Immigrant Overeducation : Evidence from Denmark

Nielsen, Chantal Pohl

World Bank, Washington, DC

关键词: ADEQUATE EDUCATION;    AGE GROUP;    COUNTRIES OF ORIGIN;    COUNTRY OF ORIGIN;    DISMISSAL;   

DOI  :  10.1596/1813-9450-4234
RP-ID  :  WPS4234

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

Anecdotes abound in the Danish publicdebate about well-educated immigrants that are in jobs theyare formally overqualified for. Using a 1995-2002 panel dataset based on Danish registers, this study attempts to findout how large a problem immigrant overeducation is in thecontext of the Danish labor market. More specifically, threequestions are posed: First, to what extent are immigrantsovereducated and are they more likely to be so than nativeDanes? Second, why are some immigrants more likely to becomeovereducated than others? And finally, what are theconsequences of overeducation for individual wages? Theauthors find that among wage earners with at least avocational education or higher, 25 percent of malenon-Western immigrants are overeducated. The same appliesfor 15 percent of native Danes. Particularly immigrants witha foreign-acquired education risk becoming overeducated -here the share is 30 percent among those with a vocationaleducation or higher. The authors find that Danish labormarket experience is extremely important in reducing thelikelihood of becoming overeducated. Years spent in thecountry without accumulating labor market experience do notimprove an individual's chances of an appropriatejob-to-education match. In terms of earnings consequences,the study concludes that years of overeducation do increasewages for immigrants, but much less so than years ofadequate education. This is also true for native Danes, butthe relative penalty for overeducation is much larger forimmigrants than for Danes.