New Light on the Remittances-Poverty-Health Nexus in Macedonia

International Migration © 2018 IOM Macedonia receives about 10 per cent of GDP as cash remittances per year while a third of the population faces poverty. The study aims to investigate whether remittances improve the poverty and health of individual remittance-receivers in Macedonia. To that end, we rely on the 2008 Remittances’ Survey and a sequential structural model linking remittances to social indicators. We find that remittances have a significant effect oto consumption, in particular health consumption, hence contribute to reducing poverty. In turn, improved health consumption significantly reduces the incidence of bad health among receivers. This finding lends support to the claim that remittances serve an informal social protection in Macedonia.