Do domestic immigrants live longer? An approach for estimating the life expectancy of small populations
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.59670/ml.v16i3.644Keywords:
Migration, Northeast Youth, North East Region, Metropolitan cities, Racialization, Discriminatory Prejudice, Othering, Diversity policyAbstract
Ageing is a major demographic issue for the world of the 21st century and is caused by substantial declines in fertility and mortality rates. Without international migration, most developed countries would not be able to balance the resulting losses of population and work force. The proportion of elderly (aged 65 and over) in Taiwan reached the threshold of 7%, indicating an ageing society, in 1993, and has been increasing dramatically since then. The county-level populations in Taiwan are also ageing rapidly, but the local changes vary widely because domestic migration rates of each county are different. Urbanization is becoming more obvious, with people tending to move to large cities and counties with better social welfare programs. As a result, domestic migration plays an important role in population ageing at the county level, and the people in counties with larger numbers of domestic immigrants are expected to have a longer life expectancy. However, the life expectancies of people in these counties do not bear out this trend. In the present study, based on domestic migration records from the Department of the Interior of Taiwan, we applied graduation methods and small-area estimation skills to construct county-level life tables, and evaluate whether domestic immigrants have lower mortality rates than those who do not migrate. We found that the domestic immigrants of Kinmen County have significantly lower mortality rates, but those of Hsinchu County do not.
Metrics
References
Andersson G. and Drefahl S. (2015). "Long-distance migration and mortality in Sweden: testing the salmon bias and healthy migrant hypotheses". Research Reports in Demography, Stockholm University, http://www.suda.su.se/SRRD/SRRD_2015_6.pdf.
Barrett A. and McCarthy Y. (2008). "Immigrants and welfare programmes: exploring the interaction between immigrants characteristics, immigrant welfare dependence and welfare policy". Oxford Review of Economic Policy, 24(3): 542-59.
https://doi.org/10.1093/oxrep/grn026
Black D.A., Sanders S.D., Taylor E.J., and Taylor L.J. (2015). "The impact of the great migration on mortality of African Americans: evidence from the deep south". American Economic Review, 105 (2): 477-503.
https://doi.org/10.1257/aer.20120642
Bostean G. (2013). "Does selective migration explain the Hispanic paradox? A comparative analysis of Mexicans in the U.S. and Mexico". Journal of immigrant and minority health, 15(3): 624-35.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10903-012-9646-y
Chang H., Hu Y.W, Yue C.S., Wen Y.W., Yeh W.T., Hsu L.S., Tsai S.Y., and Pan W.H. (2006). "Effect of potassium-enriched salt on cardiovascular mortality of elderly men". American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 83: 1289-1296.
https://doi.org/10.1093/ajcn/83.6.1289
Chort I., De Vreyer P., and Zuber T. (2017). "Gendered internal migration patterns in Senegal". https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01497824/document.
Franzini L., Ribble, J.C., and Keddie, A.M. (2001). "Understanding the Hispanic paradox". Ethnicity and Disease, 11: 496-518.
Garcia M.A., Valderrama-Hinds L.M., Chiu, C.T., Mutambudzi M.S., Chen N.W., and Raji M. (2017). "Age of migration life expectancy with functional limitations and morbidity in Mexican Americans". Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, 65(7): 1591-1596.
https://doi.org/10.1111/jgs.14875
Gavrilov L.A. and Gavrilova N.S. (2013). "Determinants of exceptional human longevity: new ideas and findings". Vienna Yearbook of Population Research, 11: 295-323.
https://doi.org/10.1553/populationyearbook2013s295
Giulietti C. and Wahba J. (2013). "Welfare migration". In: Constant AF, Zimmermann KF (eds.) International Handbook on the Economics of Migration, Edward Elgar Publishing, Cheltenham, UK, Northampton, US, 489-504.
https://doi.org/10.4337/9781782546078.00036
Goldman N. (2016). "Will the Latino mortality advantage endure?". Research on Aging, 38(3): 263-282. doi:10.1177/0164027515620242.
https://doi.org/10.1177/0164027515620242
Hayward M.D., Hummer R.A., and Chiu C.T., González-González C., Wong R. (2014). "Does the Hispanic paradox in U.S. adult mortality extend to disability?". Population Research and Policy Review, 33: 81-96. Doi:10.1007/s11113-013-9312-7.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11113-013-9312-7
Johnson J.E. and Taylor E.J. (2012). "Does moving kill? The effect of migration on older-age mortality". Retrieved from http://harris.uchicago.edu/sites/default/files/johnson_taylor_oct15.pdf .
Kibele E. and Janssen F. (2013). "Distortion of regional old-age mortality due to late-life migration in the Netherlands". Demographic Research, 29(5):105-132.
https://doi.org/10.4054/DemRes.2013.29.5
Kibele E., Scholz R., and Shkolnikov V. (2008). "Low migrant mortality in Germany for men aged 65 and older: fact or artifact?". Eur J Epidemiol, 23: 389-393.
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10654-008-9247-1
Lee R.D. and Carter L.R. (1992). "Modeling and forecasting US mortality". Journal of the American Statistical Association, 87(419): 659-671.
https://doi.org/10.1080/01621459.1992.10475265
Lee W.J. (2003). "A partial SMR approach to smoothing age-specific rates". Annals of Epidemiology, 13(2): 89-99.
https://doi.org/10.1016/S1047-2797(02)00266-1
Lewis E.B. (1982). "Control of body segment differentiation in Drosophila by the bithorax gene complex". In Embryonic Development, Part A: Genetics Aspects. Edited by M. M. Burger and R. Weber. Alan R. Liss, New York, 269-288.
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-8981-9_15
London R.L. (1985). Graduation: The Revision of Estimates. ACTEX Publication.
Markides K.S. and Eschbach K. (2005). "Aging, migration, and mortality: current status of research on the Hispanic paradox". The Journals of Gerontology. Series B, Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences, 68-75.
https://doi.org/10.1093/geronb/60.Special_Issue_2.S68
McKay L., Macintyre S., and Ellaway A. (2003) "Migration and health: A review of the international literature". MRC Social & Public Health Sciences Unit Occasional Paper. Retrieved from http://www.msoc-mrc.gla.ac.uk.
McKinnish T. (2005). "Importing the poor: welfare magnetism and cross-border welfare migration". Journal of Human Resources, 40(1): 57-76.
https://doi.org/10.3368/jhr.XL.1.57
Meyer B.D. (1998). "Do the poor move to receive higher welfare benefits?". JCPR Working Papers 58, Northwestern University/University of Chicago Joint Center for Poverty Research.
Morokvašić M. (2014). "Gendering migration". Migracijske i Etničke Teme, 31 (3): 355-378.
https://doi.org/10.11567/met.30.3.4
Ng E. (2011). "The healthy immigrant effect and mortality rates". Health Reports, 22: 25-29.
Norredam M., Olsbjerg M., Petersen J.H., Juel K., Krasnik A. (2012). "Inequalities in mortality among refugees and immigrants compared to native Danes - a historical prospective cohort study". BMC Public Health, 12(757): 1-9.
https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-12-757
Ott J.J., Paltiel A.M., Becher H., (2009). "Noncommunicable disease mortality and life expectancy in immigrants to Israel from the former Soviet Union: country of origin compared with host country". Bull. World Health Organ, 87: 20-29.
https://doi.org/10.2471/BLT.07.045138
Palloni A. and Arias, E. (2004). "Paradox lost: explaining the Hispanic adult mortality advantage". Demography, 41: 385-415.
https://doi.org/10.1353/dem.2004.0024
Poulain M. (2011). "Exceptional longevity in Okinawa: A plea for in-depth validation". Demographic Research 25 (7): 245−284. DOI:10.4054/DemRes.2011.25.7.
https://doi.org/10.4054/DemRes.2011.25.7
Poulain M., Herm A., Pes G. (2013). "The Blue Zones: areas of exceptional longevity around the world". Vienna Yearbook of Population Research, 11: 87-108.
https://doi.org/10.1553/populationyearbook2013s87
Poulain M., Pes G., Grasland C., Carru C., Ferrucci L., Baggio G., Franceschi C., and Deiana L. (2004). "Identification of geographic area characterized by extreme longevity in the Sardinia island: the AKEA study". Experimental Gerontology, Elsevier, 39(9):1423-1429.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.exger.2004.06.016
Preston S.H. and Elo I.T. (2014). "Anatomy of a municipal triumph: New York city's upsurge in life expectancy". Population and Development Review, 40(1):1-29.
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1728-4457.2014.00648.x
Singh G.K. and Miller B. A. (2004). "Health, life expectancy, and mortality patterns among immigrant populations in the United States". Canadian Journal of Public Health, 95(3), 114-21.
Thomson E.F., Nuru-Jeter A., Richardson D., Raza F., and Minkler M. (2013). "The Hispanic paradox and older adults' disabilities: is there a healthy migrant effect?". International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 10(5): 1786-814.
https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph10051786
Wallace M., Kulu H. (2014). "Low immigrant mortality in England and Wales: a data artefact? ". Social Science & Medicine, 120:100-109.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2014.08.032
Wang H.C., Jin S., and Yue J.C. (2012). "A simulation study of small area mortality projection". Journal of Population Studies, 45: 77-110. (In Chinese).
Wang H.C., Yue C.J. and Chong C.T. (2018). "Mortality models and longevity risk for small populations". Insurance Mathematics and Economics, 78, 351-359.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.insmatheco.2017.09.020
Willcox D.C., Willcox B.J., He Q., Wang N., and Suzuki M. (2008). "They really are that old: a validation study of centenarian prevalence in Okinawa". Journal of Gerontology: Biological Sciences, 63A (4), 338-349.
https://doi.org/10.1093/gerona/63.4.338
Yucesahin M.M. and Yazgan P. (2017). Revisiting Gender and Migration. Transnational Press London.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
CC Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0
