By Puren Demirel

This study reviews the labor-market effects of policies aimed at regularizing irregular migrants, with particular emphasis on amnesty programs and access to legal employment. Drawing on the existing literature and country experiences, it examines the mechanisms through which regularization may affect migrants, local workers, employers, and the broader economy. The analysis highlights that the effects of regularization depend strongly on host-country characteristics, including the size of the informal economy, labor-market structure, welfare arrangements, inspection capacity, and geographical conditions, as well as on migrants’ demographic and skill profiles and their degree of substitutability or complementarity with the local workforce. The study also discusses the potential effects of regularization on wages, employment, productivity, tax revenues, occupational mobility, and migrants’ integration into the formal economy. Evidence from different country experiences suggests that regularization does not produce uniform outcomes and that granting legal status alone is insufficient to ensure successful labor-market integration. The paper concludes that regularization policies are more likely to generate positive outcomes when accompanied by effective labor-market enforcement, access to appropriate employment opportunities, and complementary integration policies tailored to the specific conditions of the host country and migrant population.

Source SSRN