Remittances and Business Cycles in North Macedonia: A Reliable Relationship?

Abstract

Workers' remittances are often argued to have a tendency to move countercyclically with the GDP in recipient countries since migrant workers are expected to remit and support more during downturn cycles of economic activity back home. This paper aims to analyze the behavior of remittances during the recent Covid-19 pandemic crisis, and the response they gave during the downturn in business cycles during that period. In general, the results tend to be country-specific and show that, for some migration and remittance corridors, remittances are counter-cyclical while, for others, they are pro-cyclical, and for this reason we will try to study the behavior of remittances in North Macedonia in recent years with a focus on the recent crisis, to see their procyclical or countercyclical nature. By combining descriptive analysis with regression models, the findings point clearly toward a predominantly procyclical pattern, especially with respect to economic conditions in the European Union—the main host region for Macedonian migrants.

Keywords: business cycles, North Macedonia, countercyclical hypothesis, migrant transfers, external vulnerability, EU economic conditions.

JEL Classification: F240; F220;

DOI: 10.7176/JESD/17-1-03

Publication date: January 30^th 2026