In modern times, the incentives to move across international borders remain huge, and migration has continued to narrow differences between the haves and the have-nots when international labor markets have been permitted to function. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, the scope for further gains from migration remains large. Despite incentives to move, surviving restrictions on international labor markets limit the prospect of the migration mechanism for improving working conditions around the world. Even a modest relaxation of migration barriers would produce large gains.

Robert Flanagan
Stanford University
Globalization and Labor Conditions, 2007