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Complements or Substitutes? Immigrant and Native Task Specialization in Spain

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  • Catalina Amuedo-Dorantes
  • Sara de la Rica
Abstract
Learning about the impact that immigration has on the labor market of the receiving nation is a topic of major concern, particularly in Spain, where immigration has quadrupled from 4 percent to roughly 10 percent of the population within a decade. Yet, very little is known about the impact that large immigrant inflows have had on the labor market outcomes of Spanish natives. Furthermore, most studies assume that natives and immigrants are perfect substitutes within skill groups –a questionable assumption given recent findings in the literature. In this paper, we first document that foreign-born workers are not perfect substitutes of similarly skilled native Spanish workers, which may help explain why immigration has not significantly lowered natives' wages. Instead, immigration has affected the occupational distribution of natives. Specifically, owing to the comparative advantage of foreign-born workers in manual as opposed to non-manual tasks, natives relocated to occupations with a lower content of manual tasks –such as technical and alike professional occupations, clerical support jobs, and sales and service occupations. Yet, possibly owing to the significant and simultaneous reduction in the manual to non-manual task supply resulting from the increase in the share of native female workers, the increase in the relative supply of manual to non-manual tasks from foreign-born workers does not appear to have significantly changed the overall manual to non-manual task supply in the Spanish economy.

Suggested Citation

  • Catalina Amuedo-Dorantes & Sara de la Rica, 2008. "Complements or Substitutes? Immigrant and Native Task Specialization in Spain," Working Papers 2008-35, FEDEA.
    • Handle: RePEc:fda:fdaddt:2008-35
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Steinhardt Max Friedrich, 2011. "The Wage Impact of Immigration in Germany - New Evidence for Skill Groups and Occupations," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 11(1), pages 1-35, June.
    2. Pablo Swedberg, 2010. "The impact of education and host language skills on the labor market outcomes of immigrants in Spain," Investigaciones de Economía de la Educación volume 5, in: María Jesús Mancebón-Torrubia & Domingo P. Ximénez-de-Embún & José María Gómez-Sancho & Gregorio Gim (ed.), Investigaciones de Economía de la Educación 5, edition 1, volume 5, chapter 41, pages 798-824, Asociación de Economía de la Educación.
    3. González, Libertad & Ortega, Francesc, 2011. "How do very open economies adjust to large immigration flows? Evidence from Spanish regions," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(1), pages 57-70, January.
    4. Farré Lidia & González Libertad & Ortega Francesc, 2011. "Immigration, Family Responsibilities and the Labor Supply of Skilled Native Women," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 11(1), pages 1-48, June.
    5. Libertad Gonzalez & Francesc Ortega, 2013. "Immigration And Housing Booms: Evidence From Spain," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 53(1), pages 37-59, February.
    6. Francesca Mazzolari & David Neumark, 2012. "Immigration and product diversity," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 25(3), pages 1107-1137, July.
    7. Nicodemo, Catia & Nicolini, Rosella, 2012. "Random or Referral Hiring: When Social Connections Matter," IZA Discussion Papers 6312, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

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