ABSTRACT
The forms and meanings of migration vary greatly; the era, places and people need to be made explicit when we consider the migrant premium. Prevailing political conditions and attitudes, norms and laws are also relevant. The psychological and social concomitants of migration compound the economic premium; refugees, relatively poor or unskilled migrants and those with tenuous legal status, and – as I experienced in the 1950s – child migrants, are particularly vulnerable to exploitation. Legislation, regulations, some international agreements and efforts of supportive civil society organizations have eased difficulties in western democracies, but varying levels of the migrant premium are evident even there and much more so in most of the rest of the world.
