Alice Mesnard and Tiffanie Perrault

Temporary visas against smuggling

Coauthor: Emmanuelle Auriol

Abstract

We model the supply of human smuggling services and the demand from workers in low wage countries. We show that carefully designed temporary visa schemes can drive smugglers out of business while meeting labor market needs in host countries.  The configuration of these schemes influences the size and composition of worker flows. We show that the policy trade-off between migration control and liberalized borders can be overcome by combining internal and external controls with temporary visas sold at 'eviction' prices, set to throttle smugglers' businesses. We use information on illegal migrants from Senegal to Europe to calibrate eviction prices of temporary visas and subsequent variations in migration flows. Our numerical applications highlight important constraints for governments seeking to prevent temporary workers' overstay and discuss the extent to which such schemes are viable.

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