Geographical labour mobility: Migration or commuting?

In this paper, we examine how individual labour market status and spatial variations in employment opportunities influence interregional job search behaviour and mobility decisions in Sweden. The econometric analysis is based on 290,000 individual observations and refers to the years 1994-95. The empirical results show that the probability of interregional labour mobility unexpectedly decreases with the accessibility to employment opportunities in neighbouring regions. As expected, the findings reveal that accessibility to job openings in surrounding regions significantly increases the likelihood of choosing commuting as the mobility mode. Moreover, the empirical findings indicate that individual unemployment experience increases the likelihood of mobility as well as migration.