By merging longitudinal register data and a customised survey, this article explores whether sectoral segmentation, migrants’ pre- and post-migration human capital and social structures, shape wages of Polish and Romanian long-term migrants to Denmark. Pronounced wage differences in favour of Polish migrants are evident in the first two years in Denmark, notwithstanding the same regulatory context under the free movement of labour in the EU. Wage differences persist – albeit at a considerably lower level – throughout the eight-year period, mainly because of significant sectoral segmentation. Sectoral segmentation not explained by demographics, pre-migration human capital or crisis effects, might indicate categorical stereotyping by employers. Regarding (co-ethnic) social networks, at least for the early stages of migration, the study does not find significant effects on wages. While the evidence shows a positive return on wages of formal higher education taken post migration, this is not the case for further training and Danish language education.
AguileraMB (2002) The impact of social capital on labor force participation: evidence from the 2000 Social Capital Benchmark Survey. Social Science Quarterly83(3): 853–874.
2.
BeckerGS (1965) A theory of the allocation of time. The Economic Journal75(299): 493–517.
3.
BekkerSMailandM (2019) The European flexicurity concept and the Dutch and Danish flexicurity models: how have they managed the Great Recession?Social Policy and Administration53(1): 142–155.
4.
ChiswickBR (1979) The effect of Americanization on the earnings of foreign-born men. Journal of Political Economy86(5): 81–87.
5.
ChiswickBRMillerPW (2009) The international transferability of immigrants’ human capital. Economics of Education Review28(2): 162–169.
6.
ClarkKDrinkwaterS (2008) The labour-market performance of recent migrants. Oxford Review of Economic Policy24(3): 495–516.
7.
ConstantAMasseyD (2005) Labor market segmentation and the earnings of German guestworkers. Population Research and Policy Review24(5): 489–512.
8.
DawsonCVeliziotisMHopkinsB (2018) Understanding the perception of the ‘migrant work ethic’. Work, Employment and Society32(5): 811–830.
9.
DiehlCLubbersMMühlauP, et al. (2016) Starting out: new migrants’ socio-cultural integration trajectories in four European destinations. Ethnicities16(2): 157–179.
10.
EadeJDrinkwaterSGarapichM (2007) Class and ethnicity: Polish migrants in London. Research report for the RES-000-22-1294 ESRC project. Guilford: University of Surrey.
11.
ElliottJ (2001) Referral hiring and ethnically homogeneous jobs: how prevalent is the connection and for whom?Social Science Research30(3): 401–425.
12.
EmilssonHMozetičK (2019) Intra-EU youth mobility, human capital and career outcomes: the case of young high-skilled Latvians and Romanians in Sweden. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies47: 1811–1828.
13.
European Integration Consortium (2009) Labour mobility within the EU in the context of enlargement and the functioning of the transitional arrangements. Final Report. European Integration Consortium, Nuremberg.
FavellA (2008) The new face of East-West migration in Europe. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies34(5): 701–716.
16.
FavellANebeTM (2009) Internal and external movers: East-West migration and the impact of the EU enlargement. In: RecchiEFavellA (eds) Pioneers of European Integration: Citizenship and Mobility in the EU. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 205–223.
17.
Felbo-KoldingJ (2018) Labour market integration: on the multiple dimensions of immigrant labour market integration. PhD Thesis, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen.
18.
Felbo-KoldingJLeschkeJSpreckelsenT (2019) A division of labour? Labour market segmentation by region of origin: the case of intra-EU migrants in the UK, Germany and Denmark. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies45(15): 2820–2843.
19.
FindlayAMcCollumD (2013) Recruitment and employment regimes: migrant labour channels in the UK’s rural agribusiness sector, from accession to recession. Journal of Rural Studies30: 10–19.
20.
FoxJEMoroşanuLSzilassyE (2015) Denying discrimination: status, ‘race’, and the whitening of Britain’s new Europeans. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies41(5): 729–748.
21.
FribergJHMidtbøenAH (2018) Ethnicity as skill: immigrant employment hierarchies in Norwegian low-wage labour markets. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies44(9): 1463–1478.
22.
FribergJHArnholtzJEldringL, et al. (2014) Nordic labour market institutions and new migrant workers: Polish migrants in Oslo, Copenhagen and Reykjavik. European Journal of Industrial Relations20(1): 37–53.
23.
Fries-TerschETugranTBradleyH (2017) 2016 Annual Report on Intra-EU Labour Mobility. Brussels: European Commission.
24.
GossJLindquistB (1995) Conceptualizing international labor migration: a structuration perspective. International Migration Review29(2): 317–351.
25.
GranovetterM (1995[1974]) Getting a Job: A Study of Contacts and Careers. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
26.
JohnstonRKhattabNManleyD (2015) East versus West? Over-qualification and earnings among the UK’s European migrants. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies41(2): 196–218.
27.
KaczmarczykPTyrowiczJ (2015) Winners and losers among skilled migrants: the case of post-accession Polish migrants to the UK. IZA discussion paper no. 9057. Bonn: Institute of Labor Economics.
28.
KingstonGMcGinnityFO’ConnellPJ (2015) Discrimination in the labour market: nationality, ethnicity and the recession. Work, Employment and Society29(2): 213–232.
29.
LeschkeJWeissS (2020) With a little help from my friends: social-network job search and overqualification among recent intra-EU migrants moving from East to West. Work, Employment and Society34(5): 769–788.
30.
LubbersMGijsbertsM (2016) Comparing the labour market position of Poles and Bulgarians before and after migration to the Netherlands. Comparative Migration Studies4: 22.
31.
LulleAJantaHANDEmilssonH (2021) Introduction to the special issue: European youth migration – human capital outcomes, skills and competences. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies47(8): 1725–1739.
32.
McCollumDFindlayA (2015) ‘Flexible’ workers for ‘flexible’ jobs? The labour market function of A8 migrant labour in the UK. Work, Employment and Society29(3): 427–443.
33.
MacKenzieRFordeC (2009) The rhetoric of the ‘good worker’ versus the realities of employers’ use and the experiences of migrant workers. Work, Employment and Society23(1): 142–159.
34.
MatthewsGRuhsM (2007) Are you being served? Employer demand for migrant labour in the UK’s hospitality sector. COMPAS working paper no. 51. Oxford: University of Oxford.
35.
MossPTillyC (2001) Stories Employers Tell: Race, Skill and Hiring in America. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
36.
NapierałaJFiałkowskaK (2013) Mapping the market for employment agencies in Poland. In: FribergJHEldringL (eds) Labour Migrants from Central and Eastern Europe in the Nordic Countries: Patterns of Migration, Working Conditions and Recruitment Practices. Copenhagen: Nordic Council of Ministers, 169−200.
37.
NielsenCP (2011) Immigrant over-education: evidence from Denmark. Journal of Population Economics24(2): 499–520.
38.
OrtliebRWeissS (2019) How do labor market intermediaries help young Eastern Europeans find work? In: O’ReillyJLeschkeJOrtliebR, et al. (eds) Youth Labor in Transition: Inequalities, Mobility, and Policies in Europe. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 443–460.
39.
PagerDShepherdH (2008) The sociology of discrimination: racial discrimination in employment, housing, credit, and consumer markets. Annual Review of Sociology34(1): 181–209.
40.
ParutisV (2011) White, European, and hardworking: East European migrants’ relationships with other communities in London. Journal of Baltic Studies42(2): 263–288.
41.
ParutisV (2014) Returning ‘home’: East European migrants’ discourses of return. International Migration52(5): 159–177.
42.
PioreM (1979) Birds of Passage: Migrant Labor in Industrial Societies. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press.
43.
PortesA (1995) Economic sociology and the sociology of immigration: a conceptual overview. In: PortesA (ed.) The Economic Sociology of Immigration: Essays on Networks, Ethnicity, and Entrepreneurship. New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1–41.
44.
RefslundB (2018) When strong unions meet precarious migrants: building trustful relations to unionise labour migrants in a high union-density setting. Economic and Industrial Democracy42: 314–335.
45.
RuhsMAndersonB (eds) (2012) Who Needs Migrant Workers? Labour Shortages, Immigration and Public Policy. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
46.
RyanL (2018) Differentiated embedding: Polish migrants in London − negotiating belonging over time. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies44(2): 233–251.
47.
RyanLSalesRTilkiM, et al. (2008) Social networks, social support and social capital: Polish migrants in London. Sociology42(4): 672–690.
48.
SamalukB (2016) Migrant workers’ engagement with labour market intermediaries in Europe: symbolic power guiding transnational exchange. Work, Employment and Society30(3): 455–471.
49.
SimkunasDPLund ThomsenT (2018) Precarious work? Migrants’ narratives of coping with working conditions in the Danish labour market. Central and Eastern European Migration Review7(2): 35–51.
50.
SnelEFaberMEngbersenG (2014) Civic stratification social positioning: CEE and labour migrants without a work permit. Population Space Place21(6): 518–534.
51.
StuvøyIAndersenSK (2013) Temporary staffing and labour migration to Denmark. In: FribergJHEldringL (eds) Labour Migrants from Central and Eastern Europe in the Nordic Countries: Patterns of Migration, Working Conditions and Recruitment Practices. Copenhagen: Nordic Council of Ministers, 231−271.
52.
TillyC (1998) Durable Inequality. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
53.
TurnerT (2010) The jobs immigrants do: issues of displacement and marginalisation in the Irish labour market. Work, Employment and Society24(2): 318–336.
54.
WaldingerRLichterM (2003) How the Other Half Works: Immigration and the Social Organization of Labor. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
