Impact of monetary and non-monetary benefits and costs information on youth's preference for labor emigration in Nepal: A vignette experiment

What factors affect the youth's preference for labor emigration is one crucial question that needs to be answered in a remittance-dominated economy like Nepal. To address this question, how do five types of information, i.e., (i) monetary benefits, (ii) non-monetary benefits, (iii) monetary costs, (iv) non-monetary costs, and (v) employment tenure, affect preference for emigration was evaluated employing a vignette experiment with 1549 randomly selected high-school students in Kathmandu, Nepal. The information on monetary and non-monetary benefits increases the preference for labor emigration. In contrast, the information on non-monetary costs decreases the preference for labor emigration, while it is insensitive to the information on monetary costs. Lastly, the length of employment tenure does not significantly impact the preference for labor emigration. In addition, the subsample analyses reveal some clear evidence of heterogeneous effects of information across respondents' characteristics, such as gender, religion, and ethnicity. •Information on non-monetary benefits and monetary benefits increases the youth's preference for labor emigration.•Information on non-monetary costs decreases the youth's preference for labor emigration.•Length of employment tenure does not impact the preference significantly.•Non-monetary aspects of costs and benefits, which are often overlooked, must be shared with the prospective emigrants.