Building and Transferring Human Capital Via Migration

Abstract

This paper aims to explore how human capital is built and transferred via international migration. The paper is based on data from a large-scale survey with 30,000 participants from nine European countries. The survey examined several skills and competences acquired via international migration: self-confidence, learning to adapt to new cultures, ability to deal with new challenges, learning a language, acquiring formal qualifications and learning new skills. The key research question is how skills and competences are associated with specific types of tacit and explicit knowledge. The survey data are analysed via non-parametric tests and ANOVA procedure. The main finding is that knowledge acquisition and transfer differs among different socio-economic groups. Females, for example, seem to benefit more from embodied knowledge than males. Embrained and embedded knowledge is considered more valuable by tertiary graduates than people with secondary education.