New paper on remittances

Ezra Rosser of American University in Washington DC has just posted a new paper on Remittances, (http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1107485), forthcoming in the Connecticut Law Review.  The abstract follows:

Remittances, the sending of money from immigrants back to their home countries, are the newest anti-poverty, development activity of the poor to be applauded by international institutions and economists. Exceeding foreign aid and private investment to many developing countries, remittances are being hailed as a new, untapped resource with powerful poverty alleviation and potentially development attributes. After presenting the poverty, developmental, and economic characteristics of this new transnational connection between immigrants and their loved ones, as well as the dangerous effects of excessive remittance regulation, this paper argues that remittances should be understood as an anti-poverty tool, but not as a route to development.

       -TG