, we develop a novel 'sector-product' approach and use text mining to provide further detail on key sector-product cells. We find that the ICT production space is around 42% larger than SIC-based estimates, with around 70,000 more companies. We also find ICT employment shares over double the conventional estimates, although this result is more speculative. Our findings are robust to various scope, selection and sample construction challenges. We use our experiences to reflect on the broader pros and cons of frontier data use. JEL 1/ IntroductionThis paper uses novel 'big data' sources to expand our understanding of digital businesses in the UK. We produce alternative counts of ICT-producing firms and set out key descriptive characteristics. We then draw on this experience to critically reflect on some of the opportunities and challenges presented by big data tools and analytics for economic research and policymaking.Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs) -and the 'digital economy' they support -are of enduring interest to researchers and policymakers. Digital sectors and firms are the subject of much analysis both at the organisational level (Bloom et al., 2012;Bresnahan et al., 2002) and in the growth field. Human capital and innovation shape long term economic development (Lucas, 1988; Romer, 1990); high value-added sectors such as ICT make direct contributions to national growth, as well as indirect contributions through spillovers and supply chains (Audretsch and Feldman, 1996;Moretti, 2012).National and local government are thus keen to exploit the growth potential of digital businesses. Given the recent resurgence of interest in industrial policy across many developed countries (Aghion et al., 2013;Aiginger, 2007;Block and Keller, 2011;Harrison and Rodríguez-Clare, 2009;Mazzucato, 2011; Rodrik, 2004), there is now substantial policy interest in developing stronger, more 'competitive' digital economies. For example, the UK's new industrial strategy agenda (Cable, 2012) Real-world features of an industry tend to evolve ahead of any given industrial typology. For researchers, these data challenges present particular barriers to understanding the extent and nature of ICT production, where the pace of change can be very rapid. Data coverage is often imperfect, industry typologies can lack detail, and product categories do not closely align with sector categories. For policymakers, these information gaps feed through into policy gaps, which can limit the ability to design effective interventions. 3To tackle these issues we use an innovative commercial dataset develope...

In this paper, we shed new light on the links between firm-level innovation and growth. We introduce data that capture a difficult-to-observe aspect of firms' innovative activity -new product/service launches -at scale. We show that our novel measures complement existing innovation metrics. We build a simple framework covering firm-level innovation, launches and revenue productivity. Then, we show positive linkages between past patenting and launches and between launches and performance for a large panel of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the UK. We go on to explore the roles of age, size, industry and product/service quality in these relationships. A subset of SMEs with high-quality launches explains our results.

The aim of this systematic review and meta-analysis was to estimate the accuracy of qualitative pain drawings (PDs) in identifying psychological distress in subacute and chronic low back pain (LBP) patients. [Subjects and Methods] Data were obtained from searches of PubMed, EBSCO, Scopus, PsycINFO and ISI Web of Science from their inception to July 2014. Quality assessments of bias and applicability were conducted using the Quality of Diagnostic Accuracy Studies-2 (QUADAS-2). [Results] The summary estimates were: sensitivity=0.45 (95% CI 0.34, 0.61), specificity=0.66 (95% CI 0.53, 0.82), positive likelihood ratio=1.23 (95% CI 0.93, 1.62), negative likelihood ratio=0.84 (95% CI 0.70, 1.01), and diagnostic odds ratio=1.46 (95% CI 0.79, 2.68). The area under the curve was 78% (CI, 57 to 99%). [Conclusion] The results of this systematic review do not show broad and unqualified support for the accuracy of PDs in detecting psychological distress in subacute and chronic LBP.

In this paper, I use a unique individual-level pre-migration labour market dataset for Poland to examine emigrant selection in two major destination countries, the United Kingdom and Germany. I compare the pre-migration observable and unobservable characteristics of emigrants with those of non-emigrants in Poland. First, I find that Polish emigrants to the UK are more similarly educated to non-emigrants while being more negatively selected on residual wages. Second, emigrants to Germany are disproportionately more likely to fall in the middle of the education distribution but they are no different than non-emigrants in terms of unobservable skills. The familiar predictions of the Borjas (1987) model allow me to partially undercover the mechanism driving the selection patterns of Polish emigrants. I contribute to the migrant selection literature by providing additional evidence on how migrants respond to differences in both labour markets and migration policies across countries.

In this paper, I examine wage developments among Eastern European immigrants versus UK natives between 1998 and 2008 by measuring the extent to which intergroup wage differentials are explainable by these groups' changing attributes or by differences in returns to these characteristics. Specifically, by applying unconditional quantile regression to immigrant-native wage gaps before and after the 2004 EU enlargement to Eastern countries, I show that a major part of the decrease in the average wages of Eastern European migrants in the UK results from a large decrease in wage levels at the top of the distribution. At all distribution points, major role is played by occupational downgrading, which increases over time. The results further suggest that the decreased wage levels at the top of the distribution stem mainly from low transferability of skills acquired in the source country.

In this paper, I use a unique individual-level pre-migration labour market dataset for Poland to examine emigrant selection in two major destination countries, the United Kingdom and Germany. I compare the pre-migration observable and unobservable characteristics of emigrants with those of non-emigrants in Poland. First, I find that Polish emigrants to the UK are more similarly educated to non-emigrants while being more negatively selected on residual wages. Second, emigrants to Germany are disproportionately more likely to fall in the middle of the education distribution but they are no different than non-emigrants in terms of unobservable skills. The familiar predictions of the Borjas (1987) model allow me to partially undercover the mechanism driving the selection patterns of Polish emigrants. I contribute to the migrant selection literature by providing additional evidence on how migrants respond to differences in both labour markets and migration policies across countries. JEL-code: F22, J61, O15, D33

PurposeThe paper aims at examining wage developments among Eastern European immigrants vs UK natives before and after the 2004 enlargement by measuring the extent to which inter-group wage differentials are explainable by these groups' changing attributes or by differences in returns to these characteristics. The enlargement has been a defining moment in British recent history and may have contributed to the unfolding of the events that have culminated in Brexit.Design/methodology/approachThe paper uses a quantitative analysis of the immigrant–native wage gap across the entire distribution by applying the methodology known as the unconditional quantile regression. The analysis is performed before and after the 2004 European Union enlargement to Eastern countries. The data used is the British Labour Force Survey (UK LFS) from 1998 to 2008.FindingsAt all distribution points, a major role is played by occupational downgrading, which increases over time. The results further suggest that the decreased wage levels at the top of the distribution stem mainly from low transferability of skills acquired in the source country.Research limitations/implicationsThe UK LFS does not allow to follow individuals for a long period of time. For this reason, the main limitation of the study is the impossibility to measure for individual-level trajectories in their labour market integration and to account for return migration.Originality/valueThe analysis provides a detailed picture of the wage differences between Eastern European immigrants and natives along the whole wage distribution. The paper also identifies possible causes of the wage gap decrease for EU8 immigrant workers after 2008.