Using Brain Drain Migration to Induce Education Investment: An Experimental Investigation

在全球化的社會下，移民政策使得人才得以在國際間流動，影響各國的人力資本和經濟成長，因而成為相當重要的議題。本論文利用「最不努力賽局」〈或稱「最弱環節賽局」〉的實驗研究不同移民政策的效果，在此賽局中，個人的報酬決定於自己的努力程度和團體中的最低努力程度，因此成員間的協調便成為十分關鍵的因素，此特性可用以呈現出教育造成的外部性問題；且賽局中的多重均衡解，正對應到總體經濟模型中人力資本的多重均衡。我們發現當移民的機會和個人的相對努力程度有關時，會促進受試者間的合作，達到較有效率的均衡，即使在移民機會消失後，合作的狀況雖有減少，但仍有部分組別維持在較有效率的均衡上。然而，當沒有移民機會，或移民機會和個人的努力程度無關時，將難以促成成員間的合作，受試者的努力程度便快速下降，而處在最無效率的均衡。We investigate the effects of emigration with laboratory experiments by employing a “minimum effort” game, in which each person in a group chooses an effort level (investment in human capital), and payoffs are determined by one’s own effort and the lowest effort in the group. This game has multiple equilibria, resembling multiple equilibria with various levels of human capital in macroeconomic models, and illustrates the coordination problem created by the externalities of education level. We find that when subjects have a chance to migrate to a new group of one’s own after the first five rounds (in which one could perfectly coordinate at the highest effort level possible), groups could sustain high effort equilibria during those rounds if the probability of migration depends on relative effort levels (brain drain). Coordination drops in the later rounds, but some groups still coordinate on better equilibria than the worse one. On the other hand, we see effort levels drop to the lowest level when there is no migration possibility or when the chances of migration is independent of effort