International Migration in the Atlantic Economy 1850–1940

Abstract

This chapter focuses on the economic analysis of what has been called the age of mass migration, 1850 to 1913, and its aftermath up to 1940. This has captured the interest of generations of economic historians and is still a highly active area of research. Here we concentrate on migration from Europe to the New World as this is where the bulk of the literature lies. We provide an overview of this literature focusing on key topics: the determinants of migration, the development of immigration policy, immigrant selection and assimilation, and the economic effects of mass migration as well as its legacy through to the present day. We explain how what were once orthodoxies have been revisited and revised, and how changes in our understanding have been influenced by advances in methodology, which in turn have been made possible by the availability of new and more comprehensive data. Despite these advances some issues remain contested or unresolved and, true to cliometric tradition, we conclude by calling for more research.

Working Their Way Up? US Immigrants' Changing Labor Market Assimilation in the Age of Mass Migration

“…In advancing our understanding of assimilation in the Age of Mass Migration, this paper complements research byHatton and Williamson (1998),Ferrie (1999),Abramitzky, Boustan, and Eriksson (2014),Abramitzky et al (2021b),Collins and Zimran (2019),Pérez (2021), and Ward (2020) among others Abramitzky and Boustan (2017). andHatton and Ward (2019) survey this literature.…”

International Migration Responses to Modern Europe’s Most Destructive Earthquake: Messina and Reggio Calabria, 1908

“…The historical importance of this earthquake is compounded by the setting in which it struck. It occurred at the peak of the Age of Mass Migration (1840Migration ( -1914, during which over 50 million Europeans migrated to the New World (Abramitzky and Boustan 2017;Hatton and Ward 2019;Hatton and Williamson 1998), enabled by open borders and cheap transatlantic transportation, and drawn by high expected returns (Abramitzky et al 2012). Italy was a leading country in this movement, sending hundreds of thousands of migrants each year to the Americas and to other European countries, in what amounted to one of the largest free flows of international migration in world history (Foerster 1919;Gomellini and Ó Gráda 2013;Spitzer and Zimran 2022).…”

“…This paper also adds to the literature on the Age of Mass Migration (Abramitzky and Boustan 2017;Hatton and Ward 2019). Despite the recent growth in the literature, advances in understanding the determinants of migration in this context have been more limited (c.f., Gray et al 2019;Karadja and Prawitz 2019;Spitzer 2021;Spitzer and Zimran 2022).…”

US Immigrants' Secondary Migration and Geographic Assimilation during the Age of Mass Migration

“…I address this by defining migration as a move from one county in the initial census to one in the final census that has no geographic overlap with it. An example is given in Online Appendix D. (Abramitzky and Boustan 2017;Hatton and Ward 2019). 16 The sample thus includes individuals born in the United States or Europe.…”