Mihaela Simionescu

Institute for Economic Forecasting of the Romanian Academy

Romania

mihaela_mb1@yahoo.com

Macroeconomic    determinants

of permanent emigration from Romania. A Bayesian approach

 Abstract. The aim of this research is to identify some macroeconomic determinants for permanent emigration from Romania, in order to alleviate the negative consequences of this phenomenon in the origin country of the emigrates. For identifying the most relevant macroeconomic factors explaining the growth in the number of emigrants, the stochastic search variable selection was applied for various acceptance probabilities. Low increases in real earnings and the growth in poverty headcount ratio at $3.10 a day encouraged Romanian people to permanently leave the country in the period 1991-2014 in order to improve their life conditions. Moreover, the taxes on income, profit and capital also created considerable pressure. On the other hand, unemployment was not felt as a crucial problem for emigrants. The economic policies should focus on the solutions aimed specifically at diminishing poverty.

Received: December, 2015

1st Revision: January, 2016

Accepted: May, 2016

DOI: 10.14254/2071-

8330.2016/9-2/13

JEL Classification: C40, C51, J68

Keywords: emigration, poverty, earnings, stochastic search variable selection