SOAS Research Online

Abstract

In this paper, we explore the fiscal impact of immigrants in Europe applying a quantile regression approach to data from the European Survey on Living Conditions (EU-SILC) for the period 2007-2015. Our estimations show that not only on average but also in almost all income quantiles, the fiscal position of both European and non-European migrants is not significantly different from that of native citizens. Furthermore, non-EU migrants are net contributors as compared to the corresponding native citizens in the Netherlands and Belgium for various quantiles. Lastly, we examine the link between migrants’ fiscal position and the fiscal perception of native European citizens measured using ESS data. We find a conflicting relationship: countries where migrants are perceived negatively are instead countries where they are net fiscal contributors and vice versa.