The Dynamics of Spatial Labor Mobility in the Netherlands

Abstract

The spatial mobility of labor changes over time. Both the general propensity to migrate and the spatial allocation of mobile people over regions of destination are characterized by important dynamic properties. This paper discusses several factors that may explain these dynamic properties of internal labor migration. We focus especially on the influence of labor market and housing conditions on the mobility of people. A two-stage, generation-allocation model is proposed to investigate the role of different factors in the explanation of aggregate interregional migration flows. This model is applied to recent data on interprovincial labor migration in the Netherlands. The results indicate that housing supply seems to be an important determinant of temporal developments of spatial mobility, and that also the conditions on national and regional labor markets are associated with specific properties of recent migration patterns.

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