THE SOCIAL-ASSIMILATION OF IMMIGRANTS

Although there is some considerable empirical research on the economic assimilation of migrants to the labor markets of the host countries, little or no analysis exists on the social assimilation and integratio n of migrant workers. This is surprising since the integration of migr ants is not only of political importance, but it should strongly inter act with their economic behavior. This paper provides an empirical ana lysis of the determinants of migrants' integration, using data for Ger many. Ordered probit models are estimated, where the dependent variabl e is an ordered response on the feeling of national identity. The resu lts show that personal characteristics, the nationality and the family context affect the migrant's integration, while labor market variable s appear to be quite unimportant.