Department of Economics Working Papers,
Vienna University of Economics and Business, Department of Economics

Abstract: This paper proposes a method to study the relationship between voters' attitudes towards immigration and the educational attainment of immigrants and their children, and applies it to Austrian data. We measure attitudes towards immigration using data on political parties' positions regarding immigration and the share of votes that each party received at the regional level. We then study the educational attainment and intergenerational educational mobility of immigrants who grew up in the regions whose political environment we observe. Preliminary results for Aus- tria suggest that, surprisingly, better attitudes towards migration are associated with lower educational attainment for immigrants. However, immigrants are more likely than their native peers to obtain more education than their parents. Here, the returns to more positive attitudes towards immigration play a large role in explaining the mobility gap across migration background.

Keywords: educational attainment, immigration, voting behaviour, social attitudes

JEL-codes: I24; J15; I21; D72 July 2019

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