Is citizenship enough? Argentinians in the Spanish labour market

Alicia Maguid, Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas - Universidad Nacional de Luján
Rosana Martínez, Universidad Nacional de Luján

The increase of Latin American immigrants in Spain since the second half of the past decade, takes place in a migration context characterised by the acceleration, diversification of origins, and the increasing irregular status of their residence. Also there is a growing presence of those born in Argentina who, even lower in intensity, increased four times the volume between 1998 and 2006. This situation is connected to the most important changes which have taken place in the emigration patterns of the Argentinean population which are: the increase of flows and the diversification of destinations, due to the fact that at present, besides the United States, which used to be the main host, Spain and other European countries are chosen as destinations. One characteristic of this universe is its increasing heterogeneity regarding its social and educational composition. In this paper what is being analysed is the role played by the possession of Spanish citizenship in the access to work and type of occupational insertion of the Argentinean-born in the Spanish labour market, controlling other associated attributes such as age, sex, length of migration and educational achievement. Apart from examining the types of labour insertion and gaps in relation to the Spanish population, multivaried techniques are applied for considering simultaneously the effect of the variables that influence on these, and to identify the contribution of each factor and, of the “nationality” factor in particular. Special attention is paid to the differentiated situation of males and females. The group under study meets a set of indispensable requirements for developing the adopted approach due to the fact that it is heterogeneous enough concerning citizenship, length of residence, education and age. We expect that the results contribute to the knowledge of this phenomenon that is still important for Argentina and for the host country.