Undesired Properties of the European Commission's Refugee Distribution Key

European Union Politics, May 2016

ETH Zurich: Negotiation and Conflict Management Research Paper No. 15-03

32 Pages Posted: 17 Nov 2015 Last revised: 14 Jul 2016

Date Written: November 20, 2015

Abstract

The European Commission has proposed a refugee distribution key, which yields respective quotas for EU/EFTA member states. It is based on four quantities: GDP, population, asylum applications per capita in the past, and unemployment rates. We show that the given distribution key has properties which contradict the European Commission’s intentions. Exemplarily, states with low (high) unemployment may experience a lower (higher) quota when unemployment is taken into account compared to when it is not. These deviations are single-digit percentages. As a remedy, we propose an alternative distribution key, which avoids the undesired properties. It is modeled in the spirit of the European Commission’s proposal and is based on the same four quantities. Deviations between the two distribution keys are up to two-digit percentages.

Keywords: refugee crisis, crisis relocation mechanism, burden-sharing, distribution key, European Commission, Dublin III Regulation, negotiation

JEL Classification: F22, F51, K37, O15

Suggested Citation

Grech, Philip, Undesired Properties of the European Commission's Refugee Distribution Key (November 20, 2015). European Union Politics, May 2016, ETH Zurich: Negotiation and Conflict Management Research Paper No. 15-03, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2691112 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2691112

Philip Grech (Contact Author)

ETH Zürich ( email )

Weinbergstrasse 56/58
WEV K513
Zurich, 8092
Switzerland

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