INVESTIGATING THE GLOBAL PRODUCTIVITY EFFECTS OF HIGHLY
SKILLED LABOR MIGRATION: HOW IMMIGRANT ATHLETES
IMPACT OLYMPIC MEDAL COUNTS
Jonathan Horowitz, M.A. Candidate
Stephen R. McDaniel, Ph.D. University of Maryland, College Park
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LABOR MIGRATION Human Capital
Country A Country B
• More people than ever before live outside their country of birth (1 in 35 = 2.9%).
• More opportunities for workers beyond local borders.
• Academic attention since 1960s:
Early Research Stream: Determinants
Current Focus: Consequences/Productivity
Ref: Hewlett, 2002; Doyle, 2005; Kanbur & Rapoport, 2005
MEASURING THE CONSEQUENCES OF LABOR MIGRATION
• “Importers” vs. “Exporters” of knowledge (Oettl & Agrawal, 2008)
• Tracked flow of inventors and externality of patent citations across borders (found a 1.2-percent frequency of patent citations attributed to immigrant inventors)
• Data available to track aggregate migration patterns, but much more difficult to determine or measure productivity effects (Asis & Piper, 2008)
• Relatively few types and motivations for labor migration can be considered global (Global Commission on International Migration, 2005)
1) technology specialists; 2) senior academics; 3) health professionals; 4) teachers; 5) elite athletes
HIGHLY SKILLED LABOR MIGRATION
Sports are: � “economic (miniature) environments” (Torgler, 2009); � virtual laboratories to study skilled labor migration (Kahn, 2000)
Athletes as: � human capital (Shmanske, 1992); � export of raw materials (Poli, 2006) à “brawn drain” (Wharton, 2004)
The Summer Olympics:
• One of the largest and most global sports business venues
• Substantial resources devoted to pursuit of Olympic medals (e.g. £93,000 per year + an additional £70,000 per year for medal contenders = £10 million per medal)
OLYMPIC MEDALS AS A METRIC OF GLOBAL PRODUCTIVITY
� Economic studies for production functions of medals (Johnson & Ali, 2004; Rathke & Woitek, 2008)
Medals = α + β1GDP + β2GDP2 + β3POPULATION + β4POPULATION2 + β5HOST+ β6NEIGHBOR + ΣβjPOLITICSj
(for j=7, …, 10 for monarchy, single-party, military, or other
political system when compared to republic/democracy)
What about external factors?
� Hilvoorde, Elling & Stokvis (2010) suggest (but do not measure) that medals won by immigrant athletes contribute to new country’s medal total à competitive organizational advantage
Nastia Liukin Russia à
United States
“Desire for a better life outside
of sports”
Becky Hammon United States à
Russia
“Desire to compete”
Natasa Janics Serbia à Hungary
“Desire to win”
Angel Popov/ Said Saif Asaad
Bulgaria à Qatar
“Desire for money”
LABOR MIGRATION IN THE OLYMPICS • Voluntary migration is motivated by better opportunities, rational individual choice and utility maximization (Hewlett, 2002)
• Motivations for labor migration in the Olympics are similar to those in other skilled labor industries
Typology 1 Typology 2 Typology 3 Typology 4
ATHLETE LABOR MIGRATION POLICY ISSUES
• In 2004 IOC president Jacques Rogge raised concerns about the presence of labor migration in the Olympics.
• Nations have been resistant (e.g. Nikolai Peshalov from Bulgaria to Croatia for $100,000)
• Athletes have a limited time frame to capitalize on their talent unlike other highly skilled professions.
• The IOC does not track and no study has ever quantified labor migration in the Olympics.
CURRENT STUDY Medal-Winning Athlete
Country of Birth Country of Competition
Athletes who have migrated from their country of birth and captured a medal at the 2000, 2004 and 2008 Summer Olympics
for a different country
RESEARCH QUESTIONS
Research Question 1: What are the global productivity effects (Olympic medals) of highly skilled foreign-born labor (non-native Olympic athletes) in the 21st century? Research Question 2: After controlling for other variables that have been shown to be related to medal productivity for countries in the Olympics, what role does labor migration play?
METHOD: DATA SOURCE • Summer Games in 2000, 2004 and 2008
• More than 10,000 participants from at least 200 countries or territories
• However no single database provides readily available information that accounts for migration of athletes.
• A new database has been constructed because the IOC does not keep track of athletes’ birthplaces.
• Focus on medal winners (approximately 1,800 in each Games)
• Step-by-step process to construct dataset
METHOD: UNIT OF ANALYSIS • Immigrant medal-winning athletes are counted by country and continent (Agergaard, 2008; Poli, 2006)
• Productivity in terms of medals (Oettl & Agrawal, 2008)
• “Importers” = net gain • “Exporters” = net loss
EXAMPLE: Singapore’s 2008 women’s table tennis team that won a silver medal, ending the country’s 48-year medal drought. Every member was born in China (Source: China Daily).
RESULTS: HIGHLY SKILLED LABOR MIGRATION
Table 1. Immigrant Medal-Winning Athletes in the Olympics
Year Total Medal-
Winning
Athletes
Immigrant
Medal-Winning
Athletes
Percent
2000 1785 100 5.6%a
2004 1840 116 6.3%a
2008 1874 92 4.9%a
NOTE: a denotes proportions that are statistically significantly (p<.001) different from the world’s international migrant population of 2.9 percent
Review: Global Commission for International Migration, 2005
RESULTS: PRODUCTIVITY EFFECTS OF HIGHLY SKILLED LABOR MIGRATION
Table 2. The Productivity Effects of Immigrant Olympic Medal Winners
Year Total Medals Immigrant
Medals
Percent
2000 927 98 10.6%a
2004 929 103 11.1%a
2008 958 91 9.5%a
NOTE: a denotes proportions that are statistically significantly (p<.001) different from the frequency of patent citations attributed to immigrant inventors of 1.2 percent
Review: Oettl & Agrawal, 2008
RESULTS: PRODUCTIVITY EFFECTS
Significant Variables
Model 1 Model 2 Model 1 Model 2 Model 1 Model 2
PopulaDon .33** .33*** .37** .39** .29* .29*
GDP .28** .18 .31** .20 .29** .17
Labor MigraDon
.32** .38*** .32***
Total R2 .27 .38 .22 .34 .37 .46
Change in R2
.09** .12*** .09***
2000 (N = 78) 2004 (N = 72) 2008 (N = 85)
Model 1: ReplicaDon of other studies predicDng medal totals (Johnson & Ali, 2004; Rathke & Woitek, 2008) Model 2: Add “Labor MigraDon” variable classifying whether a medal-‐winning naDon is an “Importer” (Oe^l
& Agrawal, 2008) Beta Values; *p<.05; **p<.01; ***p<.001
• But GDP increases probability of classifying as an “Importer” nation
GDP à Labor Migration à Increased Productivity (seen with academics, health professionals, technology, …)
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RESULTS: LABOR IMPORTATION EFFECTS
Figure 1.
IMPLICATIONS: THEORETICAL
• Adds to labor migration literature by quantifying labor migration’s effect on productivity from a global perspective (Asis & Piper, 2008; Oettl & Agrawal, 2008).
• Finds a higher level of labor migration frequency within a highly skilled skilled context than the world’s international migrant population (Global Commission on International Migration, 2005).
• Adds to medal literature by suggesting labor migration’s influence (Johnson & Ali, 2004; Rathke & Woitek, 2008).
IMPLICATIONS: APPLIED
• First known work to study labor migration patterns and productivity in the context of arguably the largest, oldest and most global example of sports business, the Summer Olympics.
• Inform rational policymaking for the world’s largest sports business organization (e.g. co-governance between governments and IOC and NOC NGOs).
• Shows potential for reliance on foreign-born labor for productivity (such as seen in other industries) and the implications that has for domestic program development.
LIMITATIONS AND FUTURE RESEARCH • Potentially endogenous relationship between immigration and productivity (Oettl & Agrawal, 2008).
• Data limitations despite sport’s potential for analyzing economic phenomena (Asis & Piper, 2008).
• Develop dataset that accounts for timing and distinguishes motivations for migration.
• Extend to other Olympic years for historical perspective of highly skilled labor migration productivity effects.
• Extend to other sports for broader understanding of labor migration’s influence on the sports entertainment industry and one of the most global institutions.
THANK YOU.
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Thrill of victory
Agony of defeat
OR
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