17 background. Finally, given the considerable spatial heterogeneity across Albania, we incorporate in our models indicator variables for household regional location.

# **5. Results**

Since ordered probit regression coefficients do not provide us with direct interpretations of the impact of regressors on the probability of choice, we report in Tables 5 and 6 the marginal effects on the likelihood of being in each category of occupational mobility for Models 1 and 2, respectively.<sup>11</sup> Both tables are divided into two panels where the top panel displays only the marginal effects of our migration variables prior to the employment of the IV approach. Table 5 indicates that the impact of an infinitesimal change in the probability of being a return migrant on the likelihood of exhibiting upward occupational mobility of any degree is positive and statistically significant. The opposite is true concerning the categories of downward mobility and immobility.<sup>12</sup> In Table 6, where we differentiate the impact based on country of destination, it seems that the positive effect of the covariate of interest on upward mobility is driven by past migration experience in ITB, as being a return migrant from Greece is not associated with any of the mobility outcomes. This finding supports the hypothesis that the earnings potential of Albanian migrants in Greece is relatively lower than in countries further afield, and that migrants may take advantage of fewer opportunities for skill acquisition.<sup>13</sup> 11 The coefficient estimates for Models 1 and 2 are available upon request.

12 To test the robustness of our results, we estimated both models with a dependent variable that is the collapsed version of the one employed here. The variable was equal to -1 for any individual that experienced any degree of downward mobility; 0 for those that did not experience any occupational mobility; and 1 for any individual that experienced any degree of upward occupational mobility. The results indicated the positive impact of past migration experience, particularly in Italy and beyond, on the likelihood of upward occupational mobility. Moreover, since our occupational categories are aggregations of major occupational groups and essentially three-digit occupation codes, the direction of mobility for a particular individual may have been different if we had conducted our analysis using a less aggregated occupational categories. In this respect, we ranked the 9 (single-digit) major occupational groups using the same methodology employed by Sicherman and Galor (1990), where individuals in the not working category received a ranking of 1. The rankings of the major occupational groups are presented in Table A5. Estimating Models 1 and 2 based on these rankings and with a dependent variable ranging from -9 to 9 yield results that are qualitatively similar to those reported here. Lastly, we estimated Models 1 and 2 after (i) excluding handicapped individuals and students from the estimation sample, (ii) marginally increasing the age floor to 16, 17 or 18, (iii) including only the individuals that were employed initially, (iv) excluding those that initially held high skilled white collar occupations (as downward mobility or lack of occupational mobility are the only options for them over time), and (v) simultaneously imposing all restrictions in (i)-(iv). Our conclusions concerning the impact of past migration experience on occupational mobility did not change following these alterations in the estimation sample. The results from all robustness checks are available upon request.

13 Through proxy respondents, the ALSMS05 also collected data on household members that are currently migrating abroad. The comparisons of employed migrants in the age group of [15,64] in both locations indicate that over 20 percent of employed Albanians residing in Greece are involved in agriculture while the comparable figure is just 8