This publication presents the current situation with regard to the magnitude and economic impact of migrants’ remittances to their countries of origin.

This publication presents the current situation with regard to the magnitude and economic impact of migrants’ remittances to their countries of origin.

Workers' remittances have become a major source of financing for developing countries and are especially important in Latin America and the Caribbean, which is at the top of the ranking of remittance receiving regions in the world. While there has been a recent surge in analytical work on the topic, this book is motivated by the large heterogeneity in migration and remittance patterns across countries and regions, and by the fact that existing evidence for Latin America and the Caribbean is restricted to only a few countries, such as Mexico and El Salvador. Because the nature of the phenomenon varies across countries, its development impact and policy implications are also likely to differ in ways that are still largely unknown. This book helps fill the gap by exploring, in the specific context of Latin America and Caribbean countries, some of the main questions faced by policymakers when trying to respond to increasing remittances flows. The book relies on cross-country panel data and household surveys for 11 Latin American countries to explore the development impact of remittance flows along several dimensions: growth, poverty, inequality, schooling, health, labor supply, financial development, and real exchange rates.

Remittances remain a key source of funds for developing countries, far exceeding official development assistance and even foreign direct investment. Remittances have proved to be more stable than private debt and portfolio equity flows, and less volatile than official aid flows, and their annual flow can match or surpass foreign exchange reserves in many small countries. Even in large emerging markets, such as India, remittances are equivalent to at least a quarter of total foreign exchange reserves. India, China, Philippines and Mexico are the top recipients of migrant remittances. The Migration and Remittances Factbook 2016 attempts to present numbers and facts behind the stories of international migration and remittances, drawing on authoritative, publicly available data. It provides a snapshot of statistics on immigration, emigration, skilled emigration, and remittance flows for 210 countries and 15 regional and income groups. The Migration and Remittances Factbook 2016 updates the 2011 edition of the Factbook with additional data on bilateral migration and remittances and second generation diasporas, collected from various sources, including national censuses, labor force surveys, population registers, and other national sources.

International migration, the movement of people across international boundaries to improve economic opportunity, has enormous implications for growth and welfare in both origin and destination countries. An important benefit to developing countries is the receipt of remittances or transfers from income earned by overseas emigrants. Official data show that development countries' remittance receipts totaled 160 billion in 2004, more than twice the size of official aid. This year's edition of Global Economic Prospects focuses on remittances and migration. The bulk of the book covers remittances.

International migration, the movement of people across international boundaries, has enormous economic, social and cultural implications in both origin and destination countries. Using original research, this title examines the determinants of migration, the impact of remittances and migration on poverty, welfare, and investment decisions, and the consequences of brain drain, brain gain, and brain waste.

In this paper, we present evidence indicating that international migrant remittances lead to improved developmental outcomes. Using a cross-section of all Mexican municipalities (over 2400) in the year 2000, we show that an increase in the fraction of households receiving international remittances is correlated with better schooling and health indicators and with reductions in poverty, even after controlling for the likely endogeneity between remittances and developmental outcome variables. Our findings have important policy implications as they suggest that national governments and the international community should adopt measures that facilitate remittance flows.