Intergenerational Transmission of Internal Migration, Social Mobility, and the Widening of Socio-Economic Inequalities

Aude Bernard , University of Queensland

This paper contends that internal migration exacerbates inequalities in the subsequent generation. This is because internal migration behaviour is intergenerationally transmitted but it has differential effects on lower and upper socio-economic groups. On the one hand, because internal migration is associated with occupational mobility and higher earnings, individuals exposed to internal migration early in life are likely to report better economic outcomes in adulthood. On the other hand, because the likelihood to migrate increases with education, children from lower socio-economic backgrounds are less likely to migrate. Thus, disadvantaged children could potentially face a ‘double whammy’ that exacerbates the reproduction of social inequalities throughout generations. This process could be reinforced by a decline in internal migration, which has been more pronounced among low-income earners. This means that children from lower socio-economic backgrounds are increasingly less likely to migrate, which is likely to bring down their level of migration in adulthood, which will reduce their chances of social mobility proportionally more children from higher socio-economic backgrounds. The paper testes these hypotheses using retrospective migration histories collected in 27 European countries as part of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe coupled with cross-sectional data from the European Labour Force Survey. Drawing on a series of regression models, the paper classifies European countries based on (1) the role of childhood internal migration in social mobility, (2) the relative exposure of children from low socio-economic backgrounds to internal migration and (3) long-term internal migration trends. This classification is then mapped against patterns and trends in inequalities to illuminate the socio-economic impact of internal migration.

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 Presented in Session 10. Internal Migration and Urbanization