This dissertation includes three essays focusing on the relationships among human
capital, family composition and international migration. The evidence from MexicoU.S.
migration supports my hypotheses.
The first essay demonstrates that migration experience increases return migrants’
earnings in the home country on the condition that the migration stay is sufficiently
long and mostly uninterrupted. Migration is widely viewed as an investment in human
capital. However, due to the imperfect transferability of skills and knowledge
across countries, migration trips are also career interruptions, especially for return
migrants who may meanwhile experience depreciation of home country-specific skills.