Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/171167 
Year of Publication: 
2017
Series/Report no.: 
Oldenburg Discussion Papers in Economics No. V-401-17
Publisher: 
University of Oldenburg, Department of Economics, Oldenburg
Abstract: 
Immigration is a crucial issue in contemporary politics, and attitudes towards immigration are highly dispersed in many countries. We treat individuals' immigration friendliness (IF) as a feature of their self-image or identity and hypothesize that, similar to other pro-social self-images, greater immigration friendliness is associated with greater subjective well-being (SWB). We further hypothesize that greater disparity of immigration attitudes yields social antagonism and as such is associated with less SWB. Finally, we hypothesize that greater disparity of immigration attitudes permits immigration-friendly individuals to differentiate themselves from others, thus raising the SWB benefit of holding an immigration-friendly self- image. Using 225,356 observations from 35 European countries, 2002-2015, we find evidence consistent with the hypotheses stated above. A 1-standard-deviation (SD) increase in IF is associated with an increase in 11-point life satisfaction (LS) by 0.15 to 0.32 points, whereas a 1-SD increase in attitude disparity is associated with a decrease in LS by 0.05 to 0.11 points.
Subjects: 
immigration
attitudes
identity
antagonism
social conflict
subjective well-being
JEL: 
I31
D74
D63
Z13
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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