Politická ekonomie X:X | DOI: 10.18267/j.polek.1528

Is It Perception or Reality that International Migration Flows Increase Unemployment? An Empirical Assessment for the European Countries

Mehmet Mucuk, Sümeyra Evren
Mehmet Mucuk (corresponding author), Department of Economics, Selçuk University, Konya, Turkey
Sümeyra Evren, Department of Economics, Selçuk University, Konya, Turkey

This paper mainly aims to explore the long-term impact of net migration on unemployment in the 11 European countries for the period 1991-2022 employing the cross-sectionally augmented distributed lag (CS-DL) estimator. In addition, the Juodis, Karavias and Sarafidis panel Granger non-causality test (JKS test), a new technique, is employed to explore causal links between variables. According to the findings of the CS-DL estimator, net migration has no statistically significant effect on unemployment in the long-term. This result does not support the perception that migration increases unemployment. The findings of the JKS test also indicate that there is no causal link from net migration to unemployment, but unemployment is a cause of migration. When evaluated in terms of unemployment, the empirical result implies that the selected European countries follow a rational immigration policy.

Keywords: Economic growth, immigration, unemployment, panel causality

Received: December 9, 2024; Revised: July 23, 2025; Accepted: August 25, 2025; Prepublished online: March 12, 2026 

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