Death Scares : How Potential Work-Migrants Infer Mortality Rates from Migrant Deaths

Shrestha, Maheshwor

World Bank, Washington, DC

关键词: migration;    mortality;    risk;    learning fallacies;   

DOI  :  10.1596/1813-9450-7946
RP-ID  :  WPS7946

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

This paper studies how potential workmigrants infer mortality rates from incidents of migrantdeaths. In the context of migrant workers from Nepal toMalaysia and the Persian Gulf countries, the study findsthat the death of a migrant from a district lowers migrationoutflows in subsequent months. Furthermore, this migrationresponse is stronger when there have been more migrantdeaths in recent months. Using relevant elasticities, thisstudy finds that the migration response implies largechanges in mortality rates perceived by potential migrants.Models of learning fallacies better explain the observedresponses than a standard model of rational Bayesian learning.