The role of age for labour market integration

It is well known that foreign-born persons in Sweden are employed to a much lesser extent than Swedish-born. Less well known is that the age of migrants can have an important impact on their ability to establish themselves on the labor market. This policy brief analyzes how the establishment of adult migrants in the labor market varies with age.

Has age amongst immigrants any effect on their labour market success? That question has largely been unanswered by Swedish as well as international scholars. The results of this Policy Brief show that the number of years taken to get a foothold in the Swedish labor market as a waged or salaried worker increases rapidly by age among immigrants from middle- and low-income countries aged 40 years or more. Most individuals who are born in middle- or low-income countries who immigrate after age 50 never get a foothold in the Swedish labor market.

Torun Österberg, assistant professor and senior lecturer in Social Work at Gothenburg university, is the author of the study and specialized in the field of immigration, education and integration at the labour market. The Delmi-study is based on an article Torun published in 2017 “Age at immigration matters for labor market integration – the Swedish example” in IZA Journal of Development and Migration, 2017, 7:1 together with two colleagues Björn Gustafsson and Hanna McInnes.

Policy Brief 2019:7 is only available in Swedish.

Picture by John Moeses Bauan.

The role of age for labour market integration

Download the policy brief (in Swedish)

Read the article in the IZA Journal of Development and Migration